I am reading, among other things, “The Myth of the Robber Barons,” which is a fascinating book about 19th and early 20th century big business. This particular quote deals with the government’s decision to build its own munitions factories so they would no longer “be at the mercy of identical bids from the “greedy and hoggish” steel companies.”
The identical bids were the result of the government’s policy of, after seeking bids from the three companies