Evening star., 1901-01-19
city a. including the entire District in To-

city as Including the entire District in To-
cal censuses.
Obviously II Is ridiculous and unjust to
discriminate between the people In the dif-
fefent sections Of the federal District ana
fund You may not enjoy the benent OF
expenditures from that fund on the same
basis Of treatment as your fellow contripu-
tors because you live on one side OF an
Imaginary line within the federal Dis
trict while they live on the other
Street Extension On National. Not
Local Lines.
The pending bills to extend and improve
separate streets entirely at the local ex-
pense propose substantially the reproduc-
tion in the county Of the street plan of the
original city. The avenues seeking exten-
sion propose to suffer no material contrac-
ton. and IL all are carried through the
belt of suburban subdivisions and connected
with the street plan provided by the amend
ed highway act the scheme Of streets of the
new Washington. while occupying some
what smaller percentage of area In thor
oughfares, will be on the same broad scale
as that of the original city.
But the plan of Washington as conceived
by our forefathers was on national, not
local SCALE the broad streets and avenues
occupying more than one-half the entire
area. The scheme would have been absuro
for a self-supporting, self-developing Mary
land village of that day. It's extension at
this time to adjacent territory Is equally
absurd, as well as grossly unjust ana un-
bearably oppressive. unless the nation
stands in the same relation to the extended
to the original plan and in the same re-
lation to the enlarged as to the original
city. The nation should not inconsistentiy
say to suburban Washington: You are TO
be 4 part of the capital in plan, but not IN
any other respect. You are to be compelled
to dedicate, open and improve streets ana
avenues on a national scale. but exclusively
at local expense. While making you an in
tegral part of the capital street system. you
are repudiated as a part OF tnat capital I'M
der the organic act of 1873
National Responsibility In Capital
Extension.
The expense of the street system Of w ash
ington is not to be endured uu.esS met by
all the resources which combine TO make
the national capital worthy of the nation
If Congress will violate the obligations in
Cured at the founding OF the federal DIS
tr:ct upon which the act OF 1873 was baSed,
and will say in legislation conceI ming the
extension of single streets separately ana
successfully that the nation has no financial
concern in the modern capital save in the
portion limited by the imaginary line OF
Boundary street. then the streets of the re-
pudiated section must be opened and I'M
proved on the basis of cramped local re-
sources and not on the national lines OF the
original city. But if. on the other hand,
Congress wisely determines that the grand
purpose of the highway act shall be carried
out and that the greater Washington OF
the coming century, for which we modernS
will be held responsible, shall not dlscredlt
the nation when compared with the city
planned by the forefathers, then the viola
tCn of the organic act involVel in the eX-
tension propositions now under consideIa-
ton must be vigorously discountenanced.
Consider for one moment Washington
original street plan of which the use Is sug-
gested exclusively at private expense Tor
be extension of the nations city.
1t represents the hard bargain driven with
the original prOprietors of the soil. John
Law, a prominent citizen, who came here
in 1900, charged in 1920 voicins a general
complaint. that the city had been made vast
by the politicians merely to crafty their
cupidity and to tempt as many farm mold
ers as possible to give up half their prop
erty. Even more bitter complaints were
made concerning the area appropriated for
streets and avenues. not merely one-half
but all of which was taken by the govern
ment without compensation. The property
owners donated One-haf of the lots and all
of the streets and avenues to the nation:
and the national representatives showed
shrewd appreciation of the terms Of the ben
efactiGn by setting apart as streets more
than une-half Of the total area of the city,
:;,GO5 acres out of a total of Gill a greater
percentage Of street surface than in any
other city In the world. Its Vastness has
been well pictured by imagining street 100
feet wide. extending from Washington to
New York. to be graded, asphalted and sup
3 pled Win cutters, CuFDStDnSS, SlueHdlhS,
drains, sewers. lamp posts and shade trees.
As the Senate District committee said IN
its report of 1850:
THE plan of the city was formed by the
public authorities: the dimensions of the
streets determined by them without inter-
ference by the inhabitants or regard to their
particular interest or conven ence. IL is a
plan calculated for the magnificent capital
of great nation, but oppressive from its
very dimensions and arrangements to the
inha b;tants if its execution to any cons:d-
cradle extent is to be thrown upon them.
No people who anticipated the execution
and subsequent support of it out of their
own funds would ever have d. canned of
forming such plan. At that period neither
the government nor the propr etors contem-
pla ted that the whole or even a large pro-
portion OF the burden should be thrown
upon the inhabitants of the city.
The streets were not only oppressive
from their size and extent in their original
formation, but they will from the same
cause continue to be unend ng source OF
expense in their repair. They must annually
cost nearly double the amount of streets OF
the same, length of moderate dimensions.
The government which crested this condi
ton of things ought not to be ve'y deaf to
the complaints of those upon whom such
burden has fallen
Extension of the street Plan.
The proposition now is to preserve much
| of this magnificent street plan. the grandest
in the world. and to extend 1t to a consid-
cradle degree over the DISTRICT outside OF
Washington under a me; ;hod of extension
in some re poets more unjustly oppressive
to the Inhabitants of the federal District
| than the arrangement of which the original
property owners complained. The latter
were required to give land for the streets;
| bu. they were recompensed in part for their
| gifts by the nderStanding afterward vio-
| lated. that the donated streets should be
| opened and improved exclusively or large.y
at the expense Of the nation. In the pres
| ent extension of this plan TO the county, on
| the other hand. the nation is exempted in
| at least one of the pending bills from par
| tic,pating even in the Improvement of the
| extended street.
| Had old Washington realized that the na-
| ton would disregard its implied agreement
| and throw the expense of street develop
| ment almost entirely upon individual cit!-
| zens, it would never have consented to ded-
! cate for street purposes more than half of
| the total area of the city. and the new
| Washington beyond Boundary street may
| well shrink back when invited to develop
| the extravagant and expensive but magnifi-
! cent street plan Of a great national capital
| with the feeble, unaided resou' ceS OF a scat
| tered suburban population, which in its nat
| ural development would never dream of
| dedcating to the public end Of maintaining
! and improving at its own expense a street
4 talya >f a