432 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIV. No. 875 



preaching' paralysis have arisen, e. g., in a cost 

 of living exceeding that of any other age or 

 country, in diminishing exports of foodstuffs, 

 etc.; yet it seems probable that these condi- 

 tions mark a temporary rather than perma- 

 nent disturbance of economic balance between 

 primary and secondary industries — a disturb- 

 ance destined to be progressively adjusted, 

 unless current signs of the times be wholly 

 misleading. The primary industries — ^the pro- 

 duction of materials for food and clothing 

 chiefly from the soil through utilization of the 

 natural water supply — dominated the growth 

 of the country from 1Y76 to about 1850; but 

 especially during the half-century 1850-1900 

 the secondary industries of manufacturing 

 and transportation expanded beyond all pre- 

 cedent or parallel, until the annual value of 

 manufactures arose to more than twice that 

 of the primary staples, and the cost of trans- 

 portation increased to a quarter or a third of 

 the value of primary production. Despite this 

 industrial revolution, a reasonable balance was 

 long maintained through rapid agricultural 

 expansion and the bringing of virgin fields 

 under cultivation, whereby the secondary 

 workers were fed and clothed without appre- 



ciable burden on the resources of the country. 

 Of late this method of maintaining the eco- 

 nomic balance has failed, since the virgin 

 fields available for settlement and cultivation 

 in the old way are exhausted — and the indus- 

 tries of the United States have grown top- 

 heavy in manufacturing and transportation. 

 The burden of manufacturing is the greater by 

 reason of a tariff adapted neither to the rais- 

 ing of revenue nor to the protection of Amer- 

 ican workmen so much as the concentration 

 of capital ; yet indications are clear that within 

 a year this burden will be materially reduced 

 by revision of the tariff laws. The burden of 

 transportation has arisen chiefly with the 

 growth of railways in property and power 

 until the simple economic law of supply and 

 demand has been replaced by the arbitrary 

 formula " what the trafiic will bear," which 

 largely controls production; the annual cost 

 of railway transportation (of which some YO 

 per cent, is freightage) is now about $2,700,- 

 000,000, equivalent to an impost of $5.25 per 

 acre on the 475,000,000 acres of improved land 

 in this country, or a personal tax of $150 per 

 family (fully one third of the average cost of 



