Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1859-06-16
WASHINGTON NEWS AND GOSSIP.

The WASHINGTON WATER WoRKs.-We are
beset on all sides with requests for an explana-
ton of the reasons why the law recently passed
by the Corporation of washington, direcnng
the construction of the city's part of the Aque-
duct works, is not being executed InrepB
to them we have to say that that law directed
the Mayor to nominate to the Board of AIder-
men Water Works Register, and Puryeyor,
who being thus appointed shall proceed to exc
cute the law in question. There has been but
single meeting Of the Board of Aldermen
since the Mayor signed the law, and at that
meeting no such nominations were received;
nor could they have been acted upon at that
meeting had they been then sent in, except by
unanimous consent, such being the rule gov
erning the Boards proceedings. According to
their invariable custom, after going through
with the simple form of reorganization, the
Councils adjourned over for two weeks-until
Monday, the 9th instant. Unless the Mayor
sees fit to call the Board Of Aldermen together
before that time, which he has the privilege of
doing. it is therefore impossible that the execu-
ton of the law can be commenced ere then.
Until he sends those nominations to the Board,
there can be no employment upon the Water
Works for the thousand laborers now in Wash
ingtOn anxious to get days work. So, We
trust that he will at once avail himself Of his
privilege explained above and thus while COM
plying with the unanimous wish of the COM
munity that the work shall be commenced
immediately, relieve, at once, as he has the
power to do, the extensive real suffering for
want of employment that now certainly exists
in our midst.
Apr0pos-We desire to say that we have seen
nothing identifying the Mayor with the plan
| to defeat the execution Of the present law for
the construction of the works, involved, wheth
er so designed or not, in the introduction Of a
bill to substitute another law in its stead in the
Alderman's Board on Monday evening last. Its
consideration there can have but mischievous
| effect. If effccting anything, it will simply be
the means of inducing the Mayor to refrain
from the prompt execution Of the existing law,
which it is his plain duty to carry out as faith
fully, promptly, and fully as he executes any
other law Of the Corporation. The plea that
The existing law is defective, and that there
fore a substitute should be enacted, is a very
childish one, in view of the fact that it has not
yet been put into operation, and that therefore
there exists no more reason to condemn it (the
law than before the effort to defeat its enact
ment under that plea failed so signally.
In commencing the operation of an extensive
system like that of hereafter supplying nearly
every house in Washington city with water, it
| is not improbable that the earliest legislation
| to that end may prove defective in many par
| ticulars. But the common-sense mode of deal
| ing with such defects is to amend the existing
law only as they show themselves in its ope-
ration. Until fair trial shall have been nc
corded to the present law, it is utterly impos-
| sible that the Board Of Aldermen will legisla,e
further on the subject. Their last vote of ten
against to four in favor of the effort to defeat
| its contamination, that laws shows how hope
less of any other result than the possible post
| POnement of the time when the Water Works
of the Corporation shall be commenced, this
movement for almost an entire new law really il.