The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-01-28
GOOD CITY GOVERNMENT.
(contlnued from First Page)


 politics we will go. It is not enough
 either for the delicately good citizen
 simply to wet his feet in the edge of
 town politics; there are times when he
 ought to take a bold header, and plunge
 into the midst of the stream"
 Let me leave much that might be said
 along this line, and present certain present and practical problems of our
 municipal life. 1. We have on our
 hands the task of lifting our local poli-
 tics out of the flood of our national pol
 itics I do not claim that the one can
 be entirely isolated from the other; l
 am urging that when it is time for us to consider our local interests we ought
 to put them first, and we ought not
 then, to let our party politics swallow up our city's welfare We should be first citizens, men of the city, and then, if we please, party politicians. To say
 ''I am democrat or republican first and always, and next @ citizen" would be as bad a. heresy politically as it would be religiously to say, Il am a Congregationalist, or Methodist first and always, and afterwards a Christian when I can be conveniently.
 2. We have upon our hands the task of building several departments of our city government up above the greedy reach of the political spoilsmen. l do not mean to say that we can dispense altogether with the political manager in the affairs of our municipal house. hold. The political boss may be an overwhelmed and degenerate leader, but leaders of some kind the people must always have. We may, however, considerably improve the breed, and the people may find servants so able to lead that they will not have to govern by making themselves boss-paymasters of patronage to their followers. It is not true of our city that we are governed by ring. The reason Is that no ring master has happened to appear here, big enough to whip in the whole line of men who are hungry for patronage and profit. We have rings, but not ring. Our city has thus far been for tunate in this respect that our rings have succeeded with frequent profit to the public in devouring one another. I read the other day that horticul- turists in California had successfully introduced colony of beetles to de- vour colony of worms in the orchards. One fortunate thing for us has been the success of our local politicians in clean ing out one another. But we cannot al- ways rely upon their ability to eat one another up. If this city is to escape the blight of ring rule in the future, we ought to see to it in time that our chief departments of municipal patronage and power are swept and cleared of corrupting political methods and vicious practices It Is high time, for instance, that the present bad political method of appointing judges in the city courts of Connecticut should be done away with. Our higher courts have been made as politically indepen- dent as possible the judges being nomi- mated by the governor and confirmed by the legislature But the lower courses of the whole structure of our judiciary are laid in the sands and the mire of a legislative county caucus. The spectacle which the state is now witnessing in the election of judges in the courts of all our Connecticut cities by caucus methods is a disgraceful spectacle; 1t is humiliating work to the candidates and their friends who, of necessity have to participate in 1t under our system of judicial elections The legislative caucus Is a fountain of judicial power from which sweet waters indeed have sometimes issued, but also some very bitter waters. Our proposed l new city charter with remedy this vice 1 of our present charter, but the whole | system ought to be changed all over the state.
 The police department needs dec- | 1aration of political independence. It is | not effectively free from politics now as it ought to be. The prevalent method of | policemen or In securing pro- | motions is essentially vicious. If the board of education should make the ap- pointment or promotion of teachers de- pendent, not upon examination, record | or recommendation of the department, but upon the good will or personal favor of each member of the board in turn, our school system would soon become worthless. Yet this is the beautiful method by which we have been keeping up the efficiency of our police force. What we ought to have and reform will not stop until it suc- ceeds in securing it-is police depart ment non-partisan iii fact as we'll as in name. Some of our best citizens argue for the retention of the bipartisan po- lice commission; the new charter re- tains while 1t limits 1t; but, whatever the ultimate form of the commission, the object to be secured Is not a bi-par- tisan police, but a non-partisan force through and through and some princi- pies of practical civil service reform ought to be devised to secure the ap- pointment and promotion of policemen on competent examination as to their fitness, and upon their merits as officers. The proposed charter will work irn- in this direction, perhaps all the improvement now practicable; but { in my judgment it ought to go further and provide room for some trial at least of practical civil service methods In the police department. I might speak at length of, but I will now only mention, the urgent civic task ( 0f putting down all 1awlessness. Most 1 citizens shrink with horror from an archy; but any systematic failure of aw, and disregard of it by large class ,f men in city, is anarchy. It Is a . piece at least of anarchy. If the liquor