st any lower and partial interest. It
is a policy for the whole and for the many, rather than for the
monopoly-coddled few. It is a policy that looks to the future rather
than to the possible dividends of the next six months. Not separable
from it is the President's proposal to put upon these huge accretions a
decent inheritance tax. He does not spoil his case by conventional or
academic timidities. He does not ask this tax merely as a fiscal device,
but as a measure that makes for more rational, social equalities. He
asks it in order that the common wealth may grow larger and the
top-heavy fortunes (the larger portion of which privilege has made) may
be lessened for the common good. The fatuous outcry that this is to be
opposed because it is "Socialism" will, of course, continue, although
the most conservative governments in the world have long proclaimed it
with such conspicuous success, from the public point of view, that it
is no longer questioned.

With jaunty prodigality we have scattered these primary sources of
wealth precisely as we scattered transportation and other franchises
upon which dangerous private monopolies were built. The kind of mistakes
that have been made with the franchises, we have in this generation come
to see clearly. In the teeth of extreme difficulties, we are trying to
protect the public through legislative control of these corporations. We
are learning the same lesson in our forestry. We have the lesson still
to learn in remaining mines, oil-lands, water-powers, and
phosphate-beds. Nothing in the statesmanship of President Roosevelt will
more surely win him laurels in the future than his pluck and
consistency in forwarding this policy, which stands for the whole people
and for the future. It is as serenely above party as it is above
corporate or private interest.

The warring and balancing of sectional, partial, and immediate interests
will always have their claims; but the next clearest step in
civilization is to learn the political habit of acting also for the
social whole. Social politics, so called, already has this character.
The forestry legislation of Switzerland or Germany has its inspiration
in the thought for the whole people and for future generations.

Many years ago I heard a discussion in Germany among three
art-teachers,--two of them with a world-wide fame,--that was as new to
me as it was amazing. They seemed to agree that the art of the sculptor
reached its height in t