June 30, 2025

— Sinclair Lewis

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'I hit it in the stomach'

Upton Sinclair wanted to write about the soul--the Great American Novel, with sweeping themes of poverty, hope, and the inner lives of early 20th century American workers.

Instead, readers came away thinking about the rats.

Sinclair embedded himself in the Chicago stockyards like a war correspondent before writing his best-known work, The Jungle, living among the workers, dining with them, asking questions, taking notes.

At night he returned to a boarding house that probably smelled just as bad as the slaughterhouses, and he wrote furiously.

The Jungle was published in 1906. It follows the journey of the fictional Jurgis Rudkus, a Lithuanian immigrant who arrives in Chicago full of hope--but who is slowly crushed by corruption, exploitation, and unrelenting poverty.

It was meant to be a novel of ideas, a call to arms for socialism.

But what readers couldn't stop thinking about was what ended up in in the food they bought, because of passages like this:

People dropped their forks and started writing letters.

Sinclair sent a copy of the book to President Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt was horrified and moved -- not so much by the politics (Roosevelt was progressive, but he thought Sinclair was a Socialist crank).

But, he was deeply disturbted by the descriptions of contamination, disease, and dishonesty.

Teddy R. sent investigators; their reports confirmed the novel's setting; frankly, it might have been a bit restrained in its descriptions.

It had real-world implications.

On June 30, 1906, just months after the book's release -- 119 years ago today -- Roosevelt signed the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act into law.

This was one of the first times the federal government assumed responsibility for protecting consumers from the worst abuses of unchecked capitalism, and it started with a novel.

Sinclair was just 26 when The Jungle was published. He'd grown up poor, lived with artists, and wasn't especially interested in fame.

What drove him was outrage at inequality, at hypocrisy, at the way American prosperity seemed to grind up so many of the very people who made it possible.

He imagined that if people could just see what was happening, they'd rise up.

His novel didn't usher in a socialist revolution, but it created a national outcry loud enough to shake Washington into action.

That led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration, forced companies to change how they processed, labeled, and sold food, and began the long, messy history of federal consumer protection.

Most importantly, it demonstrated the power of story not just to entertain or provoke, but to alter the trajectory of policy.

Sinclair went on to write dozens more books. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1943, but The Jungle remained the work for which he was most remembered.

In his later years, Sinclair reflected: "The American people will take anything if it is draped in enough emotion. Even truth."

That, perhaps, was the final irony. He'd wanted to awaken the conscience of a nation and instead awakened its gag reflex. But maybe that was enough.

On June 30, 1906, when Roosevelt signed the bill into law, he didn't quote Sinclair or thank him.

But the pen he held might never have moved if not for the boyish writer from Baltimore who wandered into the slaughterhouses and came out with a manuscript—a story that made people sick and made a country a little cleaner.

As Sinclair famously quipped: "I aimed at the public's heart, and by accident I hit it in the stomach."

(Hey! Where are the comments?!!! Yes, we have skipped them a few weeks on Big Optimism. Long story short we had a spam problem ... and I haven't had time to fix it. I think we'll have a new solution sometime later in July. Thank you!)

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Did you see ...

• The Supreme Court gave President Trump a massive victory Friday, reducing the ability of courts to impose nationwide injunctions that restrain the federal executive -- specifically in cases in which the Trump administration seeks to deny "birthright citizenship" to people born in the U.S. who do not have at least one parent who is a citizen or permanent resident. Going forward, at least temporarily, babies without one such citizen or resident parent will be treated as American citizens if they're born in the 22 states whose attorneys general challenged the case before the Supreme Court decision (New York, California, Illinois, etc.), but may not be able to prove U.S. citizenship (or get social security numbers, etc.) if they are born in one of the 28 other states (Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, etc. (The Washington Post)
• The Senate was preparing for a key procedural vote over the weekend to try to pass President Donald Trump’s package of tax breaks, spending cuts and bolstered deportation funds over Democrats' objections by his self-imposed July 4 deadline. With the narrow Republicans majorities in the House and Senate, passage could well come down to the fact that three Democrats who were elected to the House last year have since died, but their home states of Texas, Virginia, and Arizona have not held elections to replace them. The 940-page bill was released shortly before midnight Friday, and senators were expected to grind through the days ahead with hours of potentially all-night debate and countless amendments. (Associated Press)
• A group of 17 Republican governors asked Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson to remove a 10-year moratorium on enforcing state and local artificial intelligence laws from the GOP’s megabill. In the biggest show of Republican resistance to the provision so far, the governors warned the language would undo existing state efforts to protect their citizens from the harm the technology could cause, and criticized the lack of “thoughtful” public debate over the measure. (Politico)
• Former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman was laid to rest alongside her husband on Saturday, weeks after she was killed in a politically motivated assassination. Hortman, a Democrat who served as the speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives from 2019 until her slaying, and her husband, Mark Hortman, were shot and killed in their Brooklyn Park home on June 14. (Associated Press)
• In the wake of the Minnesota political assassination, which flipped the state's house of representatives from Democrats to Republicans, some members of Congress say they're increasingly concerned about the potential for attempts on their lives. “The status quo also creates a perverse incentive for political violence through targeted killings designed to switch the majority party in the House,” said former Rep. Derek Kilmer (D-Washington). (The Washington Post)
• This week, a New York City jury of eight men and four women will begin to decide the fate of Sean “Diddy” Combs in the once mini-mogul’s sex-trafficking trial. I don't think I've even mentioned this case, because either Combs is a sex trafficker or just a guy I wouldn't want around any person I'd even remotely care about. But I guess it's newsworthy that a once near-billionaire celebrity for 30 years might now go to federal prison for life. (Deadline)
• Inside the Hamptons’ Elite Fitness Scene—Complete With Cartier Bracelets and Lamborghinis: Scoring a mat at one of the East End’s trendy and expensive workout classes has become a status symbol. Expect to see lots of coordinated sets and luxury jewelry. (The Wall Street Journal)