XPERIMENTS

There are two separate processes going on among the civilized nations at
the present time. One is an assault by socialism against the individualism
which underlies the social system of western civilization. The other is
an assault against existing institutions upon the ground that they do not
adequately protect and develop the existing social order. It is of this
latter process in our own country that I wish to speak, and I assume an
agreement, that the right of individual liberty and the inseparable right
of private property which lie at the foundation of our modern civilization
ought to be maintained.

The conditions of life in America have changed very much since the
Constitution of the United States was adopted. In 1787 each state entering
into the Federal Union had preserved the separate organic life of the
original colony. Each had its center of social and business and political
life. Each was separated from the others by the barriers of slow and
difficult communication. In a vast territory, without railroads or
steamships or telegraph or telephone, each community lived within itself.

Now, there has been a general social and industrial rearrangement.
Production and commerce pay no attention to state lines. The life of the
country is no longer grouped about state capitals, but about the great
centers of continental production and trade. The organic growth which must
ultimately determine the form of institutions has been away from the
mere union of states towards the union of individuals in the relation of
national citizenship.

The same causes have greatly reduced the independence of personal and
family life. In the eighteenth century life was simple. The producer and
consumer were near together and could find each other. Every one who had an
equivalent to give in property or service could readily secure the support
of himself and his family without asking anything from government except
the preservation of order. To-day almost all Americans are dependent upon
the action of a great number of other persons mostly unknown. About half
of our people are crowded into the cities and large towns. Their food,
clothes, fuel, light, water--all come from distant sources, of which
they are in the main ignorant, through a vast, complicated machinery of
production and distribution with which they have little direct relation.
If anything occurs to interfere with the working of the machinery, the
consumer is indi