Certain problems suggested by the foregoing analysis are unsettled, for the issues are so involved, and in some cases, both the facts and their interpretations are so much in controversy, that we cannot yet formulate sure moral judgments. On the other hand, certain principles emerge with a good degree of clearness. We state some of the more obvious.

1. Wealth and Property are Subordinate in Importance to Personality.—The life is more than meat. Most agree to this, stated abstractly, but many fail to make the application. They may sacrifice their own health, or human sympathy, or family life; or they may consent to this actively or passively as employers, or consumers, or citizens, in the case of others. A civilization which loses life in providing the means to live is not highly moral. A society which can afford luxuries for some cannot easily justify unhealthful conditions of production, or lack of general education. An individual who gratifies a single appetite at the expense of vitality and efficiency is immoral. A society which considers wealth or property as ultimate, whether under a conception of "natural rights" or otherwise, is setting the means above the end, and is therefore unmoral or immoral.

2. Wealth Should Depend on Activity.—The highest aspect of life on its individual side is found in active and resolute achievement, in the embodying of purpose in action. Thought, discovery, creation, mark a higher value than the satisfaction of wants, or the amassing of goods. If the latter is to be a help it must stimulate activity, not deaden it. Inherited wealth without any accompanying incitement from education or class feeling or public opinion would be a questionable institution from this point of view. Veblen in his Theory of the Leisure Class points out various forms of degeneration that may attend upon leisure, when leisure means not merely release from mechanical labor in the interest of more intellectual activity, but a relinquishing of all serious labor. As the race has made its ascent in the presence of an environment which has constantly selected the more active persons, society in its institutions and consciously directed processes may well plan to keep this balance between activity and reward. Modern charity has adopted this principle. We fear to pauperize by giving aid to the poor unless we can provide some form of self-help. But in its treatment of the rich, society is not solicitous. Our provisions for inheritance of property undoubtedly pauperize a certain proportion of those who inherit. Whether this can be prevented without interfering with motives to activity on the part of those who acquire the property, or whether the rich thus pauperized are not as well worth saving to society as the poor, will undoubtedly become more pressing problems as the number of inheritors increases, and society recognizes that it may have a duty to its idle rich as well as to its idle poor.

3. Public Service Should Go Along with Wealth.—Note that we do not say, "wealth should be proportionate to public service." This would take us at once into the controversy between the individualist and the socialist which we shall consider later among the unsettled problems. The individualist, as represented, for example, by Herbert Spencer, would say that except for the young, the aged, or the sick, reward should be proportioned to merit. The socialist, on the other hand, is more inclined to say, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs." In either case, it is assumed that there should be public service. Leaving for later consideration the question whether we can fix any quantitative rule, let us notice at this time why some service is a fundamental moral principle.

Such service in the form of some economically useful contribution, whether to the production and distribution of goods, to the public order, to education, to the satisfaction of Æsthetic and religious wants, might be demanded as a matter of common honesty. This would be to treat it as a just claim made by society upon each of its members. There is, of course, no legal claim. The law is far from adopting as a universal maxim, "If any man will not work, neither let him eat." Vagrancy is not a term applied to all idlers. It is sufficient for the law if some of a man's ancestors obtained possession and title by service, or force, or gift. Modern law, in its zeal to strengthen the institution of property, releases all the owner's posterity forever from the necessity of any useful service. The old theology used to carry the conception of inherited or imputed sin and merit to extremes which modern individualism rejects. But the law—at least in the United States—permits a perpetual descent of inherited property; i.e., of inherited permission to receive from society without rendering any personal return. Theologically and morally, however, the man of to-day repudiates any conception which would reduce him to a shadow of another. He wishes to stand on his own feet, to be rewarded or blamed according to his own acts, not because of a deed of some one else. To follow out this principle in the economic sphere would require that every man who receives aught from others should feel in duty bound to render some service. Merely "to have been born" is hardly sufficient in a democratic society, however munificent a contribution to the social weal the French aristocrat may have felt this to be.

But it is only one aspect of the case to say that society may claim service as a just due. There is another aspect—what this service means to the person himself. It is his opportunity to fulfill his function in the social organism. Now a person is as large as his purpose and will. The person, therefore, who identifies his purposes with the welfare of the public is thereby identifying himself with the whole social body. He is no longer himself alone; he is a social power. Not only the leader of society, but every efficient servant makes himself an organ through which society itself acts and moves forward. This is perhaps most conspicuous in the case of the great inventors or organizers of industry and society. By serving civilization they have become its bearers and have thus shared its highest pulses. But it is true of every laborer. As he is an active contributor he becomes creative, not merely receptive.

4. The Change from Individual to Collective Methods, of Industry and Business Demands a Change from Individual to Collective Types of Morality.—Moral action is either to accomplish some positive good or to hinder some wrong or evil. But under present conditions the individual by himself is practically helpless and useless for either purpose. It was formerly possible for a man to set a high standard and live up to it, irrespective of the practice or coÖperation of others. When a seller's market was limited to his acquaintance or a limited territory, it might well be that honesty or even fair dealing was the best policy. But with the changes that have come in business conditions the worse practices, like a baser coinage, tend to drive out the morally better. This may not apply so thoroughly to the relations between seller and buyer, but it applies to many aspects of trade. A merchant may desire to pay his women clerks wages on which they can support life without selling their souls. But if his rival across the street pays only half the wage necessary for subsistence, it is evident the former is in so far at a disadvantage. Extend the same policy. Let the former have his goods made under good conditions and the latter have no scruple against "sweating"; let the former pay taxes on an honest estimate and the latter "see" the assessor, or threaten to move out of town if he is assessed for more than a figure named by himself; let the former ask only for a fair chance, while the latter secures legislation that favors his own interests, or gets specifications for bids worded so that they will exclude his opponents, or in selling to public bodies "fixes" the councils or school committees, or obtains illegal favors in transportation. Let this continue, and how long will the former stay in the field? Even as regards quality of goods, where it would seem more plausible that honest dealing might succeed, experience has shown that this depends on whether the frauds can be easily detected. In the case of drugs and goods where the adulterations cannot be readily discovered, there is nothing to offset the more economical procedure of the fraudulent dealer. The fact that it is so difficult to procure pure drugs and pure food would seem to be most plausibly due to the fatal competition of the adulterated article.

Or, suppose a person has a little property invested in some one of the various corporations which offer the most convenient method for placing small sums as well as large. This railroad defies the government by owning coal mines as well as transporting the product; that public service corporation has obtained its franchise by bribery; this corporation is an employer of child labor; that finds it less expensive to pay a few damage suits—those it cannot fight successfully—than to adopt devices which will protect employees. Does a man, or even an institution, act morally if he invests in such corporations in which he finds himself helpless as an individual stockholder? And if he sells his stock at the market price to invest the money elsewhere, is it not still the price of fraud or blood? If, finally, he buys insurance for his family's support, recent investigation has shown that he may have been contributing unawares to bribery of legislatures, and to the support of political theories to which he may be morally opposed. The individual cannot be moral in independence. The modern business collectivism forces a collective morality. Just as the individual cannot resist the combination, so individual morality must give place to a more robust or social type.

5. To Meet the Change to Corporate Agency and Ownership, Ways Must be Found to Restore Personal Control and Responsibility.—Freedom and responsibility must go hand in hand. The "moral liability limited" theory cannot be accepted in the simple form in which it now obtains. If society holds stockholders responsible, they will soon cease to elect managers merely on an economic basis and will demand morality. If directors are held personally responsible for their "legal department," or union officials for their committees, directors and officials will find means to know what their subordinates are doing. "Crime is always personal," and it is not usual for subordinates to commit crimes for the corporation against the explicit wishes of the higher officials. In certain lines the parties concerned have voluntarily sought to restore a more personal relation.[231] It has been found profitable to engage foremen who can get on smoothly with workmen. It has proved to be good economy to treat men, whether they sell labor or buy it, with respect and fairness.

The managers of some of the great public service corporations have also recently shown a disposition to recognize some public obligations, with the naÏve admission that this has been neglected. Labor unions are coming to see the need of conciliating public opinion if they are to gain their contests.

6. To Meet the Impersonal Agencies Society Must Require Greater Publicity and Express Its Moral Standards More Fully in Law.—Publicity is not a cure for bad practices, but it is a powerful deterrent agency so long as the offenders care for public opinion and not solely for the approval of their own class. Professor Ross[232] maintains that in the United States classes are still so loosely formed that general approval is desired by the leaders. Hence he urges that it is possible to enforce moral standards by the "grilling of sinners." But to make this "grilling" a moral process society needs much more accurate information and a more impartial basis for selecting its sinners than present agencies afford. The public press is itself in many respects one of the most conspicuous examples of the purely economic motive. The newspaper or magazine must interest readers and not displease advertisers. The news is selected, or colored, or worked up to suit particular classes. If a speaker says what the reporter does not regard as interesting he is likely to find himself reported as saying something more striking. Publicity bureaus are able to point with pride to the amount of matter, favorable to certain interests, which they place before the public as news. The particular interests singled out for "exposure" are likely to be determined more by the anticipated effects on circulation or advertising than by the merits of the case. It is scarcely more satisfactory to leave all the education of public opinion to commercial control than to leave all elementary education to private interests. Publicity—scientific investigation and public discussion—is indeed indispensable, and its greatest value is probably not in the exhilarating discharge of righteous indignation, but in the positive elevation of standards, by giving completer knowledge and showing the fruits of certain practices. A large proportion of the public will wish to do the right thing if they can see it clearly, and can have public support, so that right action will not mean suicide.

But the logical way to meet the impersonal character of modern economic agencies is by the moral consciousness embodied in an impersonal agency, the law. The law is not to be regarded chiefly as an agency for punishing criminals. It, in the first place, defines a standard; and, in the next place, it helps the morally disposed to maintain this standard by freeing him from unscrupulous competition. It is a general principle that to resort to the law is an ethical gain only when the getting something done is more important than to get it done from the right motive. This evidently applies to acts of corporate bodies. We do not care for their motives. We are not concerned to save their souls. We are concerned only for results—just the place where we have seen that the personal responsibility breaks down. The value of good motives and moral purpose is in this case located in those who strive to secure and execute progressive legislation for the public good, and in the personal spirit with which this is accepted and carried out by officials.[233]

7. Every Member of Society Should Share in Its Wealth and in the Values Made Possible by It.—The quantitative basis of division and the method for giving each a share belong to the unsettled problems. But the worth and dignity of every human being of moral capacity is fundamental in nearly every moral system of modern times. It is implicit in the Christian doctrine of the worth of the soul, in the Kantian doctrine of personality, in the Benthamic dictum, "every man to count as one." It is imbedded in our democratic theory and institutions. With the leveling and equalizing of physical and mental power brought about by modern inventions and the spread of intelligence, no State is permanently safe except on a foundation of justice. And justice cannot be fundamentally in contradiction with the essence of democracy. This means that wealth must be produced, distributed, and owned justly: that is, so as to promote the individuality of every member of society, while at the same time he must always function as a member, not as an individual. In defining justice some will place freedom first; others, a standard of living. Some will seek fairness by distributing to each an actual share of the goods; others, by giving to each a fair chance to get his share of goods. Others again have held that if no moral purpose is proposed and each seeks to get what he can for himself, the result will be a just distribution because of the beneficent effects of competition. Still others have considered that if the economic process has once been established on the basis of contracts rather than status or slavery, justice may be regarded as the maintenance of these contracts, whatever the effect in actual benefits. These views will be considered under the next topic as unsettled problems.