The answer [to such problems] does not lie in the good intentions of industrialists or consumers; nor the efforts of earnest do-gooders; nor even the inevitable tides of historical progress. The plain answer, uncomfortable as it may be to those who believe in "free enterprise" and "small government", is that the air and water are cleaner than they used to be because government chose to make it so, and for no other reason. Today cars run cleaner and factories have scrubbers on their smokestacks, but the industrialists who installed those engines and scrubbers fought tooth and nail then—as they do today—against every law that made them do so. If allowed today, corporations would improve their bottom line and return the Bay and the Hudson to its 1960 state without hesitating as much as a heartbeat.

But as it happened, people wanted cleaner air and water, and they prevailed on their government to make it so. And since the government was in the hands of people who at some level shared that concern, it was made so. The car manufacturers and factory operators were brought under control, and no other entity—not ecological think tanks, nor benevolent foundations, nor any group of private citizens, nor even the corporations themselves (who, after all, have their stockholders to answer to)—would have had the muscle to bring it off.
(…)

Is government corrupt? Often. Does it work against the interests of ordinary people? Sometimes. Is it inefficient? Always. But of all the forces at work in shaping the world I have to live in, it is the only one whose decisions I can hope to affect even slightly, whose processes are more or less open to my scrutiny, and who has my welfare at least a tiny bit at heart. None of that is true of Archer Daniels Midland or Time/Warner. For that reason, I want government big and I want it powerful.

Ford Motor Company used to hire spies to investigate the private lives of its employees to make sure they were behaving in ways the company approved of, and it was not shy about firing those who weren't. Mining companies in Appalachia used to simply gun down anyone who demanded a decent living wage. If those days are not to return again, we need a government that is powerful enough—and rich enough—to do battle with the other powerful forces in this land—to prevail on them to do what is right and not just what is profitable.