duces motion, is the system of nomination by petition. It brings popular power to bear on the processes of government, because it strikes a body blow at the stronghold of the Boss and the Ring by abolishing the caucus and convention, and placing the nomination, as well as the election of candidates in the hands of the voters themselves. The provision for nominations is very brief and simple and of course consistently leaves much to be determined by the city in which the system is applied; that is as to the form of ballot, etc. It reads as follows: "Candidates for elective municipal offices shall be nominated by petition signed by legally qualified voters of the city concerned. The number of signatures to such petition shall be determined by the council of the city, but no more than fifty signatures shall be required. Such petition shall be filed in the office of the mayor at least thirty days before the date of the election; provided, however, that in the case of the death or withdrawal of any candidate so nominated such petition may be so filed within a less period than thirty days. The petitions "need not be one paper, and may be printed or written, but the signatures must be the autograph signatures of the persons whose names purport to be signed. To each signature the house address of the signer must be added, and the signature must be made and acknowledged, or proved, before an officer authorized by law to take acknowledgment and proof of deeds. Of course it will be said that a multiplicity of candidates will appear, and that some of them will be put up by the Ring, but the real theatre of the Ring's activities is in the narrow field of the preliminary meetings and conventions, where there are delegates who can easily be purchased or misled. It is very doubtful that it could successfully exploit an entire electorate. It may also be said that nominations would easily be brought about by a very small minority, as if the managers of the machine who now nominate were not a very small and exceedingly dangerous minority. Many petitions might be presented or not, but in any case it would be the people of the city who would finally nominate by ballot. In English cities where the suffrage is almost unrestricted, the result of nomination by petition is that very few candidates are put up. There are no conventions or Bosses, and only nominal politics in city elections; and a sufficient demonstration of that fact is the circumstance that in the heat of the fierce Gladstonian campaigns many conservative councilmen were elected, and elected again, by liberal constituencies, in English cities, because they were invaluable municipal servants, honorably and exclusively devoted to local interests. Two other essential features of the Program will be merely noted here because they are sure to receive exhaustive consideration from other speakers. They are the provisions which require public service companies to make sworn and detailed local reports of their finances, and which limit the grant of franchises to twenty-one years. A strong mayor without a fully equipped council to provide a formulation of the local will would naturally be dangerous if he were not an ideally constituted man. A council possessed of executive power is likely to become corrupt through the importunities of rival applicants for municipal contracts. A city government elected by the present method is certain to represent the agents of public service companies who are often the actual rulers of American cities through the control of nominations, and if such companies are not more perfectly restrained they will, under the best possible conditions, continue to be a source of corrupt influence and a menace to reputable government. Many of our friends who, as individuals, are above reproach and who command our highest respect, are connected with such companies, and are simply blinded to their patriotic duties by regarding matters narrowly and at too short range. It is fair to say that you can never have good candidates as long as the caucus and convention enable the machine to monopolize the power of nomination. The people will appear apathetic to a certain extent, even in general elections, until they can nominate their own candidates, and they can only nominate them with any degree of success by petition. They will never actively share in municipal government until they are fully responsible, and their interests are sufficiently jeopardized by the election of a long term council, with the powers involved in a practically exclusive system of local legislation to sharply challenge and render alert and active their instinct of self-preservation. The council even in that case would be ex posed to the invasion by corrupt and self-seeking men, unless it were deprived of executive powers. A strong and irresponsible mayor with a council elected on the present plan, that is by the Ring, might be a serious menace to good government if so inclined; and a city council with adequate legislative powers would be nearly useless without a properly organized executive force from the mayor down. Any system of city government organized upon the present nominating system in this state* would necessarily be bad. Any system, even the best, which did not provide for complete municipal accounting, and full local reports of the financial condition of franchise holding companies, together with short term franchises, would always be in danger of some degree of temporary corruption; while good executive administration without a sound civil service system is impossible. I am telling an old story over again in calling renewed attention to certain features of the new Program, and I hope I have been able in some degree to make their merits clear. They are essential and indispensable parts of perfect municipal machinery, none of which would be fully efficacious, and some of which would be not wholly safe without the others. Together they are a logical symmetrical and beneficent summing up and formulation of practical municipal experience, and a valuable adjustment, not of new things but of wise and successful methods evolved in the long history of municipal development. I could not wish this or any other state better fortune than that involved in adopting the leading features of the new Municipal Program for its cities. * Wisconsin THE NEW MUNICIPAL PROGRAM AND HON. JOSHUA STARK, President, Wisconsin Bar Association. The subject of municipal reform has engaged public attention and been much discussed in Wisconsin during the last ten years, in the public press, upon the platform and in professional and business circles throughout the state. Interest in the subject has greatly increased since the adoption in 1892 of an amendment of the state constitution, which prohibits special legislation for the incorporation of any city or the amendment of its charter. Prior to that year, the legislature at each session was deluged with bills proposed by common councils, public officials and private citizens, quite independently of each other, which would more or less change the law defining the powers and regulating the administration of individual cities. Many such bills were presented and acted upon by the legislature without attracting public attention. Members representing the city affected were often ignorant, indifferent or deceived as to the scope and effect of the proposed legislation, or were induced not to oppose, or even to favor it. The facility with which under this practice schemes highly prejudicial to the public interest could be quietly worked out through legal enactments, made it necessary that legislation for particular cities should cease. Since the adoption of the constitutional amendment referred to, the amendment of a city charter can only be effected by a general law, applicable alike to all cities of the same class, determined by population. A general law providing for the incorporation of cities was enacted in 1889, and in an amended form is still in force, but most of the cities of the state are acting under special charters granted prior to the date of the constitutional amendment. This condition of affairs has compelled the study and comparison of the charter provisions of different cities in the state and a discussion of the general subject of municipal government. For such purposes a League of Wisconsin Municipalities was formed some five or six years ago, which has ever since held annual meetings. Many civic associations, clubs and societies under various names have been organized for promoting good government in cities, and interest in the subject is increasing. Some progress in the direction of municipal reform has been already made in Wisconsin. By act of the legislature of 1885, all persons in the fire and police service of the city of Milwaukee were placed under civil service rules, framed and enforced by a non-partisan board of commissioners appointed by the Mayor. In 1895, the civil service system in its main features was extended to nearly all subordinate officers and employes in the administrative service of the city, under a similar board. The result has been a gradual, marked improvement in the character of the men and the quality of the service. In 1897, a law was passed subjecting the fire and police departments in all cities of the state having a population of ten thousand or more, to the merit system. The subject has engaged the interest and support of political parties, at least in the city of Milwaukee. The Democratic City Convention, held in Milwaukee in March, 1894, for the nomination of candidates for city offices, in its platform or declaration of principles, demanded the application of business principles in municipal government, affirmed its thorough sympathies with all efforts to extend civil service requirements to every department of the city government, and pledged the candidates of the convention, if elected, to do all in their power to carry out the letter and spirit of these declara tions. The representatives of the Republican party, in convention the same month, heartily endorsed the doctrine of municipal reform in the broadest and fullest sense, and declared their belief that the time had come when the policy of placing appointments to public office upon the plane of personal merit should be extended as far as practicable to every department of the city gov ernment. Such facts as these may be taken as evidence of a disposition |