Democracy and the origins of the American regulatory state / Samuel DeCanio.

The modern regulatory state -- State autonomy in democratic societies -- Civil War finance and the American state -- George Pendleton and mass opinion -- The election of 1868 -- The crime of 1873 -- Discretion and the Treasury Department -- The Ohio gubernatorial election of 1875 -- The Compromise of 1877 and railroad regulation -- Charles Francis Adams Jr. and bureaucracy -- Free silver and the Democratic Party -- The conservative origins of the American regulatory state -- Conclusion : state autonomy in democratic societies.

Online resource; title from PDF title page (EBSCO, viewed October 1, 2015).

Includes bibliographical references (pages 247-303) and index.

Political scientist Samuel DeCanio examines how political elites used high levels of voter ignorance to create a new type of regulatory state with lasting implications for American politics. Focusing on the expansion of bureaucratic authority in late-nineteenth-century America, DeCanio's exhaustive archival research examines electoral politics, the Treasury Department's control over monetary policy, and the Interstate Commerce Commission's regulation of railroads to examine how conservative politicians created a new type of bureaucratic state to insulate policy decisions from popular control.

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