Newark evening star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1909-1916, 1913-08-07
\NZashington
| Y ' LETTER
BY n. n WALKER
Sta s..W ~sA
"FUSION A TAMMANY AID"
Star STAR Correspondent.
Star Bureau,
Metropolitan National Bank Bldg,
uryacnrHr~a.r


himself well-known among reformers
and students of political economy, de-
clares that there can be nothing more
harmful to real reform and surer in
the end to strengthen the hold OF
Tammany on New York than a sue
cessful fusion campaign this year,
based on no constructive propositions,
and side-stepping the real issues and
fundamental reforms.
Mr.. Pinchot urges that the two fun
damental reforms in New York city
which would mean anything in des-
troying real graft and reducing cost
of living, so that the average citizen
could feel 1t, would be public owner
ship and operation of the subways,
trolleys and other transportation
lines. of electric and gas companies
and the exemption of personal prop
erty and buildings from taxation.
Tells Why Reform Failed.
Reform movements in New York,
says Mr.. Pinchot, have always failed
because they have deserved to fail.
One reason for this, he points out, is
that refermers have almost always
stood for men instead of measures.
''Such is the political instinct of
self preservation, says Mr.. Pinchot,
land so powerful the pressure otthese
elements of society which oppose real
reforms Gust as they favor bogus
ones) that even a reform administra
ton of saints would be practically
useless unless it were irrevocably
committed in advance to a platform
so definite as to resemble a promis-
sorv note, and so specific as to be in
of rtua 10
office-holder's integrity and reputa-
ton"
"Shying Around Real Issues
Certain gentlemen in the Progress
sive, Fusion and Republican camps"
continues Mr.. Pinchot, ARE today shy
ing around our real issues and re-
forms and trying to manufacture
paramount issues out of police graft,
economy of administration, etc.
"In a militant mood and bristling
with civic virtue, they denounce the
wickedness of police corruption. Does
anybody defend it? They declare
dauntlessly for honest police admin
istration. Is any one against 1t?
They go so far as to insist that prey
ing upon abandoned women, murder
ing gamblers and depressing saloon
Keepers are base-no one to the con-
trary. They cry out fearlessly that
they will put honest men in office
and clean out gangsters. Roaring
like Numidian lions, they throw down
the gauntlet to every one who does
not agree with their ultimatum that
economy and lower taxes are good
things, also clean streets and a city
beautiful, whatever that means.
''In a word, they are constructing
a n1ef faFi Job oil
comfortably stand, with the apparent
hope that it will be adopted by unani-
nous consent. And they are framing
a program which no one can possibly
oppose on any ground-except that
its sum total amounts to zero, and
that If 1t should win, the average
man, woman or child of New York
would be no whit better off for the
victory"
"Tammany Owned by ExpIoiters."
The real power behind Tammany,
declares Mr.. Pinchot, is "a group of
large calibre exploiters, with offices
further down town than Fourteenth
street, who own Tammany and use it
for their own purposes. as a farmer
uses his oxen for harvesting a crop
or a hunter his dog for running a
deer.
ANY campaign that does not strike
at the electric, gas, telephone, sub
way, surface and elevated road mo-
nopolies." says Mr. Pinchot, simply
amounts to kind of May-day PAL
eant-to attacking Tammany with
slap-sticks or pelting the Tiger with
flowers and confetti
Wherever municipal ownership has
found a footing it has seldom re-
coded, says Mr.. Pinchot 1t has al
most invariably been a success, skilled
liars in the employ of the private
companies to the contrary notwith-
standing. He points out that while
the Edison company charges a maxi
mum rate of ten cents and mini
mum rate of five cents for electric
light and power in New York, the
municipal plant in CLEVELAND has
fixed a maximum rate of three cents
and a minimum rate of one cent.
Saves 100000 to Consumers.
The South Norwalk municipal cleo
trio plant, furnishing electricity to
consumers lower than any private
plants in Connecticut, he points out,
has since 1902 made profits of four
times the amount of capital invest
ed. In Pasadena, he shows, the mu-
nicipal electric plant reduced the rate
to consumers in less than four years.
There are, he says, more than 1,400
municipal electric plants in the United
States, and there have been aban-
doned three times as many private
plants as public plants.
While Indianapolis gets gas for
sixty cents from public plant, Mr..
Pinchot proceeds to argue, New York
consumers pay eighty cents, and regu-
lation of utilities in that State has
not resulted in reducing a gas OF
electric rate outside of New York
city. Regulation of utilities, he de-
clares, has been everywhere a fail
ure, so far as securing lower rates for
the public is concerned.
Municipal Ownership In Britain.
Twenty years ago, Mr.. Pinchot ex-
plans, there were only three cities in
Great Britain that owned and oper-
ated their own street railways. To-
day there are only three cities in the
kingdom that have private ownership
of tramways. In GLASGOW 30 per cent
of the people are carried for a one
cent fare. and in London 36 per cent
Three hundred cities and towns in
Great Britain. he points out, owr
their own gas works, and a majority
or the eltctIic pidHlS, WIN great re-
duction of cost of living to the PEG.
Pile.
Most of the corruption in American
municipal politics, says Mr.. Pinchot
comes from private ownership of pub
lie utilities.
"In order to gain their end they
(the managers of the private utility
corporations) have Joined hands witt
the saloon. the gambling house ant
the red light district, but the heac
and front. of the sinister combination
is always the public service corpora
ton
Says Land Tax Is Indispensable.