ABSTRACT
The protection of the individual working man and woman, and the conservation of child life have assumed national proportions and have seemingly become national problems. The demand for national legislation and national relief grows more and more insistent and the reasons seem more and more urgent; but, unhappily, the obstacles in the way of any great extension of the federal powers in these directions remain almost insuperable. To give to the nation real jurisdiction over the changing conditions of modern industrial life would be to take a large share of the police power from the states, to upset precedents of the courts, and to change the fundamental spirit of the constitution. Until such fundamental changes are made, the measures of relief which the nation can adopt will be few and relatively ineffective. The progressive movement in the nation is of the utmost importance because of the aid which the national government, and it alone, can give.
