New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1900-04-09

HE HEARTILY CoMMENDs WORK OF THE
MERCHANTS AsSOCIATIoN-w WANTS IT
TO COOPERATE WITH CHARTER
COMMISSION

COMMISSION.
Albany April S-Governor Roosevelt has given
out the following letter the Ramapo matter:
April 6, 1900.
Frederick b. De Barard. esq. Merchants Asso-
citation, New-York N Y.
My Dear Sir: L thank you for your letter OF
the both ult The veto by the Mayor of the Fal-
lows bill. and the passage over his veto OF the
BILL against the practically solid opposition OF ms
party representatives in the Legislature mas
emphasized the wisdom of following out just the
course followed this year.
The work already done by the Merchants AS
sociation has brought about two most valuable
results: First. the Fallows bill, the principle of
which was suggested by you in November last
and the passage of which your agitation made
practicable; and, second, the exposure of the
true character of the Ramapo scheme, whereby
made future remedial legislation certain. You
have thus achieved present protection for the
city, so that the immediate urgency is past L
very earnestly hope you will continue your work,
and will cooperate through your Committee on
Water Supply with the Charter Revision Com
mission, so that IT may profit by your VIDE and
exhaustive study of the question of the water
supply of the city of New-York-a study wider
and more exhaustive than has ever before been
made, and wholly free from any official bias or
prejudice. You supply the Charter Com
mission with data of the utmost value, and
hope that your special committee will continue
its work with this end in view, for you would
thus render an additional and important service.
Your work should be continued; for at the next
session of the Legislature laws must be passed
which will afford not temporary but perma-
nent remedy.
1 also hope that your committee will push for
judicial decision both as to the precise powers
under the extraordinary grants to the Ramapo
company and to the exact effect of the
phraseology in the charter which brought about
the belief in the necessity for the Morgan bill.
Personally l trust that next year we can have
legislation taking away the unhealthy and ex-
cessive powers granted to the Ramapo COM
pany especially under the act of 1895. Even
if il be necessary to award compensation for
whatever has actually been done under these
hr,ao %ta t1,n, al
be Withdrawn.
AS it turned out, it not wise to endeavor
to push through the Morgan bill, especially in
view of the differences between your engineers
and those of the OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES which
seeming than real, but which rem
dered it utterly impracticable to get the meas
through at this time
Let me point out to you also that there were
very real objections to the Morgan bill in its
original form. In your letter you show the
grossest and most culpable misconduct on the
part of the city officials. Their acts described
by you verge actual criminality You show
that they attempted to bring about an artificial
water panic, and that the aid of the State had
to be invoked to prevent them from turning
waters from polluted ponds into the conduits
and that they were barely prevented by
plosiOn of popular Indignation from entering
into most grossly improper contract with the
Ramapo company. You show that the city
thorties of New-York have themselves pre-
pared the laws which dsqualify the city from
obtaining water through municipal ownership
Such being the case. it was but natural that
the country members should object to seeing
these same officials against whom so heavy an
indictment is framed made supreme over the
water systems of the country counties.
You have shown that the only hope lies not
in the action of the city authorities but in the
action of the State Legislature and the Execu-
tive; and, finally, that the danger is not only to
the city of New-York, but to all of the counties
in the eastern part of the State. When it is
necessary thus to invoke the aid of the State,
and when the Legislation asked for is to benefit
a city by means of works carried into various
country towns then it is well worth considering
whether not the legislation should be of such
a character as will permit these counties voice
in the matter. If Manhattan and Brooklyn
to draw their water supplies from Duchess or
Rockland Suffolk Essex, then the question
Of home rule is quite important to these coun-
try counties as it is to the two great metropoli-
boroughs. The water be obtained only
through special powers conferred by the State
and the State has right to impose such condi-
tions it deems wise in granting these powers
1t might be we'll while studying the general
question. to examine into the methods by which
in Massachusetts the city of Boston obtains its
water supply.
Let me congratulate you upon the mastery
manner in which you have exposed the facts in
connection with the effort to produce fictitious
water famine hoping that the panic thereby
produced would result in securing a contract for
the Ramapo company. The Controller believes
that the waste in New-Yor is excessive that
any possible water famine in the immediate
future. You have clearly shown that the i'm
mediate danger is not of water famine, but of
attempt the part of the city authorities
to create a panic by reason of an artificial fam
inc in order to force contract with this Ram
apo Water Company In view of this exposure
any such effort would now be discounted from
the outset.
New-York will in the lifetime of men now liv-
ing be the largest city on the globe and we
should build a water system not for one sum-
mer, but for half century to cOme-a system
that shall meet the needs of the future city and
be capable of almost automatic expansion as
those needs increase. Very truly yours.
THEODORE ROOSEVELT.