FAIR VALUE OF PUBLIC UTILITIES

Such being the decisions, we turn to the practical working of the theories that have been applied. The law is a practical subject. Even in so sacred a matter as protection of property, rules of law should regard the practical results of any theory. A theory that works badly, presumptively at least, is defective, and may be wrong.

The guaranties of the Constitution were made for man, not man for the guaranties, and a conception of property that does not work out for the advantage of man may raise a query whether the Constitution demands that conception. It was that which accounts for Munn v. Illinois, and for Smyth, v. Ames, both cases due to statutes which the people through representatives in legislature assembled had attempted to enact into law.