One may well hesitate wholly to condemn this government by commission,
because it is the first emphatic recognition in American political and
economic organization of a manifest public responsibility. In the past
the public interests involved in the growth of an extensive and highly
organized industrial system have been neither recognized nor promoted.
They have not been promoted by the states, partly because the states
neither wanted to do so, nor when they had the will, did they have the
power. They have not been promoted by the central government because
irresponsibility in relation to national economic interest was, the
tariff apart, supposed to be an attribute of the central authority. Any
legislation which seeks to promote this neglected public interest is
consequently to be welcomed; but the welcome accorded to these
commissions should not be very enthusiastic. It should not be any more
enthusiastic than the welcome accorded by the citizens of a kingdom to
the birth of a first child to the reigning monarchs,--a child who turns
out to be a girl, incapable under the law of inheriting the crown.
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