New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1889-09-01
HOH TO MAKE A BEGINNING.

Commissioner Coleman has returned from
Europe with a valuable stock of information
about foreign methods of paving ana street
cleaning. The city ought to be gratelul lor
the inquisitive and docile spirit in whloh an
important functionary has prosecuted his sum
mer travels. One of the serious obstacles TO
an efficient administration of our local afafs
has been provincial conviction in the mlndS
of public officials that they had nothing 20
learn from abroad" and it is very encourag-
ing to hear Mr.. Coleman frankly acknowledge
that his extended observation and inquiry nave
taught him that nearly everything done 10 ana
with the streets of New York is badly done
The Commissioner does not put it in those
words, but that is the real gst and substance
of his comparisons.
One of the details of street administrator
which most deeply impressed Mr. Coleman was
the enforcement of the maxim that prevention
is better than cure. He found that Paris, IN
particular keeps its streets clean by not per-
mitting them to get dirty, and he relates by
way of illustration, the experience of an Amer
can who unsuspiciously tore letter in two and
dropped the pieces in the gutter, just as he had
doubtless done hundred times at home.
moment later policeman invited MIN 10 re-
trace his steps and gather up the fragments
of waste paper, on penalty OF beng arresteu,
The American was a sensible man, and, instead
of protesting that America was the only really
free country on earth, he then ana tnere
learned valuable lesson, and subsequently
EXPRESSED his admiration of a city which showed
such respect for itself.
1t seems, perhaps, preposterous to imagine
snch system in force in New Y Ork' and so IL
is to suppose that reform of such magnitude
could be Immediately put in operation. lhat
kind goeth not forth but by education IN pub
lie virtue. The people of Paris have been
gradually led into the light, until now it is as
natural and easy for them to refrain from de-
filing and defacing their thoroughfafes as it
is for Americans to indulge the ShiftleSs and
nasty habit of which no attempt has ever been
made to break them. We may as well admit
the melancholy fact that, at the best 1t must
be a long time before our National propensity
in this direction can be overcome but this is
no reason why beginning should not be made.
1t is, on the contrary, the best of reasons for
making a beginning as soon as possible.
good example is contagious as well as bad
one, though unhappiIy not in an equal degree
If men and women who are intelligent enough
to perceive the force of the proposition as soon
as it is stated and who are conscientious and
public spirited in other directions. would from
this time forward act up to the conviction which
they must fee-that it is bad manners, bad
morals and bad citizenship to litter and befoul
sidewalks and roadways, they would do more
than ordinances and policemen could possibly
accomplish without their voluntary assistance
to bring in the era of general cleanliness They
would help to create that public sentiment
without which laws and guardians are power
less Such revolutions are accomplished slow
IT, but when they are well begun they are half
done.
The village imprS ement societies which
have transformed the outward appearance and
regenerated the inner life of many rural COM
munity during the last fifteen years supply an
e. .,ouraging example of what can be accom-
pshed by the acknowledgment of personal re-
sponsibility. The practice of a similar virtue
in ,New-York would not seem strange to many
of cur people, for in their country homes they
have been the pioneers of such movements.
They cannot by any possibility do for a me-
tropolis what can be easily done for a village.
but we insist that they can and ought to be
the means Of creating sentiment which will
eventually become universal.