Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1919-09-22
BUSINESS AND POLITICS
AND JERSEYS PRIMARIES
Behind the Election and the Trolley Row
Is Desire for the Separation OF
Public and Private Interests

I
sey, announced on Saturday that the
five members of the Public Utilities
| Commission responsible for zone fares
will be summoned to show cause why
they should not be ousted in a clump the
august commissioners had reason to be-
| lieve that the world actually does move.
Nothing so astonishing ever happened to
! a utilities commission before.
The gentlemen have much to explain.
| They have reason to feel that they are
to be a grand sacrifcial offering to the
! gods of political chance. And quite un-
Intentionally they have brought about a
crisis that will give to tomorrow's pri-
( marjes in New Jersey sprightly signif-
cance unknown to any recent elections
in America. For it isn't candidates or
| the utilities commission or even the Pub
| lie Service Corporation that will be on
trial at the polls.
The thing that the voters in New
Jersey have grown to hate and the thing
that they wish to eliminate is the old
! ldSHlOHeu, ulSdSJIOuS TeldIOISIlp DC-
tween big business and politics.
That relationship is out of date. 1t is
no more acceptable nowadays than horse
cars or the mauve- -colored plug hat of
| the eighties. Yet it persists in New Jer-
sey, as it persists in many other Amer
| lean communities, as dark inheritance
from unregenerate and unenlightened
| days. Most business men of experience
have found that it doesn't pay. Wher
ever you look in America you will find
big corporations doing their utmost to be
| free of a political relationship which,
after all, was rarely Uf their own seeking.
The Pennsylvania Railroad and the
P R. T. saw the light long ago and
profted. Wherever there is a belief that
politics and business can mix there will
| be loss and trouble. 1t is the apparent
domination of county and city govern
ments by the steel interests in western
Pennsylvania that has provided labor
leaders with effective strike propaganda.
| And it is because of sentimental ties
that are presumed to exist between the
Public Service Corporation of New Jer-
sey and the State Utilities Commission
that the people, after years of resigna-
| ton, have suddenly demanded a show
down that may be costly for everybody
concerned.
Once yout are suspected, once you
achieve Il questionable reputation, you
are doomed to go unheeded even when
your woes are authentic and your claims
just. The Public Service Corporation
may prove some justice in its claims. The
utilities commission may have decided
honestly according to its lights in the
zone fare business. But it will have
hard time convincing the people of New
Jersey of it's virtue.
Its past has returned to haunt it
as pasts always do.
The Public Service Corporation, the
real issue at tomorrow's primaries, is
consolidation of all the street railway and
electric and gas interests in the most
populous parts of the state. 1t is in
every sense monopoly 1t has revealed
the usual alterations of monopolies.
And it was formed under auspices more
or less political.
Davy Baird was one of the original
geniuses of the corporation. The Public
| Utilities Commission, which is supposed
to regulate public service in the interest
of the people, is named by the governor
Naturally the service corporation has
figured large in Jersey politics. The
present commission has been openly ac-
cused of subserviency to the monopolistic
influences, Governor Edge appointed the
five commissioners who are now to be
grilled by his friend and successor, Gov
ernor Runyon.
Rum was to have been the issue to-
morrow, and some Republican candidates
have been making desperate efforts to
divert the attention of the populace to
woman suffrage. They might have sue
ceeded had it not been for the utilities
commission itself, which in a misguided
hour sustained the appeal of the street.
car corporation for the right to whoop
trolley fares to an undreamedof altitude
in South Jersey.
That decision would have been unwise
under any circumstances. Coming imme-
diately before an election, it was disas-
trous. 1t reminded all the users of gas
and electricity of their own troubles. II
revived old grudges. 1t looked ominous.
What had happened was what has hap
pened with every monopoly in the past
The Public Service Corporation over
reached and brought down the house
about its ears.
All utilities corporations in the country
will sooner or later feel the effect of the
Camden trolley boycott. The immediate
result of that hubbub was an organized
agitation throughout all the state for ar
elective utilities commission. Heretofore
no one has seriously questioned the wis.
dom of laws which permit the appoint.
ment of such powerful commissions by
the governor of state. But the prin,
ciple now advanced by one of the can.
didates for the governorship in New Jer
sey is sure to appeal powerfully to the