The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1909-11-09
PLAY SAME GAME
IN IOWA CAPITAL
As OTHER PLACES
Continued From Page One.)

Moines, that the head Of the street
car company in that city strolled in. as
be had strolled into council meeting
several times before, and dictated to
ais bought hirelings, the council. what
the value OF his company was.
The council Immediately reduced the
valuation some hundreds of thousands
OF dollars. And it may be interesting
to remark in passing. that the same as
, SCISSOR who assessed the company in
previous days and who saw his assess
| ments cut in half when the corpora
tons and their agents came around, is
now member of the first commission
in Des Moines under the new plan.
He has saved the city of Des BONES
the money which the former clique of
servants of the corporations sliced off
the assessments Of the companies.
The Asphalt Trust.
Nor We're the Vaccinations of cor
porations in Dies Moines. of which l
have just city two representative in
stances. confined to public service cor
porations. The Asphalt Trust, some
times known lat least on its letter
heads as the Barber Asphalt company,
was one of the pillagers Of the city
Under its we'll known plan Of business
it provided forfeit for poor work-for
failure to repair, etc, etc, according
to its procedure in all American mu-
inequalities.
And
1t is said that there was so complete
an understanding between the city Of
ficials and the asphalt trust that these
forfeits for bad work and failure 20
keep streets in repair were never COL
lected. OF course, nothing could be
proved-but they were not collected.
There is more to the asphalt story
the city does better now.
Evils Of a System.
Such small matters as cutting down
one corporations assessment from ST.
3Oo 600 to $4,000 as q favor to the
interests non collection Of forfeit
ures fro ma trust: providing feed"
from the public trough to contractors.
and getting rake OFFS from advertis-
ing and inspection" together with the
commonplace or terrible according as
one knows much or little of the work
ings of the old ward plan Of govern
ment in this country today. But one
must not think too harshly of a town
which has this state of either graft or
incompetency, or both. In the first
place the fault is in the system which
places an obligation to the interests"
for every election which is held. And
one must not think badly of the aver
age, ordinary man who could not help
matters if he tried.
These evils are the by-product of a
wrong system. Attack the system and
not the by-product, and you are really
accomplishing something.
What the Future 10.
This is a very slight intimation of
the situation in Des Moines. But il
you will remember that Des Moines
shows a perfect development OF good
and bad. along typically American
lines, you will know what the condi-
tions were before the adoption Of the
Des Moines Plan.
American cities are not so unlike
that you cannot find a parallel close
at home in your own town.
What. then, has Des Moines, to
bring to this question: 1t may be still
imperfect. but it has solved these great
American problems so successfully.
that they may be applied to any city
in the United States which is tired OF
the old and wants a chance to develope
in peace. We shall see later how
these problems were overcome They
were over come-not by the courts; not I
by the state legislature: not by the
reform movements" not by good cit
izens;" not by change Of heart of pub
lie service corporations: nor yet by the !
sudden publication OF city officials and
ward politicians.
Was it miracle?
Not at all.
The people. the average men. the Or
binary men, stepped in and asserted !
their rights. And they cleared up the !
situation which the others had been |
doing their best to muddle-and have |
for years in every city in the
United States.