CONTINUOUS FOREST PRODUCTION 63 



of our industrial problems it will have to attack that thing which the 

 majority of us love most dearly — the competitive system in industry. 

 It can issue (if constitutional authority be granted) certificates of public 

 necessity to all mills and refuse to license the erection of those not 

 needed. If the government is to be the solver of the problems there is, 

 in my judgment, more likelihood of collective action under which it 

 will own and operate the mills themselves and distribute the product 

 not by distributing machinery which is in duplicate or triplicate, but 

 in the manner in which the Post Office Department is operated, namely: 

 one post ofhce to each tow^n or portion of country or city that needs 

 one with the inevitable inefficiencies of small-scale production and the 

 chaos of unorganized distribution. So much for government manage- 

 ment of the industry as it is. 



A more immediate alternative to be expected than the foregoing is 

 banking control. We are now, in fact, rapidly entering on that stage. 

 Government officials are practically advocating it through the advocacy 

 of withholding loans from concerns with inadequate systems of cost 

 accounts.^* It, of course, follows that the accounting system will 

 have to show that the business is making good in order to get loans. 

 We need cherish no illusions in regard to this. Under this system the 

 loans will go to the strong, while the weak will go to the wall. "To 

 him that hath shall be given, while to him that hath not shall be taken 

 away, even that which he hath." The strong will grow constantly 

 stronger, while the weak will be broken on the wheel of adversitv. If 

 this were a law of nature which demands that the fittest shall survive 

 we should, of course, be constrained to accept it philosophically. It 

 is, however, not necessarily due to the incapacity of the individual who 

 fails. It is only that our competitive system demands not only financial 

 strength and ability but also in many cases ruthless and unfair methods. 

 If the individual could work under fair conditions he would win, in 

 many cases where he now fails. Failiire is more due to the individual 

 being refused the right of effective cooperation \\dth his fellows, and 

 working on in ignorance of true conditions. 



Banking control will eventually result in large and centralized 

 concerns operating in each region. If these concerns cannot get together 

 to cease destructive competition, the bankers will see that they do. 

 Furthermore, capital will not be advanced to build a plant where the region 



**See statements of Trade Commissioner Edward N. Hurley, reported in Lumber 

 World Review of Chicago, October 24, 1916. 



