42 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



ally taken their places as integral parts of the system of govern- . 

 ment. Finance and jurisprudence were given as examples of this 

 truth, the former of which has scarely as yet and the latter only 

 quite recently assumed its true position. This process is more- 

 over destined to continue, until all truly public operations shall 

 come more or less directly under the power of state regulation. 

 Contrary to the general belief, this result is not often reached before 

 the time is ripe for it. Such is the aversion to innovation that the 

 evils of private management usually become well nigh intolerable 

 before the state is able or willing to step m and relieve them. 



The want of an adequate term for expressing this conception of 

 the assumption by the state of the control of interests of a public 

 nature was next pointed out, and it was proposed to designate the 

 entire movement by the name Sociocracy, as a new word, etymo- 

 logicaliy akiri to sociology, and avoiding the stigma which at- 

 taches to all expressions for the government regulation of industries 

 whose public nature is disputed. This term embraces all the func- 

 tions of government, whether universally acquiesced in or not. It 

 also conveys a distinctly different meaning from either democracy or 

 socialism, and stands simply for positive social action as opposed to 

 the negative or laissez faire policy of the predominant school of 

 politico-economic doctrinaires. It recognizes all forms of govern- 

 ment as legitimate, and, ignoring form, goes to the substance and 

 denotes that, in whatever manner organized, it is the duty of society 

 to act consciously and intelligently, as becomes an enlightened age, 

 in the direction of guarding its own interests and working out its 

 own destiny. 



President Powell remarked that it was a curious fact that no col- 

 lege teaches the positive doctrines of political economy, carried out 

 to so large an extent by the government. He said that the doc- 

 trines taught by Herbert Spencer and that school, would, at a 

 rough estimate, if practiced, neutralize nine-tenths of the legisla- 

 tion of the world. Modern legislators, while professing to sub- 



