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In the period after the Civil War, named the "Gilded Age" by author Mark Twain, big business blossomed, and a strong desire for free trade and the concept of self-interest flourished. Adam Smith, in his book An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, introduced the policies of free enterprise and laissez-faire, or minimal government intervention in the economy. While the government often upheld this policy during the period of 1865 to 1900, it also violated it at times.
"Economically, it will ever remain true, that the government is best which governs least," declared American economist Amasa Walker in The Science of Wealth: A Manual of Political Economy (Doc A). This belief is supported by Social Darwinism, or the idea that only the strongest should flourish in society, which naturally goes hand in hand with the policy of laissez-faire. It is based on Charles Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection, yet the phrase "survival of the fittest" was......

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