New-York tribune., 1900-08-09
IN THE NAME OF RAMAPO.

The announcement that the vacation schools
of the Borough of Brooklyn are forthwith TO be
closed for the remainder of the summer and
that a considerable number of the public schools
of the borough will probably not be opened for
the regular session in September, should com
mand the most earnest attention of the public.
II would be superfuous to repeat truisms con-
cerning the importance Of the school system to
the community and to the State and Nation.
We suppose that every sane man will agree that
opportunity for education should be afforded to
every child. Nor is ii necessary TO repeat, what
Is we'll known. that at best the school accom-
modations of this city are inadequate; where
fore II is eminently desirable that every exist
ing school should be kept in full use, and that
the vacation school system, the value of which
is now we'll established should be maintained.
The abolition of the latter and the closing of
number of the regular schools are therefore
steps justiiable under only the most urgent
necessities. It is interesting to observe for
what reason they are now being or to be
taken.
They are taken, in brief, in the name of Ram
apo 1t is part and parcel of the abominable con-
spiracy to create an artificial water famine and
thus force the city into letting itself be robbed
OF somewhere from $100,0O0,000 to S150,000.000.
We do not say, of course, that the Commissioner
who has given the order for shutting off the
water supply of the schools Is Influenced by
corrupt or improper motives. He finds himself
confronted by a condition not of his creation, in
which it is necessary TO reduce the consumption
of water by some heroic and arbitrary meas
ures. He deems it better for the children to go
without schooling than for the whole city to go
without water In that his Judgment may we'll
be approved. But if he be absolved from blame
all the more severe should be the judgment
upon the constituencies and desperate cOnspira-
tors who have deliberately brought about the
condition which compels this step. Scores of
millions of gallons OF water, secured by the
city at great cost are every day sent to waste
by being poured from the mains directly into
the sewers. Scores of millions of gallons are
daily wasted by being run from the city's wells
and springs upon the meadows OF into the bay.
And yet the schools must be closed to reduce
the use Of water!
That is what the Ramapo gang, in control of
the government of this city, is doing. The city
has to-day water supply ample for its uses on
the most generous and lavish scale, and ample
for the uses of it when it shall have become
twice great and populous as it now is. But
more than half of that supply is sent to waste
wantOnly and wickedly, and the people are put
to discomfort and want, and the death rate is
raised, and peStience is invited and the doors
of the public schools are closed against the
children-all in order to starve the city into
| yielding to the pirates demands That is the
inside significance OF this order concerning the
Brooklyn schools. In whatever language the
Commissioners order is framed, it should begin
with the phrase, "In the Name Of Ramapo"