University Studies 



Vol. V APRIL 1905 No. 2 



I. — On the Crises of 18^7, 1S4/, and 18^2, in England, France, 

 and the United States: An Analysis and Comparison 



EY IRA RYNER 



Attractive as is the theory that commercial crises are abnor- 

 malities interrupting and retarding normal progress, the uni- 

 versality and regularity in occurrence of these phenomena have 

 led us to adopt the contrary view as a working hypothesis. 

 While the scope of our imagination permits the conception of an 

 ideal society with organizations so nicely adjusted as to eliminate 

 every possibility of irregularity, this ideal, though highly desir- 

 able, falls so far short of actual realization as to be impracticable 

 as a standard. The question which concerns us is not the pos- 

 sibilities in an ideal society, but whether or not, given a certain 

 degree of social progress, these periodical commercial disturb- 

 ances are inevitable. If it is impossible to avoid them, the pre- 

 sumption at least is established that they are supplemental to 

 progress. That for the past century and more these economic 

 disturbances have occurred with persistent regularity and un- 

 changing severity in all parts of the commercial world, we regard 

 as evidence of their functional nature. 



Further evidence of this functional nature appears upon learn- 

 ing that the crisis is not a cause or positive force, but a result. 

 To illustrate, take the English crisis of 1847. Unquestionably 

 the original cause of this crisis was an over-investment in rail- 



UNTVEHSITV STTTDIES, Vol. V, No. 2, April 1905. 



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