2 BULLETIN 102, VOL. 1, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM. 



by mechanical power and therefore at bottom dependent upon the 

 material sources of energy. And just as an individual charged with 

 energy may be expected to attain success, so industrialism, to which 

 the individual is subject, may likewise be counted on to achieve a 

 favorable outcome, if only there arises no default in its energy sup- 

 ply. Industrialism, or the cooperative gaining of a livelihood as it 

 may be termed, has become an integral part of the social order and 

 its basic needs concern not merely industrial activities but the public 

 interest as well. 



Industry employs raw materials, power, and labor, under the 

 guidance of technological knowledge and in response to the activating 

 influence of business enterprise. Both industry and society, in 

 recognition of their common interest, have devoted considerable 

 attention to labor, technology, and business enterprise; and even 

 of late have gone to some pains to look into the matter of raw mate- 

 rials, especially such as are bidding fair to run out. But the energy 

 materials and the matter of their disposition are only to-day coming 

 in for a share of attention as a separate item, although it is ques- 

 tionable whether even yet the distinctiveness of this field and the 

 highly specialized problems it brings up are suflB.ciently distinguished 

 from the general run of economic issues. 



The energy resources — coal, oil, and water power — differ strikingly 

 from the raw materials in general, although they are customarily 

 grouped under this heading. In the first place they stand apart as 

 possessing a unique and strongly individuahzed mode of geological 

 occurrence, which causes them to yield faultily under the type of 

 economic exploitation found expedient for the normal raw materials. 

 And in the second place they are brought into use chiefly as a means 

 to an end and therefore are primarily service materials, in contra- 

 distinction to commodity materials. Representing mechanical labor> 

 they hold in consequence a sort of halfway place between raw mate- 

 rials proper and human labor. 



Because these distinctions have not been broadly apprehended, 

 and because, moreover, the course adopted ofi'ered the advantages of 

 convenience and opportunism, the exploitation of the energy 

 resources has been intrusted by common consent to the influence of 

 the natural economic stimuli which activate normal industrial 

 affairs. These stimuli, in contrast to their attainments elsewhere, 

 have failed to create an adequate situation in this particular field, 

 but owing to the fact that the energy materials do not carry through, 

 so to speak, it comes about that the shortcomings of the matter do 

 not register in their own name, but translate themselves in terms of 

 commodity cost, transportation expense, and other objective items 

 distributed all down the industrial line until they fall ultimately 

 upon the shoulders of the public in disguised form. Thus the source of 



