New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1877-04-07


have to answer is-the one now so familiar III city
politics." What are you going to do about IL
This answer has been fully given III the report
of the Municipal Commission now before the
Legislature. We must go back to the perlou
before charter tinkering began, and do the
| work which the Constitutional Convention OF
1916 neglected to do, by basing city gov
ernments on the business principle which has
ALWAYS been upheld by the State with regard
| TO all corporations except cities. The State
has always recognized with regard
TO the smaller municipal corporations
called villages the great rule that the
persons who contribute money Tor any
special object are the fittcst persons to look
after the spending of it ; and in dealing even
with these little communities, in which nom
tax-payers are few in number public spirit ac-
tive, and public opinion strong and searching
proyded that no extraordinary expenditure
should take place, and no debts be contracted
except by a vote of the taxpayers. 1t recOg-
nized the fact that whatever may be the
right of simple citizen to voice
in determining how his ordinary safety
and comfort shall be provided for by
law. when one comes to decide on what outlay
and stores with increased cOnyeniences and
embellishments, in the shape OF cleansing,
lighting, paving, and Ornamentlng, the per-
sons to be consulted are the persona who viii
be asked to pay the bills. On this point there
never has been any dispute or discussion as lar
rs villages are concerned. The sOundness and
Justice of the rule have never been questioned,
and it was easily carried out in villages, be-
cause in them the taxpayers IN general
get together in a room and do their own de-
batting and voting, as they did in Greek city.
Had the Constitutional Convention OF 1916
done its duty and made provision for the APP
plicltion of the same principle to the great
cities, the rapid growth of which in various
parts of the State was even then very APP
| parent, and in which the taxpayers were too
numerous to meet in one assembly, the proba-
| bitics are that the dismal chapter of crime
and corruption which New-York has con-
tributed to municipal history would never
have been written. We believe it is
n fact that the convention shirked this duty,
and put it off on the Legislature through
| sheer WEAKNESS, or eagcrncSs to adjourn anu
90 home. The task was likely to prove tedl-
GUS and troublesome. AMI they got rid OF 1t IN
the simplest way that suggested itself. The
| Legislature Obeyed their injunction as re-
| gardcd villages by the passage i'll the follow
ing year of a general law for the III
corporation of villages, in which the
right of the taxpayers to control the
expenditure was fully recognized, but
| disrcgarded it as to cities, in which abuses
accordingly began to multiply and taxpayers
to groan, and charter tinllering thereupon be-
| gan as the sole remedial agency, and has con-
tinued to this mOmcnt-we know with what
results. The Municipal Commission now asks
Us to 90 back to 1916, to take up the dircc-
| ton of the convention of that year, and act
on it, with the fresh light thrown on the
subject by thirty years OF additional
| and dearly bought experience. what
| this experience teaches us is that the
task of forming governments for the great
cities cannot be left to the Legislature, as the
| Convention of 1916 thought it could that the
n,unber of offices which the government of a
great city creates, and the amount of money
which it raises and spends, form prizes so
tempting that it is not in human nature for
the party controlling the Legislature for the
time being to avoid clutching them, and
finally that the submission of questions of debt
and taxation to the vote of non tax payers,
with vast masses OF tax-paylng properly
under their eyes, is simply form OF spoliation.
! The State has always refused to expose even
the non Taxpayers of small village commun-
ties to such temptation; through negligence,
| which. i'm view of the mischief 1t has wrought,
| we nav almost call criminal, the On-tax-payers
of the large cities have been exposed TO it,
and we now know the result, which the men
of 1916 could only have guessed.
There is, Of course, only one way of giving
taxpayers, in a city like New-Iork, control OF
| taxation and expenditure, and that is by rep
resentation In a small and manageable body.
| They can no more take counsel together en-
masse, like the taxpayers of small Swiss
canton. or those of an American town, than
| the peOplc of the State can meet to pass laws.
In other words, the principle which has always
been embodied in the policy of the State needs,
in the case of great cities, new machinery
for its proper application, and this the
Board of Finance proposed by the Commission
will supply Whether it will work, of course
remains to be seen. The common demag0g-
| zeal objection to it, that it Is opposed to the
| principle of universal suffrage, can hardly be
considered worth serious examination. Uni
versal suffrage, like all other instruments OF
government, is an expedient for securing the
general welfare, and the general welfare Is
not subserved when it is made means
of spoliation and the management OF prop
erty by persons who do not own 1t, or feel
that they are made any worse of
by its being wasted or alienated, is OF
course spoliaton. If the matter be properly
placed before the voters of the State, we feel