Perhaps our national ambition to standardize ourselves has behind it the notion that democracy means standardization. But standardization is the surest way to destroy the initiative.
IDA TARBELLMany men ridicule the idea that it can be scientifically handled. They tell us the unemployed have always been with us, and always must be. It is the oldest reason in the world for tolerating injustice and misery.
More Ida Tarbell Quotes
-
-
[John D. Rockefeller] didn’t care about anyone he did anything just to be rich and be the only company standing without any competition. He destroyed anyone else.
IDA TARBELL -
we were raising our standard of living at the expense of our standard of character.
IDA TARBELL -
A more immediate wrong is the way the movement for a fuller, freer life for all human beings is hampered.
IDA TARBELL -
The inference is that the men alone render useful service. But neither man nor woman eats these things until the woman has prepared it.
IDA TARBELL -
Buy cheap and sell high is a rule of business, and when you control enough money and enough banks you can always manage that a stock you want shall be temporarily cheap.
IDA TARBELL -
[On dishonest business methods:] … frequently the defender of the practice falls back on the Christian doctrine of charity, and points out that we are erring mortals and must allow for each other’s weaknesses!.
IDA TARBELL -
I decided to write the book to open the eyes of the people of how corrupt John D. Rockefeller company was and the unfair ways he used to be successful.
IDA TARBELL -
a little sounder for those who come after. Nobody begins or ends anything. Each person is a link, weak or strong, in an endless chain.
IDA TARBELL -
Canonise ‘business success,’ and men who made a success like that of the Standard Oil Trust become national heroes!
IDA TARBELL -
In walking through the world there is a choice for a man to make.
IDA TARBELL -
Now, if the Standard Oil Company were the only concern in the country guilty of the practices which have given it monopolistic power this story never would have been written.
IDA TARBELL -
It is not alone that justice is wounded by denying women a part in the making of the civilized world.
IDA TARBELL -
Very often people who admit the facts, who are willing to see that Mr. Rockefeller has employed force and fraud to secure his ends, justify him by declaring, ‘It’s business.’ That is, ‘it’s business’ has come to be a legitimate excuse for hard dealing, sly tricks, special privileges.
IDA TARBELL -
I wanted the people to know the truth about the Standard Oil Company.
IDA TARBELL -
One of the most depressing features of the ethical side of the matter is that instead of such methods arousing contempt they are more or less openly admired. And this is logical.
IDA TARBELL