ANTHROPOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 41 



i. In unjustifiable inequalities in the distribution of wealth, due 

 to the general truth that there is no necessary harmony between 

 natural law and human advantage. 



2. In enormous waste of created products, due to the ruinous 

 excesses of competition, entailing failures and losses. 



3. In artificially increased prices, due to over-supply, the result 

 also of competition, especially in distributive industries. 



4. In dangerous monopolies, whether industrial or financial, 

 which threaten to enslave labor and dictate commerce. 



These propositions were supported by statistics of corporations 

 and of public and local debts. It was also argued that, from the 

 standpoint of science and the laws of evolution, all these results 

 are the normal and legitimate products of natural law, and that 

 there is no tendency in unregulated nature to reverse the process 

 and disentangle these complicated social phenomena. 



It was moreover denied that all attempts at government regula- 

 tion had proved failures or resulted in an excess of evil to society. 

 The various industries which have been absorbed by government 

 and successfully conducted were enumerated at length, and it was 

 shown that there were many such in this country, still more in Great 

 Britain, and a maximum number on the continent of Europe. 

 The extent of State ownership and management of telegraph lines 

 in England and in Europe generally, and of railroads in Germany, 

 France, Belgium, and Italy was exhibited by facts and figures ; the 

 prevalence of national savings banks throughout Europe and the 

 character of the systems of education of Germany, Austria, France, 

 and England were adduced in support of this view, as also the 

 tendency now manifest towards the protection of home industries 

 throughout the world. 



From this basis of facts and from history the broader generaliza- 

 tion was then made, that all the now recognized government func- 

 tions have once been under a system of private management, and 

 have had, each in its turn, to pass through the stage of opposition 

 from those who would keep them so, and one by one have gradu- 



