What were some of the most important achievements of Woodrow Wilson's presidency?
In 1908, Roosevelt decided not to run for re-election as president. William Howard Taft, a Republican, won the presidency in the fall election. Roosevelt had selected Taft as his successor and expected Taft to continue the mission of progressive reform. Taft, however, proved more conservative than Roosevelt, and he soon lost the support of many progressives.
In 1912, four candidates sought the presidency. Taft sought re-election. Roosevelt, angered by Taft's conservatism, bolted from the Republican Party to run as an independent candidate of the new Progressive Party. (The new party was commonly referred to as the Bull Moose party, because of Roosevelt's boast during the campaign that he felt "as strong as a bull moose".) Roosevelt called his program the New Nationalism. Although he had gained fame as a trust-buster, he now accepted that large corporations were efficient and had come to stay. He also insisted that government regulation of these corporations was necessary so that they wouldn't trample on ordinary citizens' interests.
Democrats nominated the Democratic governor of New Jersey, Woodrow Wilson, who called his platform the New Freedom. Wilson's proposals differed from Roosevelt's. Wilson remained more distrustful of large corporations. The Socialist Party nominated Eugene Debs. In the four-way election, Wilson won the presidency, although he received only 42 percent of the popular vote.
Wilson's administration created the Federal Reserve System (1913) to oversee the nation's banking system. It also established the Federal Trade Commission (1914), which had the power to regulate fair business practices. Congress also passed the Clayton Anti-Trust Act (1914), which spelled out in greater detail which business practices could be considered unfair restraint of trade.