Norwich bulletin. [volume] (Norwich, Conn.) 1895-2011, 1909-03-27
Especial to The Bulletin.)

- Especial to The Bulletin)
Hartford. March 26.-Of course the
public utilities commission matter alb
serbs the major part of the attention
of the legislators these days, though
there are numerous other matters
which merit and receive attention.
The judiciary committee is by no
means through with its hearings on the
subject and probably not through with
the affirmative side, though, it must
be said in all truth, that the advocates
of the measure we're not so strenuous
or at the hearings in such large num-
bers as it had been expected they
would be.
No Great Rush to the Hearings.
There does not appear from the
course of the hearings thus far to be
the great popular demand for this
measure that one might have, thought
from reading the papers and from the
last democratic platform. There has
been no rush to Hartford to make the
demand for this legislation so insist
ent and so unmiStakeable that the
committee would be forced to report
something favorably. 1 do not say,
take notice, that the committee won't
report something in the way of a
commission measure, nor that 1t
ought not; I merely say that there is
evidenced no great popular uprisin'
which would force this, whether or no.
Secretary Wells, of the present tenn
porary commission. appeared and made
plain the commissions feeling in the
matter. The commission does hot in
sist on limiting the permanent COM
mission to three members and would
be as well pleased with five. 1t does,
however, insist that the first few pro-
visions of the measure framed by,
which secures to the commission to be
appointed the handling of all special
charters, after they are taken away
from the legislature. Is fundamental to
the proper sort of work by a commis-
sion. This is the very thing which the
present legislature is very unlikely to
grant
For one thing, the basis Of this lies
in the need for regulation of the Anan-
cling of public utilities companies, on
the ground that if conseryatively fl
nanced under the supervision of
commission their charges can be made
lower and thus the public will benefit.
Even if the representatives from the
small towns weren't utterly opposed to
taking these special charters away
from the general assembly, as they are
(and their attitude appears to be fixed
on this point), it would require some
thing more tangible and more readily
understandable by the average man
than the bonding and otherwise finan-
cling of public utilities corporations to
serve to work men up to see a great
public need for a plan which is now
city to them.
Something Far Away from the Average
Man.
The financing of public utilities cor
porations is something far away from
the average man and whether or not
bfc NJ r1aad YzrAfaaffpn tn f17fu
garland l am making no argument
as to whether they do or not and Sim
ply discussing the situation as it ex-
lists in the capitol from a news stand
point-the Subject isn't close enough
to his everyday life for him to get
worked up about 1t. Just there is
where the present commission has err
ed in its effort to get the people to see
matters from its standpoint.
The Only Popular Interest.
The only popular interest in this
whole subject lies in the phase of con-
troll and regulation of corporations
which furnish public utilities. If you
show a man that the telephone rates
in this state are inordinately high and
he'll open right up that's something
he knows about and can talk about,
and if you have a plan by which he
can be benefited along that line he's
Win you. but the average man cares
as little about whether or not the
Southern New England Telephone Co.
is capitalized for a million or a hun
dred million. He doesn't know any
thing about such things and it's the
hardest thing in the world to make
him see that the capitalization has anv
direct bearing on his end of the tele-
phone business; /. e.. what he pays for
telephone service. If, indeed. it has;
this isn't to say whether it has or not;
opinions of men. learned in the subject
differ very radically; yes. diametrical-
iy.
Representatives of business mems
associations see this matter from this
standpoint and, in reality. their on1~
interest in a commission is to have
court of appeals to handle complaints
that they have regarding this or that
public service corporation. At the
hearings, then. it was really a stand
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