MICHIGAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 129 



fathers in shaping their policies of government pledged themselves to 

 the idea that government should not interfere with private industry. In 

 other words, individualism was accepted without qualification. Further- 

 more, government was to be feared and its possible exercise of unwar- 

 ranted power or authoi'ity must be forestalled by shackling its powers 

 through the guarantee of personal liberty for individuals in the way of 

 constitutional provisions against the invasions of freedom of speech, 

 property, the press, trial by jury, etc. This fear was largely imaginary, 

 for experience has found little danger from such a source through the 

 intervening century. 



Experience has proved that in recent years danger to the individual 

 is not from government but from his fellow citizens whose desire for 

 control of industrial activities and the profits thereof, has transcended 

 his respect for the welfare of his fellow-citizens, who find themselves 

 compelled to invoke the interference of government with the nation's 

 industries. Government, instead of actually being the thing to be feared, 

 is the people's hope of salvation in the maintenance of a new liberty, 

 the necessity for which was unthought of a century ago. 



It is not my purpose to detail the experiences of the American people 

 which have been the outcome of this change in the relation of government 

 to industr3\ From the Granger legislation of the 70's has come the dis- 

 tinction between the public utility corporations and private corporations. 

 It was no easy task or no small achievement for the public as well as 

 the corporate holder to establish and accept the principle of control in- 

 volved in public utility organization. The next step was an assertion 

 of control over private corporations, in respect to monopoly. The jDro- 

 longed campaign over this problem and the disputed results thereof are 

 too fresh in our minds to n3cessitate any very specific statements other 

 than that the people accei)t this interference of government as a justifi- 

 able function, necessary to the preservation of individual rights. 



In this legislation our government has aided the consumer by 

 attempting to preserve fair terms of service without the existence of 

 competition in one case, thus setting aside the individualistic principles 

 or by attempting to insure the continuance of competition in the other, 

 thus preserving individualism. Aside from the public utility corpora- 

 tions, the government has relied upon the efficiency of competition as a 

 means of fixing prices on the assumption that the removal of certain 

 gross, objectionable, obstructive practices would clear the way for an 

 efficient competition. 



It seems apparent from experiences from year to year that this com- 

 petitive condition is not restored and maintained, or if it exists it is in 

 form only. As a result, the public is continuing to look to the govern- 

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