[Letter] Dec.15,1886,Smith College [to F.H. Giddings]

Dec. 15, 1886, Smith College.

Dear Mr. Giddings,
            It will give
me pleasure to accept
your kind invitation. The
Congregational Club meets
on that day, and this will
somewhat reduce our
attendance. Mr. Cable addresses
them and will 'draw', as
the saying is.
 We can tell better
on Monday how much we
have collided, if at all.
I will bring what I have
ready. My outline is
finished and about 20 pages of text. The plan
followed is like this.
 1. Ricardian economics based
on a change in actual life,
which invalidated formulas which
were then traditional.
 2. The system then inaugurated
was not permanent but transition-
al. We are experiencing the
counter-revolution, and have
before us a stable industrial state.
 3. Predatory competition, the basis
of Ricardianism, the characteristic
of the transitional era.
 4. Vague conceptions of competition
prevalent. Cairnes' effort to draw
limiting lines. Abstract of
Cairnes' theory.
 5. Objection to Cairnes' theory are
of fact. Development has
obliterated the lines.
 6. Present state characterized
by sharp divisions of function,
and consequently of actual competition
but of free access, by all, to
every trade.
 7. Migration of labor and capital
checked by artificial means.
Combinations follow lines of
sharp competition.
 8. Principles governing
combinations.

 I have written the first
five parts. It is probable that
your introduction will be so
different as not to conflict. I
will leave you the whole of our
field viz., the causes which
break a combination once
formed. I shall hear with
great interest what you have
written. By what train do
you go from Holyoke to Springfield?

         Yours Very Truly,
                J. B. Clark

P.S.
On "laws of combination"
I had intended to say that
equality of conditions, centralization
and production for extended markets
are requisite; also that prices
can be fixed only by controlling
supply; otherwise stocks accumulate
and prices must be lowered on pool break;
that controlling supply is possible
within pool not so without, which
limits prices again; in short
that the possibility of a lapse to
cut-throat competition hangs
forever over the pool as a price
regulator. Does this touch on your
territory? If so we will readjust.

J. B. C.