Perth Amboy evening news., 1911-08-04
p-actice a pseudo-democracy.

1T assigns three reasons for this
failure. Offices which are too I'M
important to attract or deserve pub
lie attention are submitted to popu-
lar election; so many Offices are sub
mitted to popular election at one
time that many of them are ihevita-
bly, crowded out from proper public
attention; and with so many offices
to be filled by election at one time,
the business of making up the elab-
crate tickets necessary at every cleo
ton makes the political machine in
d~ispensable.
Many officials, therefore, it con-
cIudes, are elected without adequate
public scrutiny. and owe their selec-
ton not to the people, but to the
makers of the party ticket, who thus
acquire an influence thatIis capable
of great abuse
THE essentials of commission mu-
nicipal government plan can be sum
married. briefly from the able treat
Use on the subject by Professor Mac
Gregor, of the University of Wiscon-
sin:
In the first place there must be
a complete Capitalization and con
c%entration of all power and respon-
sibility in a small council or commits
sion. The commission is directly
charged with and is responsible for
the entire administration of the
city's affairs-it is the city govern
.llent.
The second essential is hat the
members of this council or commits
sion must be elected at large and
not by wards, and therefore, repre-
SEN the city as a whole, not sub
divisions of it.
Third: The members Of this
council or commission must be the
only elective officers of the city.
with the possible exception OF the
auditor, and in some cities of the
school board, and must have the
power of appointing all subordinate
administrative officials.
land the final requirement is
that not only must this council or
commission have the power of APP
pointing all subordinate admin
tive city officials, but ="
. them at will, in
~eep them directly respon-
sible to the commission and the com
mission directly responsible to the
people for the administration of the
city's affairs
and recently there has been pro-
posed what we consider a highly val
ue5le suggestion from a tested and
successful German system. 1t is
called the Lockport plan, and pro
vides that the commission shall ex-
ecute It's policies through a hired ad-
ministrator, leaving to the commits
sioners simply the function of tell
ing their city manager what the peo-
pie want and seeing to it that he car
ries out their orders in the spirit in
which they are issued.
This forecasts an even fuller
measure of efficiency, which is the
real meaning of the entire short bal
lot-commission system, in that it
makes possible the acceptance of
place in the commission by the fore
mOSt ClLlZenS OF d VINO
could not afford to devote their en-
tire time to administrative details.
I'VE do not regard the short bal
lot and commission government an
automatic panacea for civic ills. The
people of any community must be
reused for its right reception and
enforcement, else it will prove as
much a failure as, for example, an
admirable primary law has been in
Philadelphia. 1t would be the worst
possible blow to the plan to have an
experiment with it made now in New
York, Chicago, or this city. And it
is all the better for its future that
it has been rejected New Jersey cit
les, where a combination of Demo-
cratic and Republican gangs, liquor
interests, vice %panderers and
strange to say-socialists could COM