Taft Domestic Policies
William Howard Taft was elected president of the United States in 1908 as a Republican in the swashbuckling vein of the popular Theodore Roosevelt. However, his lack of personal passion and eventual inability to stand up to big business interests would stymie his domestic agenda.
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Features
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Although he was viewed as a failure as a reformer in the eyes of many because of his inability or unwillingness to enact sweeping changes, Taft did share an interest in blocking monopolistic business practices with his predecessor Roosevelt. However, criticism from conservative business leaders led him to severely tone down his "trust busting" actions.
Significance
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Twice as many monopolistic trusts were broken up during the Taft administration as were under Roosevelt including the completion of action against Standard Oil and American Tobacco that started during the Roosevelt administration. However, Roosevelt accused Taft of going too far in attempting to break up U.S. Steel and Taft backed off of his pursuit of trust busting after 1911.
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Effects
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Taft's failed attempts to enact new procedures that would allow the president to directly submit a budget to Congress was blocked legislatively. However, this attempt would foreshadow the successful implementation of the Budget and Accounting Act of 1921, which created the concept of the executive budget and gave the executive branch additional control over budgetary manners.
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