the Interstate Commerce Commission reported in January 1907 that Standard Oil was still secretly accepting rebates, spying on competitors, setting up bogus subsidiaries, and engaging in predatory pricing—the same deadly sins patented by Rockefeller back in the 1870s. Roosevelt and his cabinet thirsted for a test case that would prove Standard Oil’s collusion with the railroads and dramatize the twin evils of abusive trusts and scheming railroads.
