342 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY
for finish that European goods enjoy, together with the reputa- tion for taste that some Americans affect, gives foreign products a vogue that forces peculiar trade methods in our own markets. To sell a piece of Connecticut worsted in many an American tailor shop, it must bear a south-of-England or a west-of- France label. Parallel cases might be repeated indefinitely. In all trade rela- tions between exporting and importing countries the aesthetic standard is a prime factor. Even Italian and French art squints toward the taste of American parvenus instead of aiming solely at aesthetic ideals. Every tourist in Europe today will be shown in England churches denuded of statuary and otherwise muti- lated by the troops of Cromwell, while at Versailles the desire for revanche does not prevent the keepers of the palace from praising the Germans for protecting the art treasures at their mercy during the occupation. Just as the state of aesthetic appreciation softens the rigors of war, so it modifies the eco- nomic process of nations in peace. The annual hegira of Ameri- cans to the Old World, saving thousands of complacent Europeans from poverty, and maintaining whole groups of occupations, must be attributed in part to the aesthetic interest of Americans. The crowding of people from country to city throughout the world is economic and social, but also, though unconsciously and pervertedly, aesthetic. The recent Massachusetts law pro- hibiting building in Copley square to a height above ninety feet is a local illustration of the principle before us ; namely, in general, that all human conduct is dependent upon conditions extrinsic to the immediate motive of the conduct ; and specifi- cally, that all economic conduct is subject to the limitation that aesthetic standards may enforce.
Lastly in this series of illustrations we specify the particular that economic action conforms in the final analysis to the group conception of Tightness. A German economist has said that " economic demand is a section of the moral standard of the community." The African slave trade lasted as long as Boston shipowners could keep their consciences quiet enough to accept their share of its profits. The early policy of our settlers toward the Indians tended to a level corresponding with the assumption
