The above programme of social legislation is urged as a step towards realizing that canon of social justice which demands for all equal industrial opportunities. It is believed that it will also help to raise the standard of citizenship in the country by making both wage-earners and employers more intelligent, more efficient, and more truly democratic. Thus it will serve to prepare the way for such further industrial reorganization as may be found desirable.
FOOTNOTES:
[240] Boston has an ingenious method of dividing profits. The company which supplies gas must lower the price of gas in proportion as it increases its rate of dividends.
[241] February 24, 1908.
[242] Spargo, Socialism, 220-27.
[243] Philosophical Review, xiv., 370 f.
[244] Cf. J. A. Smith, The Spirit of American Government, 1907.
[245] I have followed in this paragraph the discussion of Professor Munroe Smith, Van Norden's Magazine, February, 1908. For a full history see E. Freund, The Police Power, 1905.
[246] Above, p. 554.
[247] As in the case of gas in New York City, where the court has decided that the public cannot refuse to pay interest on the value of the franchise—its own gift.