Morning journal and courier., 1894-03-23
mUnrcIPAL RRFonm.

Of the Police Commissloners-The
Inemciency OF the City In Clearing
the snow From the Streets, After
the Blizzard, $50 Called. - ~s7@s
The New Haven Congregational club
held special meeting in Warner hall last
evening, which was very largely attended.
An excellent supper was served ct $50
O'Clock by the ladies of the College street
church.
William E. Chandler. president Of the
club, presided atsths discussion which
followed. After q short introductory
speech he announced Henry @. White,
esq, as the first speaker Of the evening,
his subject being ''Municipal Reform"
Mr.. White cited tho cities Of Brooklyn
and Philadelphia 90 municipalities that
had not been afraid to 60 ahead with the
work Of reform, and now have new char
tsrs which work.
"Nothing;" he said, "would induce the
people of those cities to 60 back to the old
system. Ex-Mayor Hewitt of New York
writes that If now city charter were to
be made he should undoubtedly follow
that of Brooklyn or Philadelphia. He
thinks the mayor ought to have the power
of removing and appointing, so that he
would be the real head as well as the
honorary. think the people can always
be trusted to select . competent head for
the city when 1t ia known that be will
have the power of removing and sp-
pointing.
"The opposition to Q simple, business
like, sound government is generally able to
be traced to one of two sources; ~ those
people who think that such people as form
the msjorities in our large cities are not to
be trusted, and e. those who believe it ia
better to have power separated than con-
centrated.
"The supporters Of the new system al
lego that experience proves this latter OBJ
lection to be unsound. They refer to
Brooklyn and Philadelphia 40 their proofs.
Machine politicians the country over seem
to prefer the complicated charter. No
one knows better than the professional
politician that the great power in this
country ia the voting power. Therefore,
II he be dishonest, there is nothing he
breads more than an open and direct en-
counter at the polls.
"These conclusions may be summed up
as follows: Let tho city government be
made as simple as possible and let the peo-
pie be allowed to use their power without
the hindrance of the professional politi-
clans. No great organization, public or
private, can be made successful unless
force, thought, power and brains be put
into 1t. Our prosperity, comfort and hap
piness to greater extent than We reslizs ia
q community matter. No community mat
ter will be healthy and comfortable until
| the voice of the people Is made to domi-
L 10 nnkk int No r.InI n1S
deny the majority the rights of American
| citizenship will ever benefit the public at
| large. Such men as Abraham Lincoln
lived and died that good government of
| the people, for the people and by the peo-
pie might not perish from the earth"
President Chandler then introduced At
| torney John w. Alling who spoke on
"Good Government" in part a. follows:
"Good government ia like good health.
You can keep it If you work for it. or you
can lose 1t like gold dollar or anything
permanence In our form of government, as
1t now exists, is in my opinion, mistaken.
| Take the time of the Antonines in Roman
history. or even the present government of
the Russian empire. They have held that
the king or emperor was the first servant
of the state. From those times We have
never heard such stories of corruption, "a
We hssr every day around Us. You won
der why 1t is-this bossism. Take our
country. Two leaders arise In q ward.
i The struggle goes on. One at last shows
himself stronger, ADLER or more unsorupu-
| lous, until at last he controls the entire
l ward and all who want Office must be his
friends. It has gone on to such an extent
l in New York that at the present time two
men control the whole city.
In the remainder of his speech he ad-
vocated the formation of an Independent
party or a good government club, which
city.
Rev. Dr.. Newman Smyth, pastor of Cen
ter church, was then introduced. He spoke
In the main as follows:
II remember little girl who used to
continually question me whether such q
man was . good man or q bad man. Nov
1t is this distinction between good men
and bad men that have ever since been
trying to draw. Sometimes psopie are
goats. But this might hardly be b.
specific enough for some of my
friends of the police commission
Laughter. Bat seriously speaking, there
seems to me to be . great revival all over
tho country, especially In large cities, of
the sense of civic responsibility. People
are swaking to the importance of our do
nestle Institutions, the conditions of life
and enforcement of law, for which as citi-
zens We ought to hold ourselves response
BILE.
1.-THE question immediately arises, Whist
is the best system of local government
The evil forces seem to be all woven to-
gether, go that this question has especial
import. Thus 1t is most important that
the sense of civic responsibility
- aoxo hn 4.
its fullest extent, to find out
what Is best in our system of domestic
l government, whether or not We are living
l under the best charter. IL our system that
under which We may hope for tho best re.
sultsa This question first came to me from
its practical rather than its moral side sew.
| eral years ago during little snow storm,
| which believe was called blizzard here,
! that reminded me of Maine, the state OF
| my nativity, where We have snow storms
that are snow storms. I enjoyed this par
around couple of blocks for the pleasure
| 1t gave me to Gee such an old fashioned
storm, and then went home. Well, It was
three days before the city officials Of New
Haven made the first move toward re-
moving that snow. And then the
city lay all that time exposed
to the danger of fire, with much
loss and Inconvenience to-the citizens.
And before anything could be done the
councilman had to bs dug out of their
drift, the aldermen out of their drift and
the mayor out of his drift-all of them free
and independent sovereiRnties. felt like
calling some of the old Maine grandmoth-
ers down here to show them how to clear
it away. Now I say that any system of
! government which fails in an emergency
betraye its ineficiency. There IL no truer
| remark than that of Mr.. AllinR that Won
must not go to the system to remedy evils.
william Penn 1t was, think, who made
/ the remark that with . bad system and
good men you may have q good govern
Emsnt, but with good system and bad men
you will have q bad government. You re-
/ member the old prayer In the Nassachu-
sstts court oh Lord, give Us respect for
our magistrates, and give US magistrates
| that We can respect
| "Now I venture to say that there is not
| . man here who has had practically any.
thing to do with the election of those COM
l missioners which have to do with the
protection of property interests Of the
city. A system which will give us more
to do with the election of these men 10
what We want. It We must get along
under the present charter what We would
like is power which would enable NJ to 20
to court, when soda water or something
else has gone to the brain of the COM
missioners, and enable n, say, to have q
conservator for that commission ap-
pointed. (Great applsusel.
even suppose there was . complete rev.
olution of parties In our city government,
L hat - 81,