Apbil 20, 1906.] 



SCIENCE. 



617 



mechanic arts, calling for the guiding hand 

 of the artisan, notably the building trades; 

 (3) the lesser branches of industry, both 

 manufacturing and mechanic arts, con- 

 ducted in small shops by combination of 

 mechanism, improved tools and hand work. 



A careful study may enable economists 

 to establish very valuable deductions when 

 these facts and figures are plainly stated. 

 The deduction which I have made from 

 such study as I can give is that the tend- 

 ency is toward individualism rather than 

 collectivism. That is to say, the arts which 

 are conducted by large numbers of persons 

 under one roof, subject to great division 

 of labor, are becoming more and more auto- 

 matic, and although giving employment to 

 a large aggregate in each decade, they are 

 giving employment to a less proportion of 

 persons occupied as the decades go by. 

 In some arts one can foresee the time when 

 the only persons occupied will be those who 

 keep the machinery in order and there may 

 be none of the class now called operatives 

 to attend to the product. On the other 

 hand, the arts which require individualism, 

 capacity, mental energy and manual skill, 

 like the building trades, and many other 

 of the arts listed under the title of manu- 

 factures, are calling for an increasing pro- 

 portion of a constantly increasing number. 

 I also find in every art that I have investi- 

 gated a confirmation of the rule laid down 

 by Henry C. Carey and Frederic Bastiat 

 seventy years ago, namely, "in proportion 

 to the increase and effectiveness of capital, 

 the share of the annual product falling to 

 capital is increased in the aggregate, but 

 diminished in its relative proportion ; while 

 the share falling to labor or to the work- 

 men and women is increased both abso- 

 lutely and relatively." 



I find in the history of every art, the 

 course of which has not been interrupted 

 or broken by tariff taxes. (these arts being 

 very few in number), that the persons who 



do the manual, mechanical work of the 

 nation, constituting in the narrow sense 

 the working classes, have been and are se- 

 curing decade by decade an increasing 

 share or proportion of a constantly increas- 

 ing product to their own use and enjoy- 

 ment. 



The Twelfth Census of Manufactures: W. 



M. Stextart, Census Office, Washington, 



D. C. 



At the census of 1900, when it was found 

 that out of the 640,194 schedules secured, 

 343,233, or considerably more than half, 

 were for the hand trades or for small shops 

 with an annual product of less than $500, 

 and also that the cost of collecting the 

 schedules for the small shops was about 

 the same per schedule as for the factories; 

 for this and other reasons given in part 

 I. of the report of manufactures, it was 

 recommended that these industries be ex- 

 cluded from the twelfth census. 



To recapitulate, the reports of the 

 twelfth census show: 



1. A clear demarcation between the 

 neighborhood and mechanical trades and 

 the factory industries. 



2. There is a provision of law which ex- 

 cludes the neighborhood and mechanical 

 trades from the census of 1905 and it is 

 probable that they will be omitted from all 

 subsequent censuses. 



3. All new industries and industries that 

 have developed from the household in- 

 dustries and passed into the factory sys- 

 tem, such as the manufacture of textiles, 

 should be considered as a part of the in- 

 dustrial development of the country. 



4. The word 'manufactures' is defined 

 in the census reports, but its definition can 

 not be used as a criterion to separate the 

 neighborhood and mechanical trades from 

 the factory industries. 



5. The gross value of the annual prod- 

 ucts of all classes of manufactures can be 

 used to show relative increase. 



