circumstances whatever. The absurdity of it is obvious, yet how many instructors in political economy have been selected without reference to their standing on this question? A few certainly, of whom Dr. Ely says he is one, and of whom I am happy to consider myself another, but most of those thus happy have received their appointments within the last few years. No later than last spring a college president came to the Johns Hopkins university looking for a teacher in political economy and said that inasmuch as one of those from whom a handsome legacy was expected was a large manufacturer, it would be just as well that the future professor should be at least a mild protectionist.

At the time the science of political economy was born its professors had excellent opportunities for saying "don't." Not only was the interference of government with commerce as then practiced obviously harmful, but even where the government had interfered directly on behalf of the poor, as in the case of the poor laws, its action had often been ill advised and conspicuously mischievous. The result of pruning the powers of government in certain particulars were so entirely satisfactory that the doctrine of laissez faire became a dogma, and a scientific dogma is a nuisance. Translated into English it is the doctrine of governmental do-nothingism, and found expression in Jefferson's saying that that is the best government which governs least. It was said that the "natural" organization of society presupposed free competition. That word natural is the most slippery tool in the whole workshop of social science. In one sense of the word it is proper to say that it is more natural to have the small pox than to be vaccinated, more natural to get wet than to carry an umbrella. As usually used in economic discussion it is a mere verbal screen behind which to beg the question. I only know of two prominent writers on economics who are, at present, using this word to any great extent one is Prof. Summer and the other is Henry George.

Another doctrine by allegiance to which the self styled orthodox economists of the country helped to side track themselves and their science was the doctrine of the trusteeship of capital. It was held that the interests of employer and employe are so nearly identical that the employer, in looking after his own interests, will by that very act adequately protect the interest of the laborer. Walker, in the address already quoted, draws the parallel between this doctrine and

It

the older one of the political trusteeship of the upper classes. used to be said that the lower classes did not need the suffrage because their interests were so bound up in the community at large that they never could be oppressed. England, you remember, once thought that the colonies ought to be content to let her manage all their affairs because it must always be to her interest to see them prosper. But the doctrine of political trusteeship has gone down. It was found that each class was the best guardian of its own interests. So, also, have gone down the arguments by which it was sought to defend the aristocratic organization of industry. Books were written to prove labor and capital allies and not enemies, but the laborers steadily refused to accept the conclusion that the capitalist could do no wrong. The fact is now acknowledged to be, as Prof. Clark has shown, that while capital and labor are necessarily allies in production they are necessarily antagonists when it comes to distribution. The economists had "cried peace, peace, when there was no peace" and had discredited themselves accordingly.

The second and most cogent reason, therefore, for the neglect of social and political scientists seems to me to have been the blunders of the scientists themselves. They were apostles of do-nothingism, though they lived in a time when many things needed doing. But the question will be asked, and is very much in order, if economists have made so many blunders how can we be sure that they will not make just as many more? What assurance have we that the new economists will teach more wisely than the old? I reply by saying that the new political economy asks you to accept none of its conclusions except such as you yourself find apt and reasonable." It evolves no "economic harmonies" from its inner consciousness when all about it is nothing but economic discord. It is not a machine where a lot of definitions are put into the hopper and assorted rules for the management of the universe are taken out in the meal bag.

A new instructor in biology had just been employed at one of our eastern colleges and the president, a rather pompous scholar of the old school, said to him: "I suppose, sir, that you will begin with great fundamental principles?" "No, sir," said the young biologist, "I shall begin with a clam." So in political economy we no longer begin with a doctrinaire explanation of the industrial world, but begin to study the industrial world at whatever points it happens to

touch us.

The old text book and the earlier teachers of political science began by telling us how things ought to be; the newer shade begin not with dogmas but questions; (1) What are the existing facts in a given case? (2) How have these facts come to exist? (3) What rules can we derive from them for our future guidance? Buckle says of even Adam Smith that his facts were subsequent to his argument; they were illustrations rather than proofs. The modern endeavor in this science as in others is to make the arguments subsequent to the facts.

We hear a great deal about the historical method, also the comparative method, also the biological method, also the statistical method, also the scientific method of study and research. They do not differ greatly, and the fact that we have so many names for practically the same thing shows that the workers along many lines have arrived at a common conclusion by converging paths. What are any or all of these methods good for? Simply this, to enable us to see things as they are. It was said of Alexander Hamilton that he excelled in "argument by statement." That is he stated a question so lucidly and so completely that when he had done nothing remained to be said; formal agreement was gratuitous. Prof. Seeley says that "to produce persuasion there is one golden principle not put down in the rhetorics; it is to understand what you are talking about." The teacher of political economy is not so much to teach truths as ways of finding out truths, not dogma, but method; he is not to fill the minds of his class with facts, but to train their minds to discern facts.

Let us take one of the most difficult problems or series of problems in the whole range of modern economic and industrial science and divine if possible what is necessary to a solution. Let the question be a living one, and nothing less than the transportation problem. We see that railroads are at once necessary and dangerous; that they have made and unmade cities; that they have shown favoritism and so built up monopolies in nearly everything capable of being monopolized; that they have raised and lowered their rates to influence the market price of the great staples. We have seen millions upon millions wasted in building parallel lines for which there was no use; we have seen competition between these parallel lines that was not competition proper, but merely a fight to the finish; we have then

seen resulting pools and combinations and two or three roads trying to make a living off of business one could more than do; we have seen the outcome of this to be at once exorbitant rates and worthless stock--robbery at both ends and bankruptcy in the middle; we have seen the courts of a state influenced by railroads until legal authorities caution us against following their decisions on corporation questions; we have seen legislatures and public officers corrupted until the result has been described as "a devil's dance of public servants in every posture of official dishonesty;" we see our own legislature, realizing that something must be done, about to go forward-into the dark.

I believe that there is one word that will indicate the way out of all these labryinthine difficulties. That word is "publicity." If we once had all the facts in the case, if we could once state the problem fully, a wayfaring man, though a fool," might solve it. If the railroads take more than justice gives they are thieves, and if we allow them less than justice demands we are robbers. It will at once be urged that publicity is impossible in the railroad business; that the corporations could not live a day if a full statement of their affairs had to be made. I know that it is no answer to this to say that there are those who "love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil," but I should like to draw a parallel between these corporations and some that were avoiding publicity from the beginning of this century down to 1863. I allude to the private and state banks that were issuing paper money. In 1856 and '57 the territorial assembly of Nebraska was as much exercised over the problem of controlling the banking corporations as our legislature now is in trying to control the railroads. Probably there are many here, who, like myself, cannot remember a time when we had multifarious and vexatious issues of paper money ranging in worth all the way from face value to worthlessness. Early in this century the evils began and grew. The secretary of the United States treasury could not tell at a given time how much money was afloat, and in guessing at it he gave himself a margin of eleven millions. "Wildcat," "coon-box" and "red dog" banks were numerous and mischievous. Large issues of notes took place unsecured by anything but the capital of banks that had no capital at all. State bank inspectors were fettered, bribed, cajoled, and hoodwinked. The papers published the rates of discount on various sorts of money as

regularly as our dailies now print the weather reports. Violent alterations of expansion and contraction of the currency followed each other. The cost of domestic exchange was ridiculously high. At this time it was said that banks could not thrive if they must keep books that could be understood and that an inspector was allowed to see. Banks were said to be private corporations, and it was alleged that the government had no right to meddle. Yet how did we get out of these monetary quicksands? How awake from this financial nightmare? By letting individual competition have its perfect work? Not at all.

We escaped by positive legislation which

created banks of issue that must conform to specified rules laid down by the government, and that must submit to regular and most searching investigation. The circulation of all other banks was taxed out of existence. The national banking act was modelled after the general banking act of the state of New York, and in the construction of the latter a Columbia college professor of political economy, Dr. McVicar, had had a very considerable share.

Now a college teacher cannot get all the facts about the railroad problem and so settle it, but he can probably find some new facts if he tries. He can systematize, and make more useful the old ones, and above all he can point the students to the way by which alone the solution of such a problem is to be reached, and he can teach by precept and example, thoroughness and caution in the work of investigation.

The nearer the student can be got to the facts the better it is for him. In some degree this science is susceptible of laboratory work. The students attending lectures on municipal and state charities at the Johns Hopkins were encouraged to visit the various institutions and take work on the visiting committees of the local societies. When one of the college fellows, while trying to get work for a man out of employment, found that it was necessary to have what is called a "political pull" in order to get the man a place as a stable cleaner for a street car company, he realized as never before the beauties of ward politics, and the fact that by leaving the management of our street car lines to private corporations we have not put them outside of politics. When another of these visitors found that he could not get justice for a poor woman until he brought the police magistrate a letter of introduction from a wealthy leader of the dominant party,