Inquirer with ballot boxes and regular printed ballots just before the lease of the Philadelphia gas works in 1897, the votes in favor of the lease were 32, and against it 2583, or 1 to 81.

The proposed San Francisco charter provides that "every ordinance involving the granting by the city and company of any franchise for the supply of light or water or for the lease or sale of any public utility" must be ratified by the people. Whenever a petition equal to fifteen per cent. of all the votes cast at the last preceding general election is presented to the city government in favor of the acquisition of any public utility and requesting a vote of the people thereon, such a proposition must be formulated by the city government and presented to the people. The legislative branch of the government must present a plan, and the Mayor may, if he desires, submit an alternative plan. The legislative branch of the city may also submit such a proposition to the people, without such petition.

In both the Minneapolis and San Francisco charters bonds cannot he issued for the acquisition of a municipal plant without the ratification of two-thirds of those voting thereon.

2. A company should be guaranteed a monopoly for a whole city, unless the city be as large as Chicago, in which case a company should be guaranteed a monopoly in its section or grand division of the city.

3. All extensions that can possibly be made by an existing company should be so made, in the way prescribed in the Berlin contract given below. This follows as a natural corollary from guaranteeing a monopoly. There are exceptional conditions where a new company might concede low fares if permitted to invade the territory of an existing company. If, however, it is possible to reduce charges, the city government can often force it on the old company, through its reserved right to fix reasonable charges, unless prevented by the terms of the franchise. If the latter are for short periods, however, as they should be, it would be far better for the city to await the expiration of the franchise. Two companies in the same district mean duplication of power houses or manufacturing plants, official salaries, etc.

4. Right of petition to some State or local board by those residing or owning property upon a street along which a new railway is pro posed, as provided in the Massachusetts law of 1898. The Illinois law, which requires the consent of the majority of abutting property owners before a franchise can be given is very bad, since it opens the way to the purchase of such consents at high price by the railway company. The Massachusetts law merely provides for a hearing by the State Board of Railroad Commissioners, after the granting of a permit in a street by a city government.

5. Local authorities should determine what new franchises are needed, and in case there is no existing company prepared to undertake the same, should offer the franchise to the best bidder, if the public do not wish to operate directly. This bid may be in the direction of low fares, or of a money compensation, as the public may prefer.

6. All the Massachusetts restrictions on over-capitalization should be rigidly applied, and a State commission should see to the enforcement of such restrictions. The Massachusetts law now forbids the issue of any kind of securities by most of these city monopolies without the approval of the Board of Railroad Commissioners, or the Board of Gas and Electric Light Commissioners. These Boards are directed to refuse permission for such increase, if the tangible assets or structural value of the plant on which the new securities are to be issued are less than the existing capitalization, although, by a law of 1897, the Railroad Commissioners may allow increase of securities in the case of street railways when the capital is impaired, but must, in such cases, order reduction in dividends until the capital is restored. No securities in tbese municipal monopolies in Massachusetts can be issued without the order of the proper State Board as to how the money shall be spent. None can be issued for the purchase of property. All securities must be sold for cash. This tends to prevent undue payments to construction companies. The State Boards fix the interest on bonds and after an examination of the market value of the existing stock they are expected to state a price somewhat near thereto, which the stockholders must pay if they would take the new stock issues. In case the stockholders do not take all of it at the price fixed by the Board, the rest must be sold at auction in the leading city of the State, after due advertisement. Bond issues cannot exceed stock issues. No stock or script dividends are allowed and no increase of capitalization on the consolidation of companies.

In consequence largely of such legislation, most of which has been enacted since 1893, the capitalization per mile of track of the Massachusetts railways, which was $52,963 on September 30, 1894, and only $44,683 September 30, 1897, was not one-half as much in the latter year as the capitalization of $91,500 per mile in Ohio, Indiana. Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri and Kentucky, although the number of cars per mile, according to the "Street Railway Journal" for August, 1898, was 3.78 in these States, or almost exactly the same as in Massachusetts. According to the same authority, the average capitalization per mile in New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia and West Verginia, was $138,000 per mile, or three times that in Massachusetts, although the number of cars was only twenty-three per cent. more.

The total stock and bonds for every thousand feet of annual output of gas in all the Massachusetts companies declined from $4.99 in 1895-6 to $4.30 in 1896-7. The capitalization of similar companies in other States, so far as investigated, seems to average over fifty per cent. higher. The thirteen gas companies outside of Boston that distributed from 40,000,000 to 300,000,000 feet of gas each in 1895-6, or an average of 110,718,000 feet, had increased their stocks, bonds and outstanding bills only 18 per cent. from 1887 to 1896, although the output of gas

increased 68 per cent. These obligations were only $3.37 per thousand feet of annual sales in these thirteen companies in 1896.

Although a State Board of Lighting or Railway Commissioners will not probably accomplish as much elsewhere as in Massachusetts, and is far from being a solution of the problems of city monopoly, such boards might well be given the enforcement of laws like those in Massachusetts relating to capitalization. Not only would such laws protect the innocent purchasers of stock, but they would render easier public regulation or purchase of these monopolies.

7. No extension of a franchise should be made till within one year of its expiration. This, if embodied in a charter of a city, would prevent a shrewd corporation from taking the people unawares, as is so common now when a Council is in office that was not elected on the issue of an extension of franchises.

8. When an existing company is allowed to extend its plant to new streets, the permit or franchise therefor should expire with that on the rest of the system, in order that the city may then have the opportunity to deal with the entire operation of the monopoly throughout the city. In order that such a requirement should not interfere with extensions, there should be in the franchise of the original company such provisions as in the Berlin contract with its street railways, under the terms of which the city agrees to bear part, or even all, of the expenses of extensions, according to the time still to elapse before the end of the franchise.

Publicity and public audit of accounts and inspection of the quality and safety of the service rendered by a monopoly are essential to intelligent action by the people. In enforcing such requirements, the city and State government should be permitted and encouraged to seek the best professional talent in the whole United States or abroad, according to the well-known principles that obtaiu in foreign municipalities. Unless this is directly specified in the State Constitution or in the State legislation or in the city charter, the same difficulty will be sure to arise which now confronts a prominent city west of the Missouri River. As one condition in permitting consolidation, this city was at some pains to secure the appointment of a gas inspector who would make the proper chemical and photometric examination of the quality of gas used, but this city now finds that it has no such expert in the State and is prevented from hiring one elsewhere by the law that requires all officials to be citizens of the State, while the prevalence of the spoils system deters any expert from trying to become a citizen of the State for the purpose of becoming a candidate for the office. A sidewalk inspector, consequently, is made gas inspector!

With respect to the provisions of this Model Charter for twenty-oneyear franchises and for city ownership and operation, a few things may also be said.

I. LONG-TERM FRANCHISES.

The Massachusetts Special Street Railway Committee shows an astonishing misconception of our political conditions when it states (Page 22): "If municipalities or corporations choose from over-eagerness or for other reasons to enter into ill-advised or improvident agreements, which they afterwards repent, that is their affair; and the officials entering into such agreement are responsible to their constituencies, whether the body of citizens or the holders of the companies' stock. It certainly is not the part of the Commonwealth either to prescribe the terms of grants, or after they are made to examine those terms with a view to seeing that they contain nothing of which the parties to them may thereafter repent."

As a matter of fact, when officials make a fifty-year contract with a street railway or gas company, in return, perhaps, for a big bribe, the defeat of such men, when they come up for re-election, is small consolation to a community, and is scarcely any safeguard at all.

Equally absurd is the suggestion of the Massachusetts Special Committee (Page 33), that we may wisely allow foreign countries to experiment with municipal operation, "sure of our ability at any time to appropriate all the useful results of foreign experience." If our companies secure meantime fifty-year to a thousand-year franchises, how much ability will we have to follow foreign example unless we pay dearly for our delay, and buy out existing companies by purchasing at enormous price the franchises we have just given away?

According to this same report (Page 71), the following twenty-one States place no limits upon the length of street railway franchises which their municipalities may grant: Arkansas, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Maine, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont, Virginia and Wisconsin. In Omaha, however, there is an exclusive grant for fifty years, and in greater New York the charter limits such grants henceforth to twenty-five years, and allows a renewal for twenty-five years more. Two States, Louisiana and Mississippi, permit ninety-nine-year franchises; North Carolina allows sixty years; eleven States allow fiftyyear franchises, namely: Arizona, California, Illinois, Kentucky, Minnesota, Missouri, New Mexico, Texas, Utah, Washington, and West Virginia, although Sacramento is limited to twenty-five years, aud in Texas, unless specified in the charter, a franchise can be granted for only twenty years. Maryland allows a forty-year grant. Two States permit thirty years, Georgia and Michigan. Five permit twenty-five years-Alabama, Colorado, Indiana, Iowa, and Ohio, although Denver is limited to twenty years. Four States allow but twenty years-Kansas, Montana, Oklahoma, and South Dakota. Wyoming allows but ten years.

Advocates of private ownership admit most of the criticisms usually

passed upon such ownership, but claim that the solution lies in long or unlimited franchises, with provisions in the contract for a system or sharing of profits with the public, and a reduction of the charges when profits permit. These views were presented in "Municipal Affairs" for September, 1897, by Mr. Edward E. Higgins. There are two most serious objections to this. First, that it violates a principle that is coming to bemore and more recognized and desired, viz., that no generation should bind its successors, where it can be prevented without serious loss of national honor and strength. The second objction is the impossibility of foreseeing the progress of the arts for fifty years and of providing for it and the growth of the city by a wise contract.

How impossible it is to legislate for conditions fifty or even thirty years in the future, in this age of wonderful invention, is well illustrated by the scale of rates established for the ferry across the Chicago River in 1829, viz., 61⁄4c. for foot passengers, 25c. for a one-horse business wagon, 50c. for a pleasure vehicle, and 64c. for every bushel of grain. Had the State Legislature then attempted to fix the rates of fare across the Chicago River for fifty years at what might at that time have been the reasonable rates just given, it would have been no more absurd than for the Legislature to do it now, even admitting, as no one acquainted with the subject will do for a moment, that present rates of street car fares in Chicago are reasonable.

When the first bridge-a floating one of rough logs was thrown over the Chicago River in 1833 by the help of the United States troops stationed at Fort Dearborn, and the city contributed toward the structure $286.20 and the Pottawatomies $200.00, the people were as capable of realizing the conditions of to-day and legislating for them as we are for those of half a century hence.

On February 16th, 1848, a contributor to a Chicago newspaper, the "Democrat," wrote in favor of plank roads as superior to railroads. He said:

"Do railroads give the same facility for traveling as plank roads do, even to those living by the side of them? Their stations are generally ten or twelve miles apart. They will only take in or put out passengers at those places. Our plank road passengers travel at the rate of ten miles an hour, which is as fast as they are conveyed (and with ten times the safety) on the Michigan Central Railroad. The charges made by the railroad.for the transportation of produce are more than it would cost the farmer by plank roads, and very little less than common roads."

What would have been more ridiculous than for the men of 1848 to have tied the hands of the City Council of Chicago as to how they could regulate the steam or street car lines entering or passing through the city in 1898? And yet our City Councils are asked to make contracts for fifty years, and even longer.

Dr. Albert Shaw puts it even more forcibly in the New York "Inde