The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1859-04-28

RENTS AND TAXES In TIE METROPOLIS AS
we approximate the awful day when every body's
household ecds are supposed to be in state Of
pesturbaaon-she housewives purgatory and tho
cartpsn's beaven--the all important question OF
rents assumes a double degree of interest AS
is well known, rents have increased in this city
In much grea'er ratio than population. Not
outstanding our rapid progress, there remains
still large proportion of the city proper which
is but scantily peopled. This circumstance
may he partially accounted for by the superior
facilities offered to down towo traders by the
suburban citiee-Brooklyn, Williamsburg, jersey
City, &C. But If man with a moderate income
could obtain the same sort Of house on the same
terms in For'ieth street as in Brooklyn, he would
prefer 70 live on this island; but he finds an in
crease of thirty-three per cent rent in New York
over Bro oklyD, which is great deal to hlm.
Well, one would suppose that the New York
landlords, seeing this emigration, would come
down; but the truth is that they cannot do 70.
They are assessed now three times as much as
they were five years ago, and the rents certainly
are not more than double. In 1856 the rents
we're raid to be enormously high; in '57 they
were increased; in '5S the heel of the crisis
did not affect them materially, except in very
expensive houses. Thisyear they run generally
up to the highest possible point Shop rents are
very high this year. The dry goods business has
taken as sudden start now as it had fall in
1857, and the shop to be erected on the site Of
the Broadway theatre is said to be already rent
ed at the round figure of sixty thousand dollars
per anDum. One effect of the increase of rents
has been to give more settled character to our
people. Time was when everybody, almost,
moved on the LIST of May every year. Now it is
customary to hire houses for longer terms--two
three. or five years That is because it is pretty
certain that rents will not go down during the
present municipal misrule and general official
corruption under which we suffer. Landlord
suffers as well us tenant. Landlord must make
bis increased taxes in the shape Of increased
rent. The taxes can only be ieesened by a
thorough reform in the municipal government
| o reform not SO much in the form Of government
| as in the men who are called to administer it.
Only let proper persons be selected for rulers,
| and the government will get on well enough.
| These views we give, not for the first, nor
! the second, nor the fiftieth time. We pressed
them upon the taxpayers last year; but the noto-
rious indifference of our people to abuses under
their own noses, and eating out their own sub
stance, picking their own pockets, prevented
anything like q combined movement against the
tax eaters, and the old system of robbery was re-
peated, is being repeated, and will be repeated
over and over again, until the people who are
pluDdered see fit to stop it, which they can do
very easily when they set about it in earnest.
GOVERNOR WISE JuMpMG Too HIGn-Our
political contemporaries are puzzled what to make
of the late Alabama letter of Governor Wise.
Certainly the peculiar declarations and opinions
of this letter are hardly consistent with the pre-
sumption that the Governor is candidate for
the next Presidency. When politician fixes his
attention upon the White House he usually en-
deavors to enlarge his views Of the policy Of the
government, 30 as to embrace the interests of all
sections of the Union Not 80 with Governor
Wise. He remains in the Dismal Swamp of those
old Virginia distractions of '9S and 100, and en-
phatically believes in the stand still and do no
thing policy. Thus he denOunces Mr. Buchanan
as latitudinarian and federalist, worse than an
Adams or Hamilton, on account Of his recon-
mendations in behalf Of Pacific railroad, Incl
dental protection to home manufactures, the ac-
QUESTION of Cuba, the pacifcation of Mexico and
the settlement of Central American affairs, ge-
neral bankrupt law, &c. Governor Wise would
have none of these things. He would reduce the
federal government to quiet asylum for decay
ed politicians, leaving the country to run to seed
like an old Virginia plantation. But if he thinks
this old Virginia policy will do for the Charles.
ton Convention, and that Virginia will rule the
democratic roast in 1850, as she has done here
toiorc, he is under o great delusion. He will
find that in his efforts to Outjump Hunter as o
strict constructionist, he has been jumping too
high. Indeed, as politician, he reminds us Of
the old Virginia darkey:--
'he wheels about, and turns about,
And does just 30;
And every time he wheels about,
He jumps Jim Crow"
|
! Our CRIMINAL RECoID.-We publish elsewhere
an article showing that there are now confined