the public and of the executive, legislative, and judicial agencies of the government, are looked upon by many as an indication of the rapid and inevitable drift in the direction of nationalization or socialization of industry. For this reason it is interesting to analyze the extent to which the policy of forming state monopolies has definitely crystallized during the war in different parts of the world.

To avoid misunderstanding, it should be clearly understood that we are not considering any of the temporary war measures so numerous in the United States, Great Britain, Germany, and elsewhere. We are eliminating from our present discussion such measures as price fixing, control of production, distribution of exports or imports of certain commodities during the war, or for a limited period after the war, where a certain degree of government control has been established either through voluntary agreements with trade associations, by compulsory syndication, or by direct state administration. In the United States the Food and Fuel administrations, the War Trade and War Industries boards, and the Railway Administration, and in other countries similar government agencies, have created a machinery which in many cases amounts to a virtual state monopoly. Similar functions are exercised by the Netherlands Oversea Trust and the Société Suisse de Surveillance Économique which control the imports and exports of Holland and Switzerland.

These and similar economic war measures are in most cases limited by law to the period of the war. Generally speaking, business interests are everywhere strongly opposed to the permanent retention of these restraints. Official spokesmen of different governments have given assurance that the abandonment of government control was being contemplated. In Germany the ViceChancellor recently discussed this subject in the Reichstag and stated that the Imperial Government had no intention of making the war organizations permanent. At the same time, he contended, the good done by the organizations in question during the war must be recognized, and it was clear that all of these organizations could not be abolished at a single stroke after the war. Most of them would have to continue in existence for a

longer or shorter time after the war for the regulation of economic life. This regulation would be considerably facilitated by the expert practical co-operation of trade and industry.

A further illustration of this attitude is given in the resolutions passed at a meeting of the Hansabund, of which the well-known financial writer, Dr. Riesser, is president. The resolutions urged that (1) state interference, necessary as it might be during the transition period, must be very limited, and must be completely gotten rid of after this period is over. Compulsory syndicates, it added, created during the war are contrary to the spirit of this resolution, since they tend to become permanent and form a serious encroachment on the rights of individuals; (2) the closing down and amalgamation of factories, etc., which has proved of little real advantage even during the war, must be stopped as soon as possible after peace and steps taken to restore all such concerns to their normal conditions; (3) as soon as possible after peace the former freedom of trade must be restored in every respect, and agreement must be reached in which the interests of industry and trade are consulted as to questions governing the supply and distribution of raw materials, foreign exchange, etc.; (4) the principle of monopolies must be definitely abandoned, since free economic activity in industry and trade is the safest guaranty for the financial capacity of the German peoples.

Sir Albert Stanley stated at the fifty-eighth annual meeting of the Associated Chambers of Commerce of the United Kingdom, in April, 1918, that it would be the function of the government at once to begin the abandonment of those controls when the national position would permit. He could not conceive of anyone desiring in the national interest that they should be continued a day longer than was necessary. All that was necessary was that there should be complete co-operation between business interests and the government departments, and he asked the employers to organize themselves so as to be able to effect that object.

However, side by side with temporary economic war measures of a monopolistic character the progress made along lines of permanent state monopolies during the war is noteworthy. Three stages of development can be clearly distinguished at the present

time: first, where the problem has not as yet gone beyond public discussion or party program; second, where a concrete proposition in the form of a parliamentary bill exists; and, third, where nationalization or state monopoly has been effected.

Nationalization of coal mines is being advocated strongly in several countries, particularly in Great Britain and Germany. The Miners' Federation of Great Britain has taken a strong stand in favor of nationalizing the coal mines and gave lengthy consideration to this subject at its annual conference at Southport in July, 1918. According to the Iron and Coal Trades Review "the Northumberland miners threaten to 'down tools if the mines are not nationalized within six months after the war. At the meeting of the Trades Union Congress at Derby in September, 1918, Mr. J. Robson, in moving on behalf of the Miners' Federation the resolution to socialize mines and minerals, said that miners were determined not to go back to the conditions that prevailed before the war, and they looked upon nationalization of the mines as an essential step toward securing the conditions they desired. Public sentiment was sketched in a paper read by Mr. F. McAvoy before the Forest of Dean Branch of the National Association of Colliery Managers as follows:2

The idea of State ownership is spreading among the ordinary men in the street, and this coupled with the projected extension of Labour representation in the House of Commons together with the resolutions of the Miners' Unions, seems likely to bring the nationalisation of the industry within the region of practical politics in the not far distant future. In the Committee stage of the Coal Mines Control Agreement Bill Mr. Adamson, a Labour member, said: "One of my chief objections to the agreement is that it is of too limited a character. I do not want only control of mines, I want ownership as well as control. This has been the attitude of the miner for many years. An important industry such as coal mining-an industry of such vital importance to the people-ought not to be in the hands of private individuals." And upon the Bill being debated in the House of Lords, Earl Russell said: "The Government have missed a favourable opportunity of taking over the coal mines and permanently working them in the interests of the community." When State ownership can be advocated in the "other place" we are indeed getting on.

1 August 16, 1918, p. 196.

The Iron and Coal Trades Review, June 7, 1918, p. 648.

In Germany public discussion has time and again centered around the question of nationalizing the coal industry. During the war numerous projects of this kind have been proposed, particularly from the viewpoint of making available new sources of revenue for the state. At a sitting of the Reichstag Committee on March 12, 1917, to consider the Imperial Coal Tax Bill, the State Secretary of the Treasury, however, deprecated the idea of a monopoly of coal production and of the coal trade on account of the difficulties of organization involved in the scheme. More progress has been made in respect of the nationalizing of electric power supply in Germany. Numerous well-known leaders of industry and science have urged projects of this kind. Professor R. Liefmann, of the University of Freiburg, in an article on "German Monopolies after the War," points out that owing to the difficulties which would arise regarding the indemnification of existing works, and the necessary arrangements with regard to the numerous schemes already taken up by the individual states, an imperial electricity monopoly could not be expected to provide a large revenue immediately after the war. He considers, however, that the existing chaos in the supply of electricity will only be reduced to order by an imperial monopoly, and that the scheme should be carried through from the point of view of national economy, if not for financial reasons. In some of the individual states the government authorities have already acted toward consolidating all electricity works with government participation.

Professor Ballod, in an article on "Finance after the War," declares himself in favor of a state monoply of coal and electric power on grounds of fuel economy as well as for financial reasons. He contends that all the railways and all industrial and agricultural plants should be electrified, and that electricity should be produced in large plants of 100,000 kilowatts and distributed in high-tension mains of 100,000 volts. He calculates that by electrifying the railways it would be possible to save at least one-third of the coal consumed by them, which amounted to about twenty million tons in the year immediately before the war. He urges that the state should endeavor to reduce home consumption of

1 Deutsche Juristen Zeitung, March 1, 1918.

coal by one-third, and should reckon to make most of its profit on coal for export. The cost of coal should not be increased to home industries, nor should the state attempt to make much profit out of electricity, as its aim should be to provide cheaper, not dearer, motive power. The Prussian Minister of Public Works, Dr. von Breitenbach, in a speech in the House of Deputies in February, 1917, and again on November 16 of the same year, declared himself in favor of the principle of state control of electricity by taking over the generation and transmission of the current but not its distribution to consumers. A section of the working program adopted by the German Social Democratic party at its meeting in Wurzburg last summer may be of interest at this time. It provides as follows:

SEC. 5. THE PREVENTION OF MONOPOLIES.-Since in industry, commerce, and especially banking, the concentrations, amalgamations, and tendencies towards the formation of cartels which have made their appearance in war time will presumably be extended in peace time and lead to an increase in economic monopolies, the Social Democrats demand that private monopolies, so far as they have been created by economic development, should be nationalized under conditions which subject the entire conduct of their business to the control of parliamentary committees, which secure to the workmen therein employed the rights accorded them by the Industrial Code and social legislation, and which guarantee the workmen suitable influence in labor conditions. Moreover, in order to control organizations partaking of the nature of a cartel, a cartel office, affiliated with the Imperial Economy Office, must be established, empowered to examine the business ledgers of the cartel associations and to combat injurious forcing up of prices. Like the employers, the workmen are also to be secured representation on the council or the expert committee of the cartel office. Imperial control of the banking system must be extended, and by the development of the Reichsbank this institution must obtain a larger influence on private banks.1

In Great Britain a special committee appointed in 1917 by the Board of Trade to investigate the electric-power supply recommended that one central authority to regulate generation and distribution of electricity in Great Britain and Ireland be immediately established, the new authority to be known as "The Electricity Commissioners." The Coal Conservation Committee appointed by Prime Minister Asquith in its final report made *Correspondenzblatt der Gewerkschaften, June 22, 1918.