LABOR’S NEW STATUS 307

dustry so far as possible shall be autonomous and shall have
the friendly cooperation of the government, but that the
government, in the sense of public policy, is superior to
industry. Industry must always be subordinated to democratic
 institutions and ideals; or, expressed reversely, the
subordination of democratic institutions and ideals to industry
 cannot be tolerated in a self-governing republic.
Unless we can have proper autonomy of industry and democracy
 in industry, as well as democratic control of industry,
 our political institutions, which have been developed
with so much bloodshed and suffering, will be futile and
ineffective.
No enlightened industrial leader or financier, however,
wishes a subordination of government to industry to occur.
Entirely aside from consideration of democracy and humanity,
 the wise observer knows that it would be shortsighted
 and inevitably destructive of both industry and
democracy. It is for this reason that in the modern day,
while it is properly claimed that the stimulus of profit in
industry should be retained, and that the rights of investors,
 management and employees should be protected,
the conception has rapidly gained ground that industrial
promotion, expansion and operation should primarily be a
social function and service. Probably the most astounding
outgrowth of the extraordinary industrial development
through which the country has recently passed, has been
the discovery that the profitableness of industrial undertakings
 really depends upon the extent to which they conform
 to this new conception of industrial policy.
During the first half-century of our national life, political
 affairs revolved around abstract questions of government.
 The constitutional questions as to the relation between
 the States and the Federal Government, other constitutional
 interpretations. and the rights of personal and