The Present Scope of Government

To get an every-day basis for discussing the present scope of government in America, let us view rapidly the experiences of an imaginary Bostonian during a day differing in no respect from ordinary days ; in short, an average daily record of an average man.

He begins the day by bathing in water supplied by the public through an elaborate system of public pumps and reservoirs and pipes. After it has been used, the water escapes through the citizen’s own plumbing system ; but this private plumbing system has been constructed in accordance with public regulations, is liable to inspection by public officials, and empties into sewers constructed and managed by the public. When he has dressed himself in clothing of which every article is probably the subject of a national tariff intended to affect production or price, our Bostonian goes to his breakfast-table, and finds there not only table linen, china, glass, knives, forks, and spoons, each of them coming under the same national protection, but also food, almost all of which has been actually or potentially inspected, or otherwise regulated, by the national or state or municipal government. The meat has been liable to inspection. The bread has been made by the baker in loaves of a certain statutory weight. The butter, if it happens to be oleomargarine, has been packed and stamped as statutes require. The milk has been furnished by a milkman whose dairy is officially inspected, and whose milk must reach a certain statutory standard. The chocolate has been bought in cakes stamped in the statutory manner. The remnants of the breakfast will be carried away by public garbage carts ; and the public will also care for the ashes of the coal that cooked the meal.

Nor do this average Bostonian and his family escape from public control upon rising from the table. The children are compelled by law to go to school; and though there is an option to attend a private school, the city gratuitously furnishes a school and school-books. As for the father himself, when he reaches his door, he finds that public servants are girdling his trees with burlap, and searching his premises for traces of the gypsy moth. Without stopping to reflect that he has not been asked to permit these public servants to go upon his property, he steps out upon a sidewalk constructed in accordance with public requirements, crosses a street paved and watered and swept by the public, and enters a street car whose route, speed, and fare are regulated by the public. Reaching the centre of the city, he ascends to his office by an elevator subject to public inspection, and reads the mad that has been brought to him from all parts of the United States by public servants. If the dimness of his office causes him to regret that sunlight appears to be outside public protection, he may be answered that there are regulations controlling the height of buildings and prohibiting the malicious construction of high fences. If now he leaves his office and goes to some store or factory in which he owns an interest, he finds that for female employees chairs must be provided, that children must not be employed in certain kinds of work, that dangerous machinery must be fenced, that fire-escapes must be furnished, and probably that the goods produced or sold must be marked or packed in a prescribed way, or must reach a statutory standard. Indeed, whatever this man’s business may be, the probability is that in one way or another the public’s hand comes between him and his employee, or between him and his customer.

Leaving his store or his factory, this average man deposits money in a bank, which is carefully inspected by public officials, and which is compelled by the public to refrain from specified modes of investment and also to publish periodical statements of its condition. He next makes a payment to an insurance company, which is subject to even stricter statutory regulations. He then goes to East Boston and back upon a ferry-boat owned and managed by the public.

When finally all the business of the day is finished, this imaginary Bostonian walks through the Common and the Public Garden, and soon enters the Public Library, a building that is the latest and most striking expression of the public’s interest in the individual. Leaving the Public Library, be strolls past a free bathhouse sustained by the public, and then past a free public outdoor gymnasium; and at last he hastens home through streets that public servants are now beginning to light.

When this Bostonian reaches home, he can reflect that he has passed no very extraordinary day. If events had been a little different, the public would have furnished steam fire-engines to protect his house, or a policeman to find a lost child for him, or an ambulance to take his cook to the city hospital, or a health officer to inspect his neighbor’s premises. No one of these emergencies has arisen, and yet this average Bostonian, if he has happened to think of the various ways in which he has this day been affected by Public control, must wonder whether his morning’s conception of the functions of government was adequate,

The functions of government may be conveniently divided into three classes : the primary, the incidental, and the enlarged. These classes shade into one another, for this classification is merely an attempt to draw a bright line near the place where a blurred line actually exists.

According to the classification here made, the primary functions of government are simply those which attain the chief purposes of organized society, and are almost absolutely essential to one’s conception of a civilized country. These functions are protection from foreign interference, preservation of domestic peace, and — closely connected with the preservation of domestic peace — maintenance of courts of justice.

Incidental functions are those which exist for the aiding of the primary functions. Thus, incident to protection from foreign interference is maintenance of forts, of navy yards, of military schools. Incident to the preservation of domestic peace are armories and the criminal law. Incident to the administration of justice, and in general to the prevention of private disputes, are a recording system, and also statutes as to forms of instruments, as to inheritance and administration of estates, and as to weights and measures. Incident to all the primary functions is taxation, in so far as taxation simply aims to collect funds for paying public expenses ; but in so far as taxation aims to encourage or discourage certain kinds of business, or to prevent the accumulation of large fortunes, taxation belongs with the enlarged functions of government.

Obviously, the primary and the incidental functions are numerous and comprehensive ; but they are not the special subjects of this discussion. The present purpose is to deal with those functions to which — not wishing just now to indicate either approval or disapproval, nor even by epithet to depart from mere enumeration — I have given the colorless designation of “ enlarged functions ;" meaning thereby that they seem not to belong with the universal and absolutely essential primary functions, nor yet with the incidental functions, but to represent a widened conception of the sphere of government, — a conception that, whether it be right or wrong, certainly is full of interest and importance. The enlarged scope of government, then, has to do with matters that conceivably may be, and in many countries actually are, left unrestrictedly in the hands of individuals ; for example, the quality of goods offered for sale, the skill of plumbers, and the care of roads.

The vast number of interests to which modern cities turn their attention, and also the distinction as to primary, incidental, and enlarged functions, may be seen in a simple list of the administrative departments of Boston. Two departments are devoted chiefly to the primary functions, the board of police and the board of commissioners of public institutions ; though, in so far as the powers of the latter board extend beyond penal institutions, and include institutions caring for paupers and lunatics, this board is employed upon the enlarged functions of government. Eleven departments are devoted chiefly to the incidental functions: the board of assessors, the city collector, the city treasurer, the city auditor, the board of commissioners of sinking funds, the superintendent of public buildings, the superintendent of public grounds, the city registrar, the registrar of voters, the superintendent of printing, and the law department managed by the corporation counsel and the city solicitor. Twentytwo departments are devoted chiefly to the enlarged functions : the overseers of the poor, the water board, the water registrar, the board of health, the inspector of milk and vinegar, the inspector of provisions, the city hospital, the board of street commissioners (a department whose jurisdiction includes, in addition to activities obviously suggested by the mere title, sanitary police, streetcleaning, street - watering, garbage removal, and sewers), the superintendent of streets, the commissioner of wires, the superintendent of lamps, the superintendent of ferries, the board of fire commissioners, the inspector of buildings, the school committee, the board of trustees of the public library, the board of park commissioners, the superintendent of markets, the sealer of weights and measures, the city surveyor, the city engineer, and the trustees of Mount Hope Cemetery ; and in addition there are numerous weighers of coal, measurers of grain, and inspectors, who are not attached to specific departments, and whose duties are part of the enlarged scope of government. Two important administrative departments — namely, the mayor and the city clerk — cannot be said to be devoted chiefly to any one of the three classes of functions. Doubtless there may be question as to the propriety of the classification of some of the departments, and doubtless there are differences between the functions of municipal government in Boston and those in other cities; but after all possible amendments are made, it must remain obvious that in municipal administration the enlarged functions predominate.

The functions of municipalities do not have their chief source in municipal legislative bodies. It is a fact that the ordinances adopted by these bodies are numerous and minute ; but these ordinances deal almost exclusively with subjects that, expressly or by clear implication, are placed within municipal control by the statutes of the state. This is one of the reasons why, for the present purpose, it is impracticable to treat separately the municipal functions, the state functions, and the national functions.

Indeed, the real distinction that divides some of the enlarged functions from others is a distinction that has nothing to do with the boundary between city and state, nor with the boundary tween state and nation. The important distinction is that in some instances government undertakes the actual doing of work, but that in other instances it simply regulates—by encouragement, partial restraint, prohibition, or otherwise — the actions of individuals. Examples are, on the one hand, the inspection of milk and the maintenance of public schools ; and on the other, the requirements that milk offered for sale shall reach a specified standard, and that children of a certain age shall go to school.

For the sake of brevity, the chief instances of enlarged functions of government, whether municipal, state, or national, will now be given in one place. It is to be understood that, unless the federal government is specially named, the functions are exercised under the direct or indirect authority of states.

The following, then, is a list of the seventeen chief groups of instances in which government merely regulates private action : —

To promote morality, there is regulation — sometimes by taxation only — of gambling and of the sale of Intoxicating liquors. To the same end, the federal government does not permit lotteries to use the mails. The promotion of morality, it should be noticed, is the place where the enlarged scope of government is most nearly connected with the criminal law.

To prevent disease, whether contagious or not, there are regulations as to dangerous medicines, poisons, vaccination, the quality of food offered for sale, plumbing, and the lighting of tenement-houses. For the same purpose, the federal government regulates interstate transportation of diseased cattle.

To prevent accidents that might cause bodily injury, there are regulations as to steam-engines, elevators, belting, hatchways in factories, the fencing of some kinds of machinery, the management of mines, and the construction and management of railways (including provisions as to fencing, brakes, couplers, signals, and color-blindness). For the same general purpose, the federal statutes contain minute provisions as to steamers and sailing vessels (dealing with life-boats, lifepreservers, water-tight bulkheads, stairways, transportation of nitro-glycerine, number of passengers, signals, and rules of the road).

To prevent loss of life or of property by fire, there are regulations as to fireescapes, and as to the height and material and construction and management of buildings (including sometimes requirements that in churches and halls doors shall open outward and there shall be no movable seats in the aisles). To prevent loss by fire in ships, the federal statutes contain provisions as to wire tiller-ropes, fire-extinguishers, fire-buckets, and the transportation of inflammable materials.

To facilitate communication, there is encouragement of turnpikes, bridges, ferries, railways, and telegraphs, by concession of the right of eminent domain ; and there are regulations as to charges of hacks and of railways, both street and steam, frequency of railway trains, and consolidation of railways owning parallel lines. The federal government, for the same general purpose, has adopted minute regulations as to railway rates for interstate service, and has made as to maritime travel many regulations, some of which are named elsewhere in this enumeration.

To prevent loss to stockholders and others through mismanagement of certain large enterprises, there are minute regulations as to the finances of banks, building associations, insurance companies, and railway companies. The federal government, in turn, regulates the national banks. As to banks, the provisions are so minute as almost to constitute a textbook in themselves.

To prevent owners of land from damaging other owners or the public, there are regulations (in a general way resembling the common law of nuisances) as to stables, slaughter-houses, cemeteries, dilapidated or dangerous buildings, high buildings, high fences, barbed-wire fences, and noxious weeds.

To prevent estates from becoming too large, there are inheritance taxes and income taxes, in addition to the long-standing abolition of primogeniture and of entail.

To encourage many kinds of business, the federal government provides a protective tariff.

To protect children, there are regulations requiring education, restricting employment in certain occupations, and forbidding the sale of cigarettes and of intoxicating liquors.

To protect workingmen in various trades, there are regulations as to the hours of labor, seats for women, and the payment of wages in cash and at certain intervals. With the same view, the federal government prohibits the importation of contract labor ; and as to seamen, the federal government makes minute requirements covering mode of paying wages, medicines, provisions, clothing, and form of contract.

To protect steerage passengers, there are federal statutes as to ventilation, food, and the use of a range.

To prevent necessitous persons from suffering burdensome losses, there are usury laws, exemptions from execution, and provisions as to foreclosure of mortgages. Here belong also state insolvency laws and the national bankruptcy law, when enacted.

To secure uniformity in articles important to the public, there are provisions as to the quality of gas, the packing of fish, etc. ; and here, apparently, is to be classed regulation of adulteration of food, in so far as the intent is not simply to protect health.

To prevent combinations that might result in enhancing the price of articles important to the public, the federal government legislates against trusts.

To secure the continuance of certain natural products useful to the public, there are close seasons for fish and game. To the same class belongs the federal government’s attempt to protect seals.

To prevent abuses in employments of public importance, there are regulations requiring licenses for hack-drivers, auctioneers, peddlers, keepers of intelligence offices, innkeepers, keepers of billiardtables, keepers of public halls, plumbers, sellers of explosives, druggists, physicians.

So much for the instances of mere regulation, including restriction and encouragement. The following is a list of the fifteen chief groups of instances in which government undertakes the actual doing of work : —

To educate the young, there are public schools, colleges, and institutions for technical and professional instruction. To promote all these kinds of education, the federal government has made gifts of land to the various states.

To educate adults, there are public libraries, museums, and art galleries. For the same purpose, the nation provides the Library of Congress and the National Museum.

To disseminate useful information, especially information supposed to be useful to farmers and to mechanics, there are provisions for collecting and publishing facts as to geology, soils, plants, abandoned farms, and the statistics of labor. This class of work has largely passed into the hands of the national government. The Departments of State, of Agriculture, and of the Interior make most elaborate investigations, and publish the results in documents so numerous and valuable that a mere examination of a catalogue of governmental publications must fill any intelligent man with wonder. These investigations and publications are made, of course, under the authority of acts of Congress ; but the acts are couched in general terms, and nothing less than actual inspection of the departments and of the publications can give an adequate conception of the vast amount of scientific work now done under the federal government. One item is that the federal government supports at least one agricultural experiment station in each state. Another item is that the Agricultural Department contains a bureau to which one may send for examination any plant suspected of being infected with disease. Another instance of enlarged activity is the weather bureau. Indeed, in almost every branch of science the federal government employs experts, who are engaged in investigation or exploration.

To promote pleasure, there are public parks, flower-gardens, menageries, gymnasiums, swimming-baths, band concerts, and displays of fireworks. It is for the same purpose, chiefly, that the federal government cares for the Yellowstone National Park and other reservations, and occasionally aids a national exposition.

To help the poor, partly for the sake of the poor themselves and partly for the sake of public peace and health, there are almshouses, outdoor relief, public hospitals, dispensaries, and other public charities. To the same end, the nation provides hospitals for merchant seamen.

To prevent disease, there are provisions for the inspection of plumbing and of food, for the cleansing or destruction of buildings dangerous to health, for the removal of garbage, and for the building and maintenance of sewers. To the same end, the federal government makes elaborate provisions as to inspection of cattle shipped from state to state and as to quarantine, and gives to the national board of health wide powers as to cholera, smallpox, and yellow fever.

To secure the performance of a service closely connected with health, and also with the extinguishment of fires, the state permits municipalities to construct and manage water-works.

To prevent accidents, the state inspects steam-engines, elevators, and mines. To the same end, the federal government inspects the hulls and boilers of vessels carrying passengers or freight.

To prevent loss of life and property by fire, the state authorizes the maintenance of local fire departments.

To prevent loss of life by shipwreck, the federal government provides life-saving stations.

To facilitate communication, the state authorizes the building and maintenance of public roads, streets, sidewalks, bridges, and ferries, the cleaning and watering and lighting of streets, sometimes even the ownership of railways. To the same end, the federal government maintains the post-office system, improves rivers and harbors, builds and maintains lighthouses, and conducts the coast survey.

To promote domestic trade in products of farmers, graziers, and fishermen, there are public market-houses. To promote a foreign demand for similar products, the federal government inspects cattle for export.

To secure a permanent supply of certain natural or semi-natural products, some states have drainage and irrigation systems, and some states exterminate noxious weeds and insects, — the latter function somewhat resembling the obsolescent payment of bounties for killing bears and wolves. For the same general purpose, the federal government distributes seeds, propagates fish, and maintains fishways.

To secure efficiency in certain matters peculiarly important to the public, there are examiners of physicians and of engineers. To the same end. the federal government examines ship captains, mates, ship engineers, and pilots.

To secure decent and permanent care of the dead, municipalities own and manage cemeteries.

Any one inspecting these lists will perceive that the classification is largely a matter of opinion, and, no doubt, that the lists omit items worthy of being included. Some omissions, however, are intentional,—for example, the encouragement that exemption from taxation gives to churches, incorporated schools, incorporated hospitals, and the like, because the reason for the exemption is probably not a conscious desire to promote such purposes, but rather a perception that property devoted to these purposes is necessarily unproductive. Again, there has been an intentional omission of the liquor dispensaries of South Carolina, because this instance of governmental action is exceptional. The purpose, in short, has been to select and classify the instances that indicate the average condition of government throughout the United States, and the theories upon which legislators frame the laws.

Upon the very surface of the facts thus presented float in full view numerous inferences. One is that wide functions are not phenomena of the municipality as distinguished from the state and the nation. Another is that it is impossible to draw a definite line separating matters with which government interferes from matters with which government does not interfere. The general theory, obviously, is that government restricts or encourages private acts when, and only when, such acts concern the public ; and that government undertakes the performance of acts when, and only when, the acts are important to the public, and are practically incapable of satisfactory performance by individuals. But this theory does not make a clear distinction, although probably it makes as clear a distinction as is practicable in a field like this, — a field where law and statesmanship seem to meet and discuss questions of expediency.

It is necessary now to pass from these obvious inferences, and to discuss the apparent change that has taken place in the theory and practice of American legislation within a hundred years.

Doubtless, in America, as in all other civilized countries, the scope of government has always exceeded the prevention of foreign aggression, the promotion of domestic tranquillity, the administration of justice, and natural incidents of these primary functions. There have always been town clocks, town pumps, town cemeteries, and public roads. Yet surely, from the enumeration of the functions now exercised, it is clear that — with a few exceptions, such as the direct and indirect support of religion and the control of the rate of interest — the grasp of government is closer now than it was a hundred years ago.

To some extent, the increase of regulation and of activity has simply widened functions long recognized. One example is the improvement in the care of the poor ; and another is the progress as to roads. In many instances, however, there has been a development of functions that a hundred years ago were wholly, or almost wholly, non-existent. Examples of new or almost new functions are education of adults, dissemination of useful information, and prevention of accidents..

Whether manifested in enlarging old functions or in creating new ones, the development has been due largely to those advances in science and skill which both create new desires and enable old desires to be gratified more abundantly. The enlargement of the postal service has been rendered possible by the use of steam, and the rise of hospitals has followed discoveries in medical science. Further, the extension of governmental functions has been promoted by another cause, — indirectly connected with advances in science and skill, — a new perception of the public value of intelligence and of æsthetic culture. Only thus can one account for the great development in the education of the young, the dissemination of information, and the maintenance of libraries, museums, and parks. Again, a more or less unconscious demand for extension has come from the growing custom — principally resultant from modern inventions — of doing all things in a large way; and so it has happened that there seems to be a need of regulating great private enterprises, whose powers, if abused, might injure the public, and that there even seems to be an occasion now and then for the government itself to undertake important functions peculiarly suited to large treatment, and not deemed likely to be satisfactorily managed by individuals. Examples are the regulation of railways and of banks, and the construction and maintenance of waterworks.

Such are some of the causes aiding the development of the enlarged functions of government. This development has involved to some extent a departure from the political theories and instincts that chiefly guided American statesmen a hundred years ago. The views then popular had their main encouragement in the works of certain French philosophers, who represented a violent revolt against governmental control. The philosophical basis for the revolt was found in tire theory that, by reason of the benevolent construction of the universe, each man’s pursuit of his own personal welfare must result eventually in the welfare of the whole world. From that principle political philosophers inferred that the system of natural liberty is both theoretically and practically the best, and that there should be but slight interference by government. From that school of thought, so influential in America at the time of our Revolution, the present scope of government indicates at least an apparent departure.

Indeed, a departure seemed inevitable. The true basis of the theory adopted in the eighteenth century appears to be found in the fact that in the early years of that century it was natural enough to protest against the wide powers exercised by sovereigns. Governmental control had gone very far ; and even if it had not gone far, it must have excited hostility by reason of seeming to exist for the benefit, not of the many, but of the few. A protest was inevitable, and the philosophical theory as to the benefits of natural liberty was the easy formula for the protest. As soon, however, as government became the property of the people themselves, administered by the agents of the people, and guided almost invariably — as every one believes, notwithstanding jests to the contrary — by an intention to promote the common welfare, there ceased to be a visible reason for emphasizing the old formula. From a merely practical point of view, it is reasonable enough for one to be willing that government should do to-day what in the last century might have been deemed tyrannical. If government be considered as an enemy, it may easily be called despotic ; but if it be conceived as a fairly intelligent and well-meaning agency, controlled by the people themselves, " despotic ” ceases to be an easy epithet. Hence it was natural that there should be a reaction from the theory of our early statesmen.

Yet does it not seem probable that the reaction would excite opposition ? The fact is that it has come without elaborate discussion and almost without notice. It does not mark the success of a political party, nor even the triumph of a political thinker, whether statesman or theorist. Still less does it mark a concession to the threats of agitators. Governmental functions have grown silently, naturally, like the rings of a tree.

Why is this ? Why has not the apparent departure from the old theory excited attention and opposition ? One reason, as already indicated, is that the practical cause for emphasizing the importance of individual liberty has disappeared. Another reason is that the civil war seems to have diminished the willingness of our people to enter into discussion as to the proper power of government, whether state or national. Another and more important reason is that the apparent change of theory is really a mere change in the relative emphasis placed upon fundamental principles of our legal and political system.

In one aspect the common law emphasizes the sanctity of private right. That “an Englishman’s house is his castle,” that one accused of crime is entitled to a trial by jury, that private property cannot be taken save by due process of law, that private contracts shall be inviolate, — these and other formulas, ancient and modern, illustrate this phase of the law. Yet it has been possible for these formulas to exist for centuries in fairly friendly association with principles of quite opposite import. That private property must not be used in such manner as to cause a nuisance ; that private property may be appropriated, fair compensation being given, under the theory of eminent domain ; that private property may be destroyed in order to stop a conflagration ; that contracts contrary to public policy will not be enforced, — these and numerous other doctrines have long illustrated another phase of the law, a phase indicating that private rights are sometimes to be subordinated to the interests of the public. In the Germania of Tacitus, the liberty of the individual is no more conspicuous than is the wide scope of the power of the community ; and thus, from our very earliest glimpse of the primitive system from which our common law is believed to descend, there have been in our law two phases, private right and public interest.

This, then, is the reason why, when government after the American Revolution became more truly an agency of the people, and when the advance in our knowledge of natural forces made it more possible to do things in a large way, and when the rise of powerful combinations of capital gave occasion for turning to government to curb the increase of private power, and to assume new functions and enlarge old ones, it was possible to enlarge the scope of government without friction, and even without discussion. Legislation grew just as the common law grows, not in a spectacular way, but along old lines, almost automatically adjusting preexisting theories to new emergencies.

Is the result beneficial ? Undoubtedly there are defects, including occasionally an unnecessary and therefore unwise assumption of work, and occasionally an unnecessary and therefore unjust encroachment upon individual liberty, — defects giving clear notice that there is necessity for the exercise of perpetual vigilance; but, looking at the question in a large way, it seems clear that the growth of governmental functions thus far has been wise and necessary. How else could the great mass of the people have secured schools, libraries, parks, water, sewers, protection against fire ? How else could they have been protected against unwholesome food and against overcharges for transportation ? How else could many of the advances in knowledge have been prevented from benefiting almost exclusively a narrow circle ?

Nor have these desirable results been obtained at an unreasonable cost. The expenditures of the city of Boston are larger per capita than those of most cities. Yet for the current year, what is the total amount of taxes, for all city, county, and state purposes, paid by a Bostonian whose taxable property is reasonably worth $15,000, and whose income from a profession or a trade is $4000 ? The sum is $221. This is about nine times the average payment made by the inhabitants of Boston on account of property and income. The city has other sources of revenue, such as license fees and the corporation tax ; but, after all statistics are taken into account, it appears that the sum named, $221, amply covers the cost of furnishing to a family of five or six persons, at the hands of the city, county, and state, the many services (primary, incidental, and enlarged) already indicated, including police, fire department, streets, parks, sewers, charitable institutions, library, schools, and school-books. In private hands, how far would $221 go toward securing these numerous services ? Notwithstanding the extravagance of some public officials, — an extravagance that probably characterizes the same persons in private life, — so expensive is small administration as compared with large administration that the sum thus paid for those numerous public services would hardly procure from a private school the mere tuition of two children ; and besides, in thoroughness of instruction and in completeness of outfit few private schools would seek comparison with the schools furnished by the public. Still further, while laziness and inefficiency are no doubt the rule in most occupations, both public and private, it is quite as invariably the rule that public service is not less skillful and satisfactory than private service. Is your cook more efficient, on the average, than the policeman or the fireman ? Does the gas company give better service than the water department ? Does a telegraph company give greater satisfaction than the post-office ?

As to the future, what can one say ? Simply that what has happened heretofore is likely to continue to happen. There is no sufficient reason to dread that by and by government will begin to interfere dangerously with individual liberty, or to undertake more than it can perform successfully ; nor, on the other hand, is there sufficient reason to dread that government will fail to enlarge its scope as soon as there is seen to be a necessity for enlargement. For centuries two intents have guided the law, whether statutory or judge-made : the intent to guard individual liberty and the intent to secure the public welfare. There is no reason to believe that one of these deep-seated intents will be uprooted. The actual scope of government must continue to be the resultant of the interplay of a natural desire for enlargement of governmental functions and an equally natural repugnance to unnecessary enlargement. Precisely what the resultant will be at any one time no one can predict ; but from an enumeration of the functions constituting the actual scope of government today, no one can reasonably fail to gain new respect for popular institutions and new hope for the next century.

Eugene Wambaugh.