Tevi Troy is a national treasure. A presidential historian and former White House aide, every few years he emerges out of nowhere with yet another book on an as yet unexplored area of presidential history. He’s done it again with his unique look at the intersection of political and financial power throughout American history.
After exploring areas like presidents and pop culture, presidents and disasters, and White House infighting, Troy has come out with another timely, ripped-from-the-headlines book on American presidents, this time focusing on the relationships between presidents and chief executive officers (CEOs) of major corporations – The Power and the Money: The Epic Clashes Between Commanders in Chief and Titans of Industry.
CEOs have been part of the American landscape since John D. Rockefeller and Troy naturally starts with him. In the 1870s, Rockefeller built a massive empire by standardizing the product in the fledgling and volatile oil business. (Hence the name “Standard Oil,” as Troy helpfully points out, one of many “I didn’t know that!” moments in the book.)
Rockefeller built his empire with little government interference. There were no laws or regulatory bodies at the time that could have interfered. But Rockefeller’s very success led to the mechanisms that would break up his own company, and constrain future CEOs going forward.
As Rockefeller garnered more and more attention and became increasingly unpopular— at one point he had to sleep with a revolver under his pillow— citizens and politicians alike began clamoring for the government to do something about him and his empire. Congress passed the Sherman Antitrust act in 1890, and in the first decade of the 20th century Teddy Roosevelt went on his trust-busting crusade. In 1909, the federal government broke up Standard Oil. Rockefeller had retired and Roosevelt was no longer president, but the breakup established a paradigm for governmental oversight of corporate activities, something that has grown immensely since the passage of the Sherman Antitrust Act. In a helpful appendix, Troy shows the growth of government regulation and oversight bodies over the period in question, which is a useful visual demonstrating the degree to which CEOs increasingly have to take government into account.
After Rockefeller, the book continues to profile high-level CEOs from key American industries: banking, automotive, entertainment, media, and high tech. Troy organizes the book by period, so the chapter on the Great Depression, for example, will include not only Henry Ford’s and TIME’s Henry Luce’s clashes with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, but also the Warner Brothers’ collaborations with Roosevelt, as well as a coda on Rockefeller, who died during Roosevelt era.
The Luce section is particularly interesting. He may be less well-known than some of the other CEOs profiled, but had a long and fascinating career, not only establishing the concept of national news, but also both befriending some presidents — Dwight Eisenhower — while creating lasting enmity with others — Roosevelt. Interestingly, as Troy points out, neither enmity with Roosevelt nor friendship with Eisenhower served Luce’s interests, as having a president as an enemy can obviously be harmful, but being too cozy with a president could also damage reputations, as it did to Luce’s beloved magazine. Luce’s too-cozy relationship with Eisenhower led the intelligentsia to be dismissive of TIME, telling jokes like “TIME was even-handed during election years: Half the time it praised the Republicans, and half the time it damned the Democrats.”
Speaking of jokes, in another appendix, Troy assembles jokes told by and about CEOs over the period in question. These range from the kind of jokes Henry Ford would tell as icebreakers in meetings with President Woodrow Wilson, as well as jokes about Mark Zuckerberg that date to the current day. Incurring this century-and-a-half long period, Troy shows a variety of different relationships with presidents and CEOs, allowing leaders to compare and contrast which strategies worked better than others. In this way, the book would be particularly useful for CEOs and all corporate executives, or their consultants, for trying to figure out ways to navigate Washington at a time when Washington has more power over what they do than ever before.
Troy’s original look at the presidency will help the reader understand the ways in which government and business have become increasingly enmeshed over the years. Despite the many interesting conflicts Troy describes, what seems to have occurred in recent years is that these big corporations increasingly see themselves at the service of the government and recognize that if they run afoul of presidents, or bureaucrats at any level, it will cause nothing but trouble for their companies. In this way, they work together to impose the goals of the ruling class on all of us, using both public and private sector power to make it happen. It’s a disturbing message in the midst of a fascinating read. I’m looking forward to seeing what aspect of the presidency Troy covers next. “The Power and the Money” is a must-read in the interim.
