The New York herald., 1879-02-07
THE LECTURE SEASON.

OUR GREAT METRoPoLIs-ITs GROWTH, MIS-
MANAGEMENT AND NEEDS ExpoUNDED BY
WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER.
Mr.. William Allen Butler lectured before the Me-
chancs Society at steinwsy Hall last evening. His
theme was ''rhe Municipality of New YorkIts Past,
Present and Future. He traced back its history to
the reed thatched huts of the Dutch traders. who
bought tfrom the aborlginals for s2i These worthy
burshers he said rat. testy and selfloving they
are usually painted. held nevertheless. many of
those ideas OF local self-governnlent which have
since been the pride of Americans. prison. gal
lows and whipping post were among their earliest
public institutions, and their pillory. stocks and
iron cage regarded with much envy
by their neighbors. Funds were misappro-
priated by the collectors. dominies wero ac-
cused OF getting drunk in the pulpit aud
directors of open peculation in their Offices with
freedom that clearly foreshadowed the future of New
York They took especial prido in their irredeema
BILE currency of beaver skins. They built ricketty
City Hall, which tumbled about their one morn
ing. They moved it further up town and filled
it with officials of questionable character.
The Collector of New York. owing $50 to the
Collector of Albany sent him negro boy.
said to be worth that sum- payment in full; but
the boy away and furnished. said the lecturer.
of the city. Nor did matters improve under English
rule for the famous John Adams. though he admired
the Bowling Green and the statue of George ILL.,.
igilded lead said there not real gentleman
nor well bred man in the whole town. Yet it
here Nathan Hale regretted that he had
only life to lose for his country Andre too said
the lecturer. came from New York; but if are to
raise monument to the foiled accompice Of Bene-
dict Arnold LOT search out and the spot
where Nathan Hale died for the liberties we now
enjoy From this time forth the city began to take
a metropolitan air. Stage coaches ran from
Philadelphia with sober drivers" the first steam
boat. dubbed Fulton's Folly, piled upon the Hudson;
newspapers We're born ard the pulse OF the great
world first heard to beat against patriotic
citizens lent buckets to the Fire Department, and
refused to the government when the buckets
were lost; and the seeds OF many future blessings
were sown. But the tares were freely planted with
the wheat. New York from the hrst cosmopoli-
tan. She refused to persecute witches and Quakers.
She welcomed all the refugees from foreign
sheres. The confusion of tongues, the comminglng
of races never ceased in her tcrrtory and the
result we have all seen The result was Tweed.
When Tweed came miasma and malaria rose from
every crevice of the public service. We had made
immense material progress. but none whatever in
the science of selfgovernment. The public purse
was at the politicians mercy and public opinion
sank to the dead level Of indifferentism. 1t was
joke to call the city's representatives the Forty
Thieves, witticism to assert that they had stolen
Broadway. Benevolence became cloak for fraud.
The new Court House was st. Tammany's Grand
Cooperative Orphan Asylum. One OF the orphans
had built it. another plastered it, another furnished
it, fourth supplied it with frescoes and fifth
sends in bill of $500 for its thermometers. The
city staggered under a floating debt of $40 900
But, luckily, the fibre of our free institutions was
strong, and we survived.
But who suggest fitting remedies for the evils
that still encompass usY The constabulary OF poll
ticans warns us off the ark OF universal suffrage;
but in the limited suffrage which has freed the Office
of city Comptroller from popular election we may
yet find safety. When $l.0OO,OOO is yearly
set aside for philanthropic purposes, why should
distress prevail? When eighty per cent of public
scholars leave school before the age OF fourteen why
shOu1l BOARD Education receive such large
appropriations? These questions. like the school
rooms, require to be ventilated. What we want is q
non-partisan police excise law generally respected
the Injurious burden of State taxation lifted from
shoulders, that New York may WELD justly the
sceptre Of commercial supremacy and wear the
wreath Of civic virtue.