A Disturbed Year: Financial Writing, Stock Exchange Regulation, and the Panic of 1893

During the late nineteenth century, financial panics and social unrest destabilized American society. Although agrarian and labor reformers had long called for financial regulation, a few elements of the upper class began to discuss economic reform as well during the final two decades of the nineteenth century. While financial journalists initially resisted reform impulses and wrote in favor of trusts and financial speculation, with the Panic of 1893, some financial publications began to support regulating these elements of the economy. These journalists projected a vision of America's financial future that resembled the one that actually emerged during the Progressive era.