new national development is before us without the former safety valve
of abundant resources open to him who would take. Classes are becoming
alarmingly distinct: There is the demand on the one side voiced by Mr.
Harriman so well and by others since, that nothing must be done to
interfere with the early pioneer ideals of the exploitation and the
development of the country's wealth; that restrictive and reforming
legislation must on no account threaten prosperity even for a moment. In
fact, we sometimes hear in these days, from men of influence, serious
doubts of democracy, and intimations that the country would be better
off if it freely resigned itself to guidance by the geniuses who are
mastering the economic forces of the nation, and who, it is alleged,
would work out the prosperity of the United States more effectively, if
unvexed by politicians and people.

On the other hand, an inharmonious group of reformers are sounding the
warning that American democratic ideals and society are menaced and
already invaded by the very conditions that make this apparent
prosperity; that the economic resources are no longer limitless and
free; that the aggregate national wealth is increasing at the cost of
present social justice and moral health, and the future well-being of
the American people. The Granger and the Populist were prophets of this
reform movement. Mr. Bryan's Democracy, Mr. Debs' Socialism, and Mr.
Roosevelt's Republicanism all had in common the emphasis upon the need
of governmental regulation of industrial tendencies in the interest of
the common man; the checking of the power of those business Titans who
emerged successful out of the competitive individualism of pioneer
America. As land values rise, as meat and bread grow dearer, as the
process of industrial consolidation goes on, and as Eastern industrial
conditions spread across the West, the problems of traditional American
democracy will become increasingly grave.

The time has come when University men may well consider pioneer ideals,
for American society has reached the end of the first great period in
its formation. It must survey itself, reflect upon its origins, consider
what freightage of purposes it carried in its long march across the
continent, what ambitions it had for the man, what role it would play in
the world. How shall we conserve what was best in pioneer ideals? How
adjust the old conceptions to the changed conditions of modern life?

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