The efficient conduct of
any complicated business, be it manufacturing, transportation, or
political, always involves the constant sacrifice of an occasional or a
local interest for the benefit of the economic operation of the whole
organization. But it is just such sacrifices of local and occasional to
a comprehensive interest which official commissions are not allowed by
public opinion to approve. Under their control rates will be made
chiefly for the benefit of clamorous local interests; and little by
little the economic organization of the country, so far as affected by
the action of commission government, would become the increasing rigid
victim of routine management. The flexibility and enterprise,
characteristic of our existing national economic organization, would
slowly disappear; and American industrial leaders would lose the
initiative and energy which has contributed so much to the efficiency of
the national economic system. Such a result would, of course, only take
place gradually; but it would none the less be the eventual result of
any complete adoption of such a method of supervision.
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