294 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XIX. No. 477. 



polities becomes a life-work— a profession, 

 and of the highest order. 



All this is seen in Switzerland where the 

 optional referendum has existed in federal 

 affairs for twenty-nine years, and the direct 

 initiative since 1891. 



The striking changes which this system 

 effects are seen most clearly in the execu- 

 tive department of the Swiss government. 

 The final power being in the people, has 

 freed the heads of departments from sub- 

 servience to the instructions of a party con- 

 vention. Stated another way, through the 

 optional referendum each public question 

 goes to the people after it has been con- 

 sidered by the heads of departments and by 

 congress, thus leaving these officials free to 

 recommend ivhatever their best judgment 

 dictates. They are more independent, and 

 probably more effective, than are the offi- 

 cials in our mammoth private corporations, 

 for these heads of departments are abso- 

 lutely dependent for their positions on the 

 autocratic general manager, who is a chan- 

 ging factor. Not so in the Swiss govern- 

 ment. The expert heads of departments 

 are continued in office from term to term. 

 For the past thirty years not a member of 

 _ the Swiss cabinet has been obliged to retire. 

 Yet there is no fossilism, for changes can be 

 made by congress, and the subordinate 

 officers, being more independent than in 

 private corporations and subject to promo- 

 tion for ability, propose changes. Uniform 

 accounting opens up the keenest kind of 

 competition. 



In the general field of legislation there 

 is absolutely no corruption under the ref- 

 erendum and initiative, owing to the final 

 power in the people, and as the legislators 

 represent the people's interests, scarcely a 

 biU is ordered to a vote of the people. In 

 South Dakota and Oregon not a bill has 

 yet been referred. 



The order of development in systems of 

 government is from one-man poAver to 



party government; which in the course of 

 centuries becomes thoroughly autocratic 

 and is the political basis of the trusts and 

 other forms of industrial monopoly. The 

 next higher system is the transfer of final 

 legislative power from the party machine 

 to the people. It is the people's rule in 

 place of trust rule. But in framing the 

 legislation the people act through repre- 

 sentatives, who are uninstructed, and there- 

 by the highest and best forms of legisla- 

 tion are proposed to the people, who usually 

 accept these bills without a direct vote. 



Wall Street and the Country: Charles A. 

 CoNANT, Treasurer, Morton Trvist Com- 

 pany, New York. (Atlantic Monthly, 

 February, 1904.) 



What is the meaning of the recent flota- 

 tion of industrial enterprises in "Wall Street 

 and their significance in the economic de- 

 velopment of the country ? The offer of new 

 financial projects is the natural result of 

 the great fund of saved capital seeking in- 

 vestment, and the merits of new methods of 

 investment must be determined by the 

 question whether they survive the tests of 

 time and competition. Only those can 

 survive which have in them real elements 

 of benefit to the community. In so far 

 as methods of investment are diversified 

 there is greater inducement to capital to 

 enter the market and to place itself at the 

 disposition of far-sighted men for produc- 

 tive use. Speaking of such forms of organ- 

 ization as the security-holding company and 

 the voting trust and of the ultimate result 

 of such developments, the system of the 

 security-holding company permits far- 

 sighted men, for instance, who are willing 

 to postpone present dividends to future 

 wealth, to study the needs of a growing 

 community, and to promote its growth by 

 building traction lines in advance of the 

 public demand instead of waiting for such 

 a demand to become imperative. It enables 



