Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 84.djvu/476

472 was determined by the status into which he happened to be born and not by competition. Accordingly, the courts in place of upholding the right of competition as at present were once inclined to look upon it with disfavor. Likewise, property rights are no more absolute than is the right of competition. Slave property, once nation-wide, became sectional and then disappeared altogether. Property in general depends as much upon considerations of social utility as property in slaves. For a long time it was restricted to movables. At first it included only weapons and ornaments. Gradually it came to include domestic animals. The ownership of land was vested in the community and not in private hands until comparatively recent times. The powers and franchises granted corporations are wholly optional with the several states, and depend upon considerations of social expediency. But for the social will embodied in positive law, there would be no such thing as theft.

At the present time property rights are being modified in various directions. There is a strong tendency to municipalize or nationalize certain industries. In Ireland, the property rights of the large landowners have been abridged by Parliament. Railway and other labor organizations that occupy a strategic position are altering the distribution of the social income and are establishing a sort of joint proprietorship. This is the effect of "full crew bills." According to the committee of railway managers, the demands of the railway employees on the eastern roads at the present time for an advance of wages are equivalent to putting the income of three hundred and forty millions at five per cent, ahead of the first mortage bonds of the roads. The modification of the liability of employers at common law, the enactment of workingmen's compensation acts and more ample provision for playgrounds, art, music and education by taxation and private benevolence point to the growth of collective property. The social obligations resting upon private property are increasing. The abridgment of property rights is reflected in the lighter punishments provided for offenses against property. Imprisonment for debt has been abolished. The branding of thieves and vagabonds has been discarded. Capital punishment for crimes against property no longer exists. Many punishments which appear cruel and unusual in the light of to-day did not appear so at all to our forefathers. As humanitarian considerations have gained ground, private property has lost something of the sanctity in which it was once held.

It is remarkable how quickly even the staunchest defenders of property sometimes face about and demand an abridgment of property rights. All that is needed is some event that brings out clearly the opposition between private and public interests. A strike that ties up