University of Michigan - Michiganensian Yearbook (Ann Arbor, MI)

Page 26 text:

comprehensive, as the responsibility of the tax-payer for the use to which his money is put. It means responsiveness to, or vital interest in, every- thing ' with which we have relations. It is a responsibility that is self- executing and not dependent upon a penalty for its enforcement. The interest of every alumnus to his Alma Mater constitutes in this sense a responsibility for the welfare of the University. And Professor Adams does not insist that that form of ojective property has been discovered which can create a sense of this responsibility; but just as the astronomer can determine that there must be a star somewhere influencing the move- ments of known planets, so it is reasonable to assume that there is a form of property to be discovered which can create this responsibility, or responsiveness. Then the trust will not crush heartlessly the small employer, then the small employer will not bleed his workmen, and the workmen will not resort to destructive strikes to gain their rights, for each will have shares in this peculiar form of property that will make them inter-responsive and harmonious. As president of the American Economic Association, Professor Adams delivered an address before the session of December, 1898, which attracted universal attention. In Economics and Jurisprudence, the title under which the address was published in Economic Studies, he calls atten- tion to the confusion in economic theory and the discord in industrial life, and explains them as due to an inadequate expression by formal law of fundamental industrial rights; the conception of industrial rights having evolved from the individualistic stage, while the theories of jurisprudence are those of eighteenth century individualism. The point of view, he says, has been shifted from the individual to the whole; the social inter- est, the social impulse, the social aim, must be more clearly recognized by formal rules of conduct. Provided two things in particular rind this formal expression, Professor Adams is willing to trust the future to vol- untary individual association. The two things are rights and responsi- bility; rights that are fundamental, and a responsibility that works in the same manner to both parties to a contract. Too long has consideration been given to rights alone, the problem is one of rights and responsibility. This address as translated for Schmoller ' s Jahrbuc i fdr Gesetzgebung und Volkwirtschaft im Deutschen Reich for 1898, under the title Volkirirtxcliaft und Rechtsordnung. So far we have called attention only to Professor Adams ' mono- graphs and shorter articles, and not to all of these. His first work, we have seen, was one in Finance, a subject upon which he contributed dur-

Page 25 text:

among ' a people incompatible with a choice of monarchical forms. Democ- 1 racy is not merely a political form, but constitutes an element in the general life of the present age. On the Education of Statesmen appeared in the Princeton Review for January, 1884. In this article Professor Adams took the position that among a people that has adopted laissez jaire as the maxim of control in its public policy, a higher political education can hardly flourish, inas- much as among such a people all thought tends to effect a negation of activity. Professor Adams was of the opinion, however, that a change was taking place in this regard in the United States, and the past few years have seen a verification of his prophesy. The Forum of July, 1886, contained Shall ive Muzzle the Anarchists? in which he emphasizes once more a favorite idea, by arguing that danger comes not from too great freedom of speech, but from too little sense of personal responsibility. About this time the demand for a paper read before the Constitution Club of New York, lead to its expansion and pub- lication under the title the State in Relation to Industrial Action. This trea- tise begins with a consideration of laissez faire as a maxim of control, and states that, while much the doctrine contains seems true, the authority of the English Economy is shattered beyond recovery, its fundamental error being that it regards the state as a necessary evil. But the German political philosophy, he argues, is as erroneous in considering the state an organism complete within itself. The problem is to harmonize gov- ernmental activity and private enterprise, society being the entity about which all our reasoning should centre. The social harmony may be restored by extending the duties of the state, especially along two lines; by allowing it to determine the plane of competitive action, and by allow- ing it to realize for -society the benefits of monopoly. The choice, he says, lies between individualism and socialism, compromise being impos- sible. To the former of these Professor Adams is willing to adhere, believing that the solution of the problem lies in an extension of the old principle of personal responsibility, which must be accepted fearlessly and applied without reserve. Inasmuch as this idea of laying greater emphasis on the principle of personal responsibility is a favorite one of Professor Adams, it may not be out of place to define the meaning of responsibility as here used. It does not mean such responsibility as that of all of us before the law the responsibility of the public officer guilty of embezzlement, or of the student who rides his bicycle on the walks. It means something more

Page 27 text:

ing these years many articles to magazines and reviews. Finally in 1887, appeared Public Debt a: An Essay in the Science of Finance, the first compre- hensive work on the subject to appear in the United States. One of the important lessons of the civil war was that the finances of a government in such crises cannot be administered in an empirical way without sore disaster. This work was one of the scientific treatises brought forth by this lesson, and is considered an authority on the administration of public debts. The chapter on the management of finances in time of war was translated for the use of the Japanese Government at the outbreak of the late war with China, and during the past year the entire work has been translated. The Science of Finance, An Investigation oj Public Expenditures and Public Revenues appeared in the fall of 1898. This is Professor Adams ' greatest contribution to scholarship. It is a work of such magnitude and of such aspirations that it would be impossible to attempt an analysis of it here. It was awaited by scholars with great expectations, and these expectations were not disappointed. At once recognized as a lasting contribution, and as marking a turning point in the history of Ameri- can political literature and an epoch in the discussions of fiscal prob- lems. The chief merit of the work has been declared to be the masterly power of analysis in the representation of the newer and saner views. Professor Seligman, of Columbia, than whom no one is more competent to speak, said: It is perhaps no exaggeration to say that Professor Adams is at the head of those American scholars who have grasped the essential spirit of modern industrial life; and it is likewise no exaggera- tion to claim for this volume the distinction of being one of the most original, the most suggestive and the most brilliant productions that have made their appearance in recent decades. We have found the exposition of Professor Adams literary work so interesting that our space is nearly exhausted and half has not been told. His life has been devoted to many other activities than writing and teaching. He is one of the ed itorial committee of the International Journal of Ethics. He was chairman of the transportation department of the eleventh census. He has been since 1888 statistician of the Inter- State Commerce Commission, and for the past year or more has been conducting a statistical investigation, for the use of a committee of Con- gress, of the decrease in the cost to the railroads of carrying United States mail. During the past summer he had at work under him in this investigation some twelve or fifteen students and four college professors.