such a luxury. About that time a new system of charges known as
the "message rate" plan was introduced, according to which the
subscriber paid a moderate price for a stipulated number of
calls, and a pro rata charge for all calls in excess of that
number. Probably no single change in any business has had such an
instantaneous effect. The telephone, which had hitherto been an
external symbol of prosperity, suddenly became the possession of
almost every citizen.

Other companies than the Bell interests have participated in this
development. The only time the Bell Company has had no
competitor, Mr. Vail has said, was at the Philadelphia Centennial
in 1876. Some of this competition has benefited the public but
much of it has accomplished little except to enrich many not
over-scrupulous promoters. Groups of farmers who frequently
started companies to furnish service at cost did much to extend
the use of the telephone. Many of the companies which, when the
Bell patents expired in 1895, sprang up in the Middle West, also
manifested great enterprise and gave excellent service. These
companies have made valuable contributions, of which perhaps the
automatic telephone, an instrument which enables a subscriber to
call up his "party" directly, without the mediation of "central,"
is the most ingenious. Although due acknowledgment must be made
of the honesty and enterprise with which hundreds of the
independents are managed, the fact remains that they are a great
economic waste. Most of them give only a local service, no
company having yet arisen which aims to duplicate the
comprehensive national plans of the greater corporation. As soon
as an independent obtains a foothold, the natural consequence is
that every business house and private household must either be