When did the term “Robber Baron” first become attached to Vanderbilt?
In 1859, The New York Times compared Vanderbilt to the medieval German robber barons on the Rhine, which was the first use of that metaphor. It didn’t use the precise phrase “robber baron,” but it came into common use in the 1860s. What I think is interesting is how different the original meaning of the metaphor was from its modern definition. Today “robber baron” is applied to industrial monopolists and financiers who corrupt government. What I discovered, though, is that the Times first used it in a sense that was very specific to that time, and makes little sense to us now. It reflected an old strain of thought in the Whig Party, which favored government-led economic development and looked askance at competition, seeing it as anarchic and destructive. The Times criticized Vanderbilt for being too competitive against “legitimate” enterprises—specifically, Pacific Mail, a federally subsidized steamship company, which paid him a large sum to protect its monopoly on a line to California
