The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-08-09
Thinks Council Would Not O7er-
rule His Protest.
WHAT THE PEOPLE SAY
Will Listen to Views of the Tax
Payers.
Profit by Experience of Lincoln
City Fathers.

council at the meeting on August /.
81 will do it, says the mayor, 'if
become convinced that the majority
of the business men and citizens gen.
orally are opposed to it. l believe that
if l veto the ordinance it can not be
passed over my veto.''
Personally, the mayor is anxious to
drive the spike which will render the
franchise null and void. But he is
going to wait a few days and listen
to what people say. When he left
Topeka he was inclined to bow to the
VIII or the nine members of the coun-
Gil who voted for the franchise. Since
then he has absorbed a new lot of
resolution on the subject, and is only
trying to satisfy himself that his ac-
ton would not be unpopular with the
people, preliminary to returning the
gas franchise without his approval.
The mayors course causes conster-
nation among the friends of the gas
that If the mayor decides to veto the
ordinance, and the chances are poor
Tor passing it over his veto, the gas
company will make retreat. They
VIII get word from headquarters that
the franchise is not satisfactory to A.
N. Brady owner of the company. This
Will make it appear that the mayor
was turning down a very good thing
for the city, and would tend to put him
in bad light.
1t takes nine votes to pass the ordi-
Hd4lCS over the mayors veto. Every
councilman who is absent and not vot-
| ing is really vote in support of the
mayor. Councilman GriIey, who voted
for the ordinance, has gone away to
be gone six weeks: If the matter
comes up within that time, there is
almost no chance of its being passed
over the mayor. Councilman Ryder
and possibly others, would vote in
FAVOR of sustaining the mayor.
| Some of the counciIrnen are taking
up a threatening attitude in view of
the possibility that the mayor will
veto the ordinance. One member said
! today:
'The mayor had better look out. If
he makes the boys hot, they may get
after him. When a measure received
nine votes in the legislative body.
ecutive is taking a serious RESPONSE
bility on himself to veto the measure.
He is setting UP his judgment as
against the Judgment of three-fourths
OF the members of the council"
Superintendent Diehlmann of the
gas company said today, when it was
suggested to him that the mayor
would likely veto the ordinance:
What does he do that for? 1t is the
best and most liberal franchise ordi-
nance the city ever had. The people |
want it to go through"
The news of the passage of the gas
franchise here has reached Lincoln |
Neb., and seemed to have aroused |
much interest there. Lincoln has Just |
passed through a long war for cheap |
gas, and finally managed to secure a |
compromise with the company on a |
rate of S1.20. Consequently Lincoln |
has not much the best of Topeka, but |
the Lincoln News shakes up some of
the skeletons in the closet of the city |
council of Topeka with the following |
very pointed editorial:
SOME GOOD ADVICE.
Through the Vaccinations of a gas |
company that seems to manifest the |
usual activity in the matter of elect |
ing and controlling councilmen the peo-
pie of Topeka have had saddled onto |
them the burden of paying slips for gas |
for the next thirty years.
1t is inconseivable how anybody of |
sound mind and average discretion |
would vote to clamp such a tax upon |
his fellow-citizen for so long a period, |
but when 1t comes to dealing with |
councils manufactured by public ser |
vice corporations almost anything is |
likely to happen. And anyway a city |
that will calmly elect the president of /
the gas company as a member of its |
council in the trusting belief that he |
will deal fairly as between the city and |
the company deserves to get soaked |
good and hard.
The whole transaction bears the ear |
marks of a deliberate throw-down. The |
that perpetual franchises. such as are |
granted in Nebraska, are not possible. |
The gas company that operates in To-
peka had franchise which would not |
scented danger ahead and while it had |
a council that was complainant it |
deemed it the part of wisdom to apply |
for and secure a thirty year grant to |
gouge the people This application for |
a franchise years ahead of the expira-
ton of it's old one ought to have placed |
the people of Topeka upon inquiry. 1t
was a plain notice that the company |
had something up its sleeve, that 1t |
was fearful of the future.
Topeka's council-not the present one |
passed dollar gas ordinance several
years ago. The company, as is the
still in the courts, with the probability, |
as the local press says, of the city be-
ing defeated. The gas company came
forward, under the pretense of settling
the controversy. by oner i $50, ~
in the council by making the figure
SLIPS, and the tying up of the town in
a thirty year sack followed.
When one considers what remarkable
progress has been made in the gas
making industry in the past thirty
years and how the cost of manufacture
has been steadily reduced, he must be
amazed that city would voluntarily
tie itself up in a contract to pay what
is now more than the just and proper
price, for thirty years in the future.
Readers of The News have been made
fully aware of the facts concerning
the price of gas, and when it is con-
sidered that Topeka has the advantage
in the matter of cost of coal, it re-
quires no extended argument to prove
that Topeka, if she consumes any ap-
preciable amount of gas ought to have
it supplied in the neighborhood of a
dollar.
Long before Topeka's thirty year
contract to pay s1.25 for gas expires
the city of Lincoln will be enjoying 81
gas. This is pledge that The News
has out, and it proposes to redeem it.
The present company has given it's