in a letter-box; and those who
desire to change it reply that state services are efficient and praise
God whenever they use a telephone; as though either private or public
administration had certain peculiar and unalterable characteristics,
instead of depending for its quality, like an army or railway company
or school, and all other undertakings, public and private alike, not on
whether those who conduct it are private officials or state officials,
but on whether they are properly trained for their work and can command
the good will and confidence of their subordinates.

The arguments on both sides are ingenious, but in reality nearly all of
them are beside the point. The merits of nationalization do not stand
or fall with the efficiency or inefficiency of existing state
departments as administrators of industry. For nationalization, which
means public ownership, is compatible with several different types of
management. The constitution of the industry may be "unitary," as is
(for example) that of the post-office. Or it may be "federal," as was
that designed by Mr. Justice Sankey for the Coal Industry.
Administration may be centralized or decentralized. The authorities to
whom it is intrusted may be composed of representatives of the
consumers, or of representatives of professional associations, or of
state officials, or of all three in several different proportions.
Executive work may be placed in the hands of civil {116} servants,
trained, recruited and promoted as in the existing state departments,
or a new service may be created with a procedure and standards of its
own. It may be subject to Treasury control, or it may be financially
autonomous. The problem is, in fact, of a familiar, though difficult,
order. It is one of constitution-making.

It is commonly assumed by controversialists that the organization and
management of a nationalized industry must, for some undefined reason,
be similar to that of the post-office. One might as reasonably suggest
that the pattern exemplar of private enterprise must be the Steel
Corporation or the Imperial Tobacco Company. The administrative
systems obtaining in a society which has nationalized its foundation
industries will, in fact, be as various as in one that resigns them to
private ownership; and to discuss their relative advantages without
defining what particular type of each is the subject of reference is
to-day as unhelpful as to approach a modern political