New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1871-12-14
COST OF THE CITY GOVERNMENT.

Since the entire workings Of the munich
pal government are had in pubic, and
are then printed in detail for general IN
spection and consideration, it does seem
to US that the immediate cause OF quar-
rel which the reformers have with the
Administrators ought to be sufficiently
understood to allow Of its being explicitly
stated in the public prints. General
charges of incompetence and corruption
never benefit the community, since they
merely produce distrust and confusion,
without allowing the officers against
whom they are made to correct abuses or
to reform unnecessary expenses. In the
first place, the city Of New Orleans can
not be properly administered without
large cost to the people, and it is no eyi-
dence Of mismanagement that she spends
more money than she collects, because
her wants may demand greater OUTLAWS
than her income will provide for.
The Administrators, it is true, might
content themselves with such an econom-
ical disbursement of the public funds as
to overrun the municipal treasury with
surplus cash; but then to accomplish this
end they would have to leave the streets
uncleaned, the wharves unrepaired, the
levees unbuilt, the schools unopened, the
drainage imperfect, and the people I'M
protected. The question is, would this
answer the ends of taxation? Was gov
created to hoard the revenues?
or was it instituted to protect the COM
munity and answer the demands of trade,
travel, pleasure and convenience? We
keep open seven hundred miles of streets,
sustain thirteen miles of wharfage front,
support schools for ninety thousand chill
lren, protect three hundred thousand
people in their liberties and property,
axe care of the poor, provide for Grim
nails, doctor the sick, the lame and the
blind, fight off disease from the healthy,
Keep watch against the floods in front
nd rear, and manage all the affairs of a
,reat commercial metropolis. This must
reeds cost money, and millions of it at
hat. /
The dispute that now agitates the CON-
nunity is as to the sufficiency Of the pro-
ision which the people have made for
his vast list of expenditures. The very
that have 1.1,<
hirteen millions of dollars, that has been
teadily on the increase for years, is con-
lusive testimony that the government of
be city Of New Orleans has always cost
1ore money than her people calculated
Or in the outset Of housekeeping No
ooner is there surplus dollar in the
reasury than some good citizen sees
tile improvement that ought to be at
ended to; and whether there are funds
n hand or not, the corporation is 10 ,et
18th suggestions as to the necessity of
pending money in hundred different.
irections
The truth is, either the city must spend
large amount Of money, or the people
lust content themselves with an inferior
RIDER Of government And since we do
OF believe the community is so stupid
lat it would prefer to live in filth and
arkness rather than in light and progress,
| order to economic a niggardly dollar
: two in their taxes, We can not come to
ny other conclusion than that the clanor
)out extravaganza emanates from the
eakness of some and the wickedness Of
hers. And We are fortified in this con-
usion by the absence of all directness in
e charges that are made with such album
ance of language by those who say that
e city is mismanaged. If there was that
zen fraud in the government, of which
e are told, it ought to be apparent to the
.ople; and, If it was apparent to all, the
ess that harbors and circulates these re-
'rts ought to give us the details Until
is is done, so that the Administrators
n be told Of and made directly response
e for these discreditable transactions,
; submit that the entire community is I
jured and scandalized by the constant +
petition Of charges that have no other I
undations than the suspicion Of their a
thors.