New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1920-08-01
YOuA
Municipal Courts Are
Crowded Daily With
Folks of Every Station
Pleading for Time TO
Find New Homes or
Against Unreasonable
Rent Increases; Judges
Position a Hard One


pathy with tenants who try to use the
rent laws to deprive landlord Of Just
rights. One woman who tried to enlist
the sympathy Of the court by her APP
pearance and pleading voice. but had
no grounds for the justice she claimed
soon discovered her mistake when Jus
tice Wilson told her he would give her
five days to pay her rent. She lett the
court murmuring against the justice
that had been dispensed to her.
Where Profiteering Is Cruel
The more cruel features of the rent
problem are to be encountered in the
courts in the lower East Side. In
the Municipal Court in old St. Mary's
schoolhouse in Madison Street, near
Clinton Street, the seamy side of life
is repeatedly on exhibition. Be
draggled women carrying infants in
their arms and with faces saddened by
an unequal struggle for life. are to be
seen every rent day. The landlord
wants his apartment or he wants more
rent Most times he is in court not to
obtain possession of his apartment,
but in defence of his rent schedule.
A dollar or two increase in rental, a
mere nothing to folks who live IN the
district covered by Justice Wilson'S
court, is a big thing to folks at the
other end of the town. They frankly
tell the court that they cannot pay the
landlords increase and purchase the
necessities of life. Deciding such
cases is most difficult because it is
I hard for a judge, who is a man first
with measurable amount of sym
pathy, to listen to the pleadings of
folks who must make a little go far
l
titled to income from his investment
and the dictates of the law must be
carried out.
Justice Blau has had to contend with
the currents of sentiment and justice
! for the last month, giving the tenants
the full benefit of the law without be-
ing unjust to the man who owns prop
erty. There were times last week
when the law imposed suffering on
| tenants, but it was because the limita-
tons provided for the tenant in the
recent legislation had been reached
and nothing more could be done for
the renter.
American Justice Is Strange
An Italian woman carrying a baby
on her arm was brought before Justice
Blau because she had not paid her
rent She lives in one of the lowly
houses of the Italian district Her
landlord, one of her own kind, leased
the house some months ago, and i'm
mediately increased her rent to S14.
The increase of several dollars she
could not pay, SO she set out to find a
cheaper place. Before she could find a
more reasonable home to live IN the
landlords day had come around
She told the justice, with the aid Of
an interpreter, that she could not paw
But this man must have rent" the
justice told her.
She could not grasp the justice of
the court defending the landlord She
told the court that she would have an
other home soon. She was given five
she left the courtroom betokened COM
plete lack of understanding of Ameri-
can justice
Several tenants who live in St. Marks
Place were in court because they would
not pay the rental demanded by the
new owner Of their house. Some of
them endeavored to have the new owner
believe that they were expected to pay
lower rental than he understood thew
paid He asked for s27 month from
most of them, but they explained they
we're paying only SIC and SIT a month
until he came.
The tenants story did not impress
Justice Blau; neither was he inclined
to give the landlord all he wanted.
Since S23 a month was mentioned in
the testimony as being the old rental,
he settled the matter by ordering some
to pay S23 and others $24 a month un-
til October
You understand" said the court.
addressing the landlord. there is to
be no increase in rental in the mean
time"
No Help for the Unemployed
One of the tenants piped up that he
could not pay this rental, that it was
toe much and ne was financially en-
barrassed.
II have been out Of work for sew
eral weeks, your honor" pleaded the
tenant
We'll, why don't you go to work 90
asked the justice.
Because my union is on strike"
Il don't see that that is any reason"
said Justice Blaua. adding. there is
nothing in the law that deprives a
landlord of his rental"
The striking tenant was given
neither moral or legal support He
was bit chagrined.
An elderly Italian woman told the
court that she did not pay her rent
because the landlord would not fix the
ceiling which had fallen down. By
gesture and outbursts she made him
understand that it had hit her on the
arm.
The landlord said it was because he
was a Jew that she had refused to
give him his rent The old lady said
she had lived in the house eleven
years, had paid her rent and was will
ing to pay now if the court would
make the landlord put her house in
condition He was told in no unmis-
taxable terms that it was the wish of
the court that the ceiling be put up
and the house put in order The old
lady then turned over the rent to the
court clerk, who passed it to the land
! lord
SO goes on the amending stream of
landlord and tenant cases, day after
day, in all parts of the city Thousands
more Of tenants are going to see the
inside of courtrooms for the first time
you'd better be ready.
Spier Property in Adirondacks
To Be Site of Many Bungalows