ABSTRACT
The historical roots of the term 'lobby' can be sourced back as far as 1640 and refer to the place where the British public would go to speak to their Member of the House of Commons. The United States has its own mythology of the origination of the term – tracking it back to the nineteenth century and the pestering of President Grant in the reception of the Willard Hotel by 'those damn lobbyists'. In the nineteenth century the UK wrestled with the enormous opportunities and problems brought by industrialisation and accelerated urbanisation. The political establishment was packed with landed gentry keen on protecting their age old rights and privileges, and there was also an emergent self-made business class seeking to press selfish interests of its own. Across the Atlantic, the United States had a different tradition. Famous philanthropists such as Andrew Carnegie, John Rockefeller certainly left large charitable legacies, but their approach to business conduct was much less progressive.
