The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1906-05-22
GAYNOU HITS OUT At BELMONT
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'a .'plv munieital owuorihip l'ia'los
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country
WITHIN onr aeat NJ tustIre upvnof vac
.slirrt Aurtia' tislrrpt No h1d not
rirrIrI ~ Nv anvfhiuF hut 4 fee words
.r.rfuine the work ~ tho commission
,a J.H,OHr Uaynrr got into hrs ala NJ.
l.u.muni e iaca flushed and hc hooked very
ur. owfprttblr
WHOM ho rpt . chnu-o 10 urcnk hc went
f,r Oivuof. without mentioning him hv
ramc. and snid that hr vputed TO rrpudintr
N the m.s unqualified language Tho M
suntIon- that had bccn made.
I'Igo Olyuor was not called upon until
urrr Oscar Straus, who prr-ided. had
.uosan ~ tho work the commission ev-
icc'rl fp do and after Prof. Frank Good
r,w and Albert Sha W. members n the
c1mmlastpn. had talked about municipal
uyrcrship and how to study the question.
Nr. Strais, who, "a toastmastcr, zepn-
rate! Judge GaynOr from Mr.. Belmont
A. the head table. had announced that
tho discussion was to he informal and
that any one might be called upon. and
the Justice started OF mildly enough by
saying that It was hardly worth while
talking in a company Of such philosophers.
II the federation, he said, had done no other
work than to bring Mr.. Belmont and Mr..
Gompers together il would have lone a
great work.
These agitations for municipal ownership,
and to some extent for munici pal manage
ment, /" he said, "have, In my judgment,
arisen not out Of any hostility to capital or
to the private management Of public service
corporations. The live coal now in the
mind Of this country was neither originated
nor Ia it being famed into fame by such
hostility. On the contrary, IL has come
wholly from the Encouragement OF these
enterprises, in overcapitalisation, in water
ing stock again and again.
The community cannot look without
feeling, without regret, without deep resent
ment and, finally, without action to the
doubling up Of capital, the trebling OF CAPT
tai put into these public franchises, repre-
senting nothing but a perpetual tax on the
community.
We see these great companies in New
York now united and leasing themselves
for 900 years. Dear me, think Of our stand
ing that thing for 900 years! Nine years is
more likely than 900. Is the actual capital
doubled? No, not the capital but these
great gifts, these franchises that are nothing
but licenses from the people, are made
a drain on the community, by being bonded
and the stock double up, year after year.
until the sum has become colossal enough
] will be bold enough to say it even In this
presence-dishonest enough to shock the
moral sense Of the people of this country.
There is the seed OF this hostility, this feeling
toward these corporations.
We have just had a great debate in WASH
ington touching on the railways. The same
thing is true Of them. There is no resent
ment in Washington against capital, but
there is hostility to these public utilities
being madea perpetual tax on the people "a
though the recipients had the right to do
as they pleased with them. What are
the railroads but our public highways
as much as the dirt road alongside?
The public mind has now come to the
understanding Of this and you can't rid the
public mind Of it. The building Of these
roads may by mismanagement, by mis-
direction, have been turned over to private
individuals and the trouble is, not that we
have any hostility to honest capital, but
that those who have these gifts have come
somehow to understand that they own
them for their own profit first and for the
public second,
1T is a horrible crime if the public high
ways carry the freight Of one man or a
group Of men at half the rate charged
another, to the aggrandizement OF one
man and the destruction of the other.
Go back to the days Of tollgates. What
do you think would happen If one man
should drive through for one-half what
another man paid? They would tear down
the tollgate. What will happen ultimately
to the railroads? The people will tear down
the railroads. We will do this peacefully
If possible, forcibly if We must.
There is nothing more certain than
that the people have come to the conclusion
that this thing will no longer be tolerated
either on the highways of the nation or the
highways of the city. They demand that
they shall be managed for the aggra ndize-
ment Of no single individual, but for the
welfare of all. need not say to you that
taking of private property by the Govern
ment can be done only for the Government
and for the welfare Of the people, and could
only be on the theory that they are per-
forming governmental functions; that they
are highways which from the twilight Of
history have always been managed by
governments.
And l want to invoke a blessing on the
man who as President OF the United States.
has seen this great question as you would
see through that pane of glass, who has
heldi it up before the country when no politi-
cal party dare to make it an issue, who has
forced it before Congress and fought for a
fnal issue in spite of all the abuse and re-
elimination that has been heaped upon
him. Not that 1 think that this law will
cure all the ills but that the moral feeling
Of the people is expressed in it,
Judge Gaynor said that the commission
would find in Europe that no man can hold
Mo h;0h