700 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
cerned at least, the people were not obliged to be so continually ready to take up arms, nor were they obliged to contract permanent alliances ; executive power, therefore, became subordinate to deliberative power. The three great events in the history of England are: the establishment of constitutional liberty and the parliamentary regime ; colonial expansion ; and the triumph of Protestantism.
Combine the Danish-Saxon tendency and the Celtic, and join to that the Latin influence exercized by France and Italy, and you will understand how the greatest poetry of modern times could be born and develop in England. The individual char- acter was for English individualism the proper object for dramatic poetry. — Alfred FouiLLtE, Kevue des Deux Mondes, October I, i8g8.
Public Service and the Question of Monopolies in the United States. —
Monopoly constituted in opposition to the will of cities or states is a purely American phenomenon. The administration of continental Europe offers no examples of it. It results from the peculiar conception which obtained in the United States in the first half of this century concerning the functions of the state, of local government, and of city administration. These functions were reduced to a minimum. Material condi- tions then permitted it ; agriculture was the ruling occupation, and there were few great fortunes. Besides, Anglo-Saxon spirit tended to organize strongly private life and to defend it from all intervention of public powers rather than to assure the devel- opment of these latter. But, the habit of treating public affairs as if they were pri- vate produced a veritable confusion. Concessions were granted to companies in every case where they could be made. But in place of imposing guarantees upon these companies in ceding to them all or part of their monopoly, the public authorities exercised their ingenuity to put them in competition with one another, thinking that competition would assure cheapness here as in ordinary affairs. Since the public put all its hope in the efficiency of competition, it was very disagreeably surprised to see that here competition did not long persist. The situation was all the more serious because the public found itself disarmed. Monopoly was organized against it and without compensation. The means which people had imagined would prevent it proved an illusion. The companies, often provided with perpetual charters, shut themselves up in their rights. The only resource which remained was to attack them in the name of the common law or by means of laws against trusts, which declared null all combinations which aimed at monopoly. Neither of these means, however, has been very efficacious. While in private industry a conjunction of exceptional cir- cumstances is necessary to create monopoly, in the organization of public services it is the nature of the business which creates the monopoly. Instead of being excep- tional, as in ordinary affairs, monopoly is here natural, normal, obligatory, and noth- ing is efficient against it. The abandonment of a public service without sufficient guarantee is here what has produced the abuse.
There are two principal sorts of trusts in the public service of the United States : those in the municipal service and those in the telegraphic service. Among the most prominent of the former are the gas companies. They obtained their charters at a period when the belief in the sovereign efficacy of competition was still intact. Thus five or six companies were often given charters in the same city. These afterward combined tacitly or openly to form a trust. The most conspicuous of these has been the Chicago Gas Trust. All legislative and legal efforts to kill this trust have been in vain, and it is still in existence. The situation is somewhat different for street rail- ways, elevated roads, and other means of public transport. Inasmuch as street rail- ways are much more recent than the use of gas, the municipalities have lost some faith in the efficacy of competition when it is a matter of public service ; and they accordingly grant to transit companies licenses necessary for the construction of their roads. Generally they also exact a compensation. The tendency is to make the com- pensation greater and to limit the franchises to a shorter period.
The American telegraphs are in the hands of two companies only, the Western Union and the Postal Telegraph Company. These also practically form a trust. They have one tariff for the ordinary public, another for certain large business houses, and especially the press syndicate known as the Associated Press. A comparison of rates with the European systems is difficult to make, and, as usually made, is fallacious. This is at least true of Gunton's comparison. A strict comparison of American rates
