The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-11-19

"A very interesting, even II a quite elu-
siye, contribution to the problem of
municipal government is that made by
Mayor Jones, of Toledo, to the current
number of Municipal Affairs. 1t is
entitled "a Golden Rule of Municipal
Government"
The position won by Mayor Jones in po-
litical life no longer admits of being
treated as mary not over-thoughtful
newspaper writer's treat it. He is a man
of intense earnestness, who has. .measur-
ably at least, applied that principle of
conduct to his private business interests
which he breaches for adoption in DO
litical concerns.
The most careful examination of Mayor
Jones article fails to enable the reader
to grasp wholly the means by which he
seeks to'apply to municipal affairs and
to mems relations toward each other in
daily conduct the principle of the golden
rule. David HaIum, a character whose
homely philosophy is at this time at
tracing many readers Of fiction iowa I'd
him, makes practical application of the
golden rule to a horse trade in these
terms: DO unto the other Teller the
way he'd like to do unto you-and do it
fust. In trades of most kinds, political
and otherwise, this application is not
at all infrequent. Indeed, 1t might be
said, without great exaggeration, that the
philosophy of David, Notwithstanding
nineteen centuries of avowed Christian
attachment to the great rule is much
more common than that involved in the
Christian precept itself
Freedom and equality and social justice
are easy terms to conjure with. Mayor
Jones deals with them quite extensively.
How to apply them to municipal concerns
he does not make any palmer that 1t has
been made by any of the countless al
TRUSTS who have preached them in con-
nection with politics and business In
America for a century or so. His ar
ticle has the distinct advantage of not
embodying columns of figures, either
senseIess or juggled. But this advantaga
is hardly justified by the appearance Of
anything tangible which might direct
the student toward the realization of Mr.
Jones very laudable object.
We're We to dispense wholly, as he sug-
gests, with party political divisions in
conducting municipal contests, it might
no
ditions in local politics, but the trouble
in this direction. as in most other d.
rectiOns in which he extends his gaze as
a philosopher, is that it Is to all intents
waste Of time to consider the idea in this
generation. Aside from non-partisanship,
the abolition of the contract system in
the doing of municipal work and the
ownership by the municipality Of it's own
public utilities, there is no way of the
attainment of the golden rule In local
affairs set out by Mayor Jones. Yet it
Is reasonably open to doubt whether with
all these conditions realized we wou
be any nearer the application of the gold
en- rule in our local affairs, or In any
other relation, than we are today.
1t IS quite easy to insist, as Mayor
Jones does, that there is such thing
as social justice, justice that is as I'M
erring as any rule of arithmetic JUS ice
that will discover the exact basis for So
cial relation between every man and
every woman, and the first business of a
municipality is to see that its affairs are
so ordered as to make this justice ac-
cessibie to the weakest as we'll as to the
strongest" We may believe all this, but
what are We going to do about it? Where
is Mr.. Jones to go to furnish us with
the human material through which we
will bring into practical play this social
justice which he refers to? Certainly
not among his labor followers, any mora
than from among any other class Of So
ciety
The G e is sorry to think that
Mayor Jones must begin to delve deeper
than he has thus far. He has but the
commonest human clay to deal with
just now. Some generations hence the
material may improve so as to admit of
the construction from it of objects moro
or less angelic. 1t won't do today. IT