The New York herald., 1922-12-01
Senator Couzens a Live Man.

Senator Couzens a Live Man.
JAMES CoUzENs, appointed by the
| Governor of Michigan to fill the un-
expired term of Senator NEwBERRY,
has been an extraordinary success
as a business man, has made him.
self one of the dominant forces in
American municipal politics as Mayor
Cf Detroit and should become a strik-
ing and commanding figure in the
United States Senate.
A millionaire many times over
when he was scarcely more, than 40
years old, with his large fortune
made entirely by his industry, ability
and vision, this live. strong man, en-
tering the Senate at so. is fit to
make his mark there through the
imaginations which is his endowment
and the hard work which is the lot
of every man that becomes an ac-
knowledged leader in either house
of Congress. But while Republi-
can all his life, Senator CoUzENs
may reveal an independence Of view
and a freedom OF action which will
be startling to both the regular par
ties. That was his way when he
was first Police Commissioner and
then Commissioner of Street Rail-
ways in Detroit. 1t has been his
way as Mayor of that city. II it
does not prove to be. his way as
United States Senator nobody will
be more astonished than the ardent
political supporters who have fol-
lowed him deyotedly since he parted
from HENRY FORD with thirty mill
ions of dollars in his pocket and set
out, as he expressed 1t. to do some
thing for the, city of Detroit.
And what Mayor CoUzENs did with
the local transportation problem in
Detroit may have a powerful bearing
on what will be the attitude Of Sen
ator CoUzENs toward the transporta-
tion problem of the country. He put
Detroit into the street car business
without any illusions as to the nat
ural incapacity of governmental agen-
cies to do business job as cheaply
as private business interests could
do it. Himself a business man OF
large administrative capacity and
brilliant achievement, he knew bet
ter than to claim for public owner
ship and operation the financial
results obtainable under equal con-
ditions by personal incentive, en-
deavor and hope of reward. On the
contrary, he admitted that this was
not to be expected. But he said that
this was not the question. He de-
clared that the prime consideration
in the matter of local transportation
was that the public, regardless OF
comparative cost, must have service.
And he gave the people of Detroit
street car service.
II Senator CoUzENs holds fast to
that view of the imperative necessity
of service for the public in the ma
tional transportation field as in the
local transportation field he is likely
to become not merely new factor
but powerful force in the deter
mination of the cardinal issues Of the
American railway system, the coal
situation, agricultural credits and
every other question that involves
essential service for the American
public.
And if Senator CoUzENs now goes
into those national problems with the
energy and the strength he put into
the Detroit problem it would not
surprise THE New YORK HERALD II
he were practical as we'll as revolu-
tionary in his proposals for solving
those problems. His large business
sense. coupled with his large common
sense. might we'll move him, for ex-
ample, to approach either the rail-
road or the coal problem from the
angle OF a vast, reorganized, consoli-
dated and generally unified alliance
of few great systems under private,
not government, ownership and oper.
alton but under Federal sanction and
control. with the fat carrying the
lean, $50 that all those industrial
bodies might live while the public
got service