 Frick and Gary traveled overnight by train to the White House to implore Roosevelt to set aside the application of the Sherman Antitrust Act and allow — before the market opened — a company that already held a 60 % share of the steel market to make a large acquisition . Roosevelt 's secretary refused to see them , but Frick and Gary convinced James Rudolph Garfield , the Secretary of the Interior , to bypass the secretary and arrange a meeting with the president . With less than an hour before the Stock Exchange opened , Roosevelt and Secretary of State Elihu Root began to review the proposed takeover and appreciate the crash likely to ensue if the merger was not approved . Roosevelt relented ; he later recalled of the meeting , " It was necessary for me to decide on the instant before the Stock Exchange opened , for the situation in New York was such that any hour might be vital . I do not believe that anyone could justly criticize me for saying that I would not feel like objecting to the purchase under those circumstances " . When news reached New York , confidence soared . The Commercial & Financial Chronicle reported that " the relief furnished by this transaction was instant and far @-@ reaching " . The final crisis of the panic had been averted . 
