How Should Chicago 
 
 Governed ?

 
 How Should Chicago 
 
 -BE- 
 
 Governed ?
 
 COPYRIGHTED 1893 BY B. A. ULRICH, CHICAGO, ILL.
 
 HOff SHOULD CHICAGO BE GOVERNED? 
 
 Given a population of 1,350,000, composed of large com- 
 munities of Bohemians, Swedes, Norwegians, Italians, etc., 
 together with a large element of Germans, Irish, and French, 
 interspersed with about 600,000 Americans, inhabiting an area 
 of 180 square miles, on the banks of a magnificent lake, floating 
 a large share of the commerce of the world; with railroads 
 entering it from every direction and connecting it by air lines 
 with all the great centers of trade; containing many millions 
 of property, real and personal, and the largest manufactories 
 in America: The question is How shall this vast metropolis 
 be governed? Will it not require a strong, stable municipal 
 organization to hold in check and direct this great heterogene- 
 ous collection of people, annually increasing, decade after de- 
 cade, and demanding healthy surroundings, pure air and water, 
 light, transportation, comfortable homes, instruction and 
 proper amusements. How are these objects to be attained? 
 
 The only practical way of lifting Chicago out of the abyss 
 of bad city government into which she has fallen is by 
 
 1st. Obtaining legislative action in reference to calling on 
 the people to vote for a 
 
 CONSTITUTIONAL CONTENTION. 
 
 2nd. When the people have voted for such a convention, an 
 election must be called to choose its members. 
 
 3rd. The convention will meet and draft a new con- 
 stitution. It should modify the present clause which prevents 
 
 3
 
 special legislation relative to city charters, as Chicago needs 
 a charter which will not suit the smaller cities in the state. 
 
 4th. By incorporating into the city limits all that portion of 
 Cook County which Chicago needs, turning the remaining 
 territory over to the adjoining counties. Fifty of the best 
 men should then be chosen, including the first legal talent in 
 the city, to draft a model modern city charter suitable for a great 
 metropolis, covering the City and- County of Chicago, under 
 one government. The succeeding Legislature should then be 
 asked to grant the charter. 
 
 To accomplish all this by popular vote an act of the Legis- 
 lature must be passed at the present session, authorizing the 
 secretary of state to issue ballots with the clause, " For a con- 
 stitutional convention" incorporated therein, at the next general 
 election, stating that those who do not wish to vote for the pro- 
 vision must strike out the clause, otherwise it will be lost sight 
 of in the general shuffle, as it was at the last election. 
 
 * 
 
 WHAT THE NEW COUNCIL SHOULD DO FOR CHICAGO. 
 
 Birmingham, known as the best governed city in the world, 
 under the able administration of the Honorable Joseph 
 Chamberlain, gained possession of the gas works and tht, water 
 works by purchase, and has since operated them at great 
 saving to the consumers and profit to the city. The price of 
 gas wa8 reduced to two shillings and five pence (about 60 
 cents) per thousand feet. 
 
 An improvement scheme was also inaugurated by Mr. 
 Chamberlain and the Town Council of 1875. It is stated by 
 Julian Ralph to be one of the most stupendous, courageous and 
 wise acts ever performed by a municipality. 
 
 " The Council purchased a large district covered with slums, 
 where vice, crime, poverty and drunkenness flourished and con- 
 verted it into the handsomest portion of the city. This prop- 
 erty was leased for a number of years and it will eventually 
 add enormously to the wealth of the city."
 
 The market rights are controlled by the city and a profit of 
 from 8,000 to 10,000 is realized annually. 
 
 " The drainage and sewer system has also been brought to a 
 high state of perfection. The Drainage Board manages a 
 farm of 1,200 acres in the Tame Valley. The sewerage is con- 
 veyed thither through an eight-foot conduit and is passed 
 through the land by an extensive system of filtration by 
 gravity, after which the effluent reaches the Tame river nearly 
 in the condition of perfectly clear water." The land is rendered 
 very productive and the system will pay sufficient to meet all 
 expenses. 
 
 The city builds the street railways in order to keep control 
 of the streets. It rents them to chartered companies at a profit 
 to the city of many thousands annually. 
 
 Public swimming baths in buildings and open swimming 
 baths are built for the benefit of all classes, both male and 
 female. Turkish baths cost 24 cents, first-class swimming 
 bath with private dressing room and bathing suit ten cents. 
 In the second-class department, four cents is charged. All 
 baths are set apart for women at certain hours. Special rates 
 are made for schools and clubs, and professional bathing 
 masters are furnished when required. 
 
 The Art School, Art Gallery, Museum and numerous public 
 libraries, are all open to the use of the people with necessary 
 regulations. 
 
 The people in Birmingham have all these advantages, with 
 clean streets, parks, fountains, schools, etc., and it costs the 
 city one-fourth less to run the entire corporation than is annu- 
 ally paid by one hundred cities of the United States, estimat- 
 ing the expense per capita. 
 
 Glasgow will show a record of good and economical gov- 
 ernment equaling that of Birmingham. The city owns the 
 gas works and the price to consumers is 60 cents per 1,000 
 cubic feet. The street railways are all owned by the corpora- 
 tion and leased to private companies, giving the city a fine 
 revenue.
 
 6 
 
 Paris: Although the gas works of Paris are owned by pri- 
 vate corporations, $40,000,000 has been paid into the City 
 Treasury from this source of revenue alone during the last ten 
 years. The company must pay the city 200,000 francs a year 
 for the privilege of piping the streets, 2-10 of a franc on each 
 cubic meter supplied, and half the net profit, after paying 13 
 per cent on the capital stock of 84,000,000 francs, which stock 
 cannot be watered. 
 
 All transportation companies pay heavy taxes to the city. 
 In the last ten years Paris has received 60,000,000 francs from 
 companies and individuals using streets for transportation 
 purposes. 
 
 As against New York City's annual expenses, amounting to 
 $40,000,000 or 200,000,000 francs, Paris annually collects from 
 these and other sources and pays out an average of 250,000,000 
 francs ; 
 
 140,000,000 francs are collected from octroi dues; 
 40,000,000 francs from markets and use of streets; 
 35,000,000 francs from direct taxation; 
 35,000,000 francs from national treasury. 
 
 But the latter is the best lighted city in the world, its 
 streets are cleaned, it has a superior and well organized 
 police and detective force, it maintains numerous hospitals, 
 a public market, a magnificent opera house, and elementary, 
 industrial and high schools for both sexes. Is it necessary for 
 me to tell intelligent citizens why Chicago does not have 
 a similar income from gas companies, markets, street rail- 
 ways, etc., as Paris has? Do they make less money here? 
 Recently the capital stock of the West Side railroad street 
 car line was doubled, and the north side increased its capi- 
 tal stock $1,000,000, and the south side $2,000,000. The 
 stockholders pocket what in Paris goes to the City, and the 
 people in Chicago, thanks to its Aldermen who work for 
 patriotic motives and $150 per annum, get but a small pro- 
 portion.
 
 The gross earnings of the Chicago Gas Trust for 1892 amount 
 to about $4,000,000, leaving about $2,500,000 to distribute 
 among stockholders controlling the $44,000,000 watered stock, 
 after paying all expenses. The trust is getting 6 per cent, on 
 $35,000,000, which originally cost nothing, allowing $9,000,000 
 for cost of plant, etc. This surplus profit should be divided 
 with Chicago, or else she should manufacture her own gas. 
 
 The gross earnings of the Chicago City railway for 1892, 
 amount to $4,400,944; net earnings, $1,501,500. The net per 
 cent, on capital invested is 19.01 per cent, on $1,331,137, of 
 which Chicago gets practically nothing, but pays policemen to 
 watch the crossings, etc. All these companies pay about 
 $50,000 for license on running cars. $880,000 is asked for to 
 <jlean the streets. This should be collected of the street car and 
 gas companies who use the streets. In any well regulated city 
 they would be compelled to contribute largely to city revenue. 
 
 The assessors tax private individuals on their realty 1-5 its 
 actual value, while they only tax corporations 1-35 of the value 
 of their holdings. All these gentlemen, like Boss Tweed, look 
 wise and say, " What are you going to do about it? " 
 
 WHAT MAYOR WASHBURNE SATS ABOUT TAXES IN CHICAGO. 
 
 A LIMIT TO INCOME BY TAX. 
 
 " It is prohibited from further increasing its indebtedness by 
 legislative enactments, as the limit of its bonded indebtedness 
 has been reached. One reason for this shortage of funds is 
 that those who own and control tho wealth of this commun- 
 ity do not pay their just proportion of the debts of the com- 
 monwealth. The total valuations of the real estate owned by 
 the great railroad corporations centering here is conservatively 
 valued at not less than $350,000,000. The official valuation 
 places it for the year 1892 in the sum of $12,440,479. The 
 total valuation of real estate in the city, outside of railroads, is 
 conservatively estimated at $1,906,146,360. The assessed valu- 
 ation of this same real estate for the year 1892 is $190,614,- 
 636. It is impossible to approximate the value of personal
 
 8 
 
 property owned in this city, but its estimated value for the 
 year 1892 was $36,395,680. Our supreme court has decided 
 that all property shall be assessed at 33^ per cent, of its actual 
 value, but an inspection of official books shows the figures I 
 have given you, and they show that real estate of private 
 holders is assessed at one-fifth to one-fourth its actual value, 
 and corporation holdings are assessed as low as one- thirty- 
 ninth the actual value. It can readily be seen that if the 
 assessed valuation of large corporations, such as all railroad 
 companies, gas companies, etc., was increased in proportion to 
 its growing and actual value there would be fewer complaints 
 on the part of the public by reason of unkept streets and 
 alleys. Add to this, millions of dollars' worth of improved 
 real estate owned by church corporations, from which said 
 corporations derive large revenues and which properties are 
 now exempt from taxation, and you will see that a more equit- 
 able adjustment of these assessments would relieve us immed- 
 iately from present financial straits, Our system of tax assess- 
 ment and collection is entirely wrong." 
 
 The Hon. Seth Low, states in the September Century, that "at 
 the present time in the two cities (New York and Brooklyn) there 
 is a board of estimate, consisting of three or four of the principal 
 officers of the city. This board annually prepares a budget 
 for the ensuing year. The meetings of the board of estimate 
 are public, and they have authority to summon before them 
 for explanation of any estimate, all city officers. This budget, 
 when prepared, cannot be increased by the common council. 
 The board of estimate in Brooklyn consists of the mayor, the 
 comptroller, and the city auditor, with two others representing 
 the county, all of whom are elected officials." 
 
 POLITICAL INFLUENCE OOTTNTS TOO MUCH. 
 
 The tenure of office for assessor depends upon his popular- 
 ity with the individuals and corporations of the district to 
 which he has been elected and that popularity is gained
 
 9 
 
 through a low assessment and accommodations which should 
 never be permitted. The total value of real estate in this city 
 to-day from the assessor's books is less than it was twenty years 
 ago. The growing interests of this city and the million and 
 a half of its inhabitants is based upon a tax levy which was 
 originally intended for a city containing, as this did in 1873, 
 less than a half a million of people. 
 
 Americans may be expected to have more than ordinary for- 
 bearance, but forbearance ceases to be a virtue, (unless one 
 holds the stock) under these circumstances. If citizens of 
 Chicago are blind and servile enough to endure such outrages 
 when they are independent men, with the ballot in their hands, 
 they need blame no one but themselves. Those who will not 
 help themselves cannot expect either God or man to help them. 
 
 CITY FRANCHISES. 
 
 Since the inauguration of the present city government in 
 April, 1891, the following valuable franchises have been 
 granted to corporations. The amount of pecuniary advantage to 
 the city is noted. The list does not include ordinances for the ex- 
 tension of city railway lines and changes of motive power, nor 
 for railway platforms and stations, nor for bridges over alleys, 
 nor roadways and tunnels connecting buildings. There is omit- 
 ted all permits for private switch tracks and for additional tracks 
 for rail ways; also, all grants or concessions to the World's 
 Fair Corporation. 
 
 Economic Fuel Gas Company: Conceding rights to con- 
 struct works for gas, right-of-way along, upon and under all 
 the avenues, streets, alleys and public places. Limits charges. 
 Gas company to pay city 3 per cent of gross receipts from 
 illuminating and 5 per cent from natural gas. Company to 
 furnish gas to city at $17.50 per lamp. Passed over mayor's veto. 
 
 Waukesha Hygeia Mineral Spring Company: To convey 
 mineral or spring water along and under certain streets, ave- 
 nues and alleys. Pays Chicago nothing and decreases revenue 
 from water works of city.
 
 10 
 
 Chicago Power, Supply and Smoke Abating Company: 
 Manufacturers of compressed air motors and fittings and pneu- 
 matic appliances; right-of-way upon and under all the avenues, 
 streets, alleys and public places for pipes, tubing, etc., neces- 
 sary for distribution, and for heating and sanitary ventilation, 
 pays to city 5 per cent, of gross receipts. This franchise is 
 worth many millions to originators and stockholders. 
 
 Calumet Electric Street Railway: Construct and operate 
 street railway along certain streets. $50 per car license fee. 
 
 Chicago & Evanston Electric Railway: Similar privileges 
 and compensation. 
 
 Chicago & Jefferson Urban Transit: Similar privileges; 
 $7,143 per mile and $50 license fee. 
 
 Chicago Elevated Terminal: A very important and com- 
 prehensive franchise. No pecuniary benefit to the City. 
 
 Blue Island Railroad: Construct railroad on 121st Street 
 from Michigan avenue west. 
 
 South West Chicago Rapid Transit: Along Sixty-third 
 between Ashland and Central Park avenue; $50 license fee. 
 
 South Chicago City Railway: Along certain specified 
 streets. $50 license fee. 
 
 West & South Town Horse Railway: Similar privileges; 
 $500 per mile and $50 per mile license per annum. 
 
 Grand Crossing & Windsor Park Railway: Similar privi- 
 leges; $50 license fee. 
 
 Metropolitan West Side Elevated: Certain specified streets; 
 $50 license fee; very important franchise.
 
 11 
 
 We can do no better than give 
 
 QUOTATIONS FROM THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE'S 
 
 article on this subject, of April 4, 1892. 
 
 HOW PUBLIC PROPERTY IS USED FOR PRIVATE GAIN. 
 HOW ORDINANCES ARE SECURED. 
 
 What proportion of the profit made by individuals from 
 privileges granted or taken, on, under, or above the streets of 
 Chicago does the public get? 
 
 It is a broad question and cannot be definitely answered. 
 No one knows how much profit is made from the privileges, 
 but every one does know that the city does not begin to get 
 the proportion that it should ; that it does not get what an in- 
 dividua 1 or a private corporation would if either stood in the 
 place of the city. In many instances the city does not get one 
 cent for the privileges that it has granted; the Aldermen may 
 have received something at the time they gave the rights, but 
 not the city. 
 
 The streets being the property of the city should of course 
 be utilized for the greatest good to the greatest number, in- 
 stead of which they seem to be utilized for the greatest good 
 to the favored few. They are torn up, built over, tunneled 
 under, and in many instancss wholly appropriated. If the 
 rights given to a few, proportionately free, were given to all 
 free, there would be no room left on or under them, and nine- 
 tenths of the population would be crowded out before they 
 had a chance to make use of the rights granted. 
 
 This can be asserted on the strength of the investigations 
 made by the Tribune, although it was impossible to learn ex- 
 actly how many streets are occupied for private purposes. 
 The city does not and cannot know without first making a 
 long and searching investigation. It would take months for 
 it to find out what it has given away, and still longer to find 
 whether the gifts were in perpetuity or only for a term of 
 years.
 
 12 
 
 No complete record is kept in the City Hall, outside of the 
 Council Records, of the privileges given. 
 
 In view of these circumstances it is as impossible for the 
 city to know what the proportionate return is as it is for an 
 individual citizen. Even an Alderman would have to search 
 the Council records for a week or two to find out if one of his 
 constituents was using a street without authority. Perhaps that 
 is the reason so many have been able to go ahead without being 
 " touched " or disturbed after their ordinances have expired. 
 
 ANNUAL RETURN TO THE CITY. 
 
 The maps and plats at the City Hall are more nearly com- 
 plete for the business district than any other, and a study of 
 them is calculated to surprise one. 
 
 Something like 25 per cent, of the streets between Division 
 street, Twenty-second street, Halsted street, and the lake, are 
 occupied wholly or in part by railroad companies. 
 
 This is admitted at the Department of Public Works, but it 
 is difficult to discover just what the return is. In estimating 
 it, franchises that extend to the city limits have to be taken in- 
 to consideration. 
 
 As near as could be learned at the City Hall the annual income 
 to the city from all these privileges combined does not exceed 
 $250,000, and of this the gas companies pay, or did pay last 
 year, more than half. Most of the privileges given have been 
 given free or for a consideration, at the time of the grant, that 
 ended the whole matter as far as any return to the city is con- 
 cerned. So the income can hardly be increased without the 
 granting of further privileges, and the diagrams accompanying 
 this would seem to indicate that there were not many left to 
 grant. 
 
 Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars a year for one-fourth 
 of the street space in the heart of the city! 
 
 Following is a list of some of the roads that have been 
 granted privileges more or less valuable, for which they pay 
 or have paid sums more or less inadequate to the advantage
 
 13 
 
 they have gained. Some are trunk lines, some are 
 branches or offshoots of trunk lines, and some have been 
 merged into other lines, bat all have been granted valu- 
 able privileges. While the privileges granted have been 
 greater than those given to firms in the way of switch tracks, 
 and the consequent inconvenience to the public is greater, the 
 railroads have done more for the city and have made some re- 
 turn, although proportionately small, if one considers what 
 they would have given for the streets if they had been forced 
 to make reasonable terms 
 
 RAILROADS GIVEN RIGHTS. 
 
 Atchinson, Topeka & Santa Fe. 
 Baltimore & Ohio. 
 Chicago & Alton. 
 Chicago & Eastern Illinois. 
 Chicago & Evanston. 
 Chicago & Great Eastern. 
 Chicago & Great Western. 
 Chicago & Indiana State Line. 
 Chicago & Lake Superior. 
 Chicago & Milwaukee. 
 Chicago & Mississippi. 
 Chicago & Northwestern. 
 Chicago & Pacific. 
 Chicago & Southern. 
 Chicago & Western Indiana. 
 Chicago, Burlington & Quincy. 
 Chicago, Madison & Northern. 
 Chicago, Millington & Western. 
 
 Following is a list of some of the companies that have been 
 given privileges in the streets of Chicago: 
 
 Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul. 
 
 Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific. 
 
 Chicago, St. Charles & Mississippi 
 Air-Line. 
 
 Chicago, St. Louis & Pacific. 
 
 Chicago, St. Paul & Fond du Lac. 
 
 Chicago, Columbus & Indiana Cen- 
 tral. 
 
 Galena & Chicago Union. 
 
 Illinois & Wisconsin. 
 
 Illinois Central. 
 
 Joliet & Chicago. 
 
 Lake Shore & Michigan Southern. 
 
 Michigan Southern & Northern 
 Indiana. 
 
 Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago 
 
 Northern Pacific. 
 
 Chicago & Englewood Horse and 
 Dummy Company. 
 
 Chicago & South Side Rapid Tran- 
 sit Company. 
 
 Chicago City Railroad Company. 
 
 Chicago Passenger Railway Com- 
 pany. 
 
 Chicago West Division Railway 
 Company. 
 
 Lake Street " L" Road Company. 
 Metropolitan City Railway Com- 
 pany- 
 West Chicago Street Railway Com- 
 pany. 
 
 West Chicago Rapid Transit Com- 
 pany- 
 North Chicago City Railway com- 
 pany.
 
 14 
 
 Following is a list of some of the big corporations that have 
 been granted rights under the streets: 
 
 Chicago Gaslight & Coke Company. Sun Electric Light Company. 
 
 Consumers' Gas Company. Western Edison Light Company. 
 
 Co-operative Electric Light Com- Chicago Sectional Electric Under- 
 pany. ground Company. 
 
 Equitable Gaslight & Fuel Com- Consumer's Electric Light Com- 
 pany, pany. 
 
 People's Gaslight & Coke Com Chicago Power Supply & Smoke 
 pany. Abating Company. 
 
 Other corporations that have been granted rights under the 
 streets, and mor3 above in most cases, are the telegraph and 
 telephone companies. Following is a list of some of them. 
 They have been granted rights to occupy a good deal of space 
 belonging to the city, and the return no greater than in most 
 of the other cases : 
 
 Atlantic & Pacific Telegraph Com- Pacific & Atlantic Telegraph Com- 
 pany, pany. 
 
 Baltimore & Ohio Telegraph Com- Chicago & Western Indiana Com- 
 pany, pany. 
 
 Bell Telephone Company. Chicago City Telephone Company- 
 
 Cushman Telephone Company. Chicago Telephone Company. 
 
 Mutual Union Telegraph Company. United States Telegraph Company. 
 
 From a real estate point of view that is almost like giving 
 it away. But it is not $250,000 for that alone; it is $250,000 
 a year for practically all the privileges on, under, and above 
 all the streets within the city limits. 
 
 A rough estimate of the rights that have been granted on 
 and under the streets of Chicago shows the following: 
 
 Private firms-(switch track) 60 
 
 Railroads 1. 35 
 
 Street and "L" roads 10 
 
 Electric light and gas companies 8 
 
 Telephone and telegraph companies 12 
 
 Miscellaneous 50 
 
 Total 175 
 
 This does not mean 175 streets; it means more occupied 
 wholly or in part by individuals or colorations, and the 
 return to the city is comparatively nothing. Some pay, or
 
 15 
 
 have paid, something for the privileges they enjoy, but more 
 have paid nothing. Some have perpetual rights (strange as it 
 may seem), and some only for a term of years. Some only cross 
 the streets, some occupy them to the exclusion of all others, 
 and some occupy wholly or in part a dozen or more streets. 
 
 PAY NOTHING TO THE CITY. 
 
 The first item on the list represents no return to the city. 
 In other words, something like sixty individuals, firms, or cor- 
 porporations have, by ordinance, been granted the right to lay 
 tracks on or across one or more streets in Chicago without pay- 
 ing a cent for the privilege. The strongest stipulation made 
 when any of the ordinances was passed was that the city 
 should pay nothing for the repair of or damages on the street 
 or that portion of it occupied for private purposes. 
 
 If the streets are worth something to the companies are they 
 not to the city ? 
 
 "Would not the companies expect to pay something for the 
 same privileges on land that did not belong to the city, and 
 would they not be willing to do so ? 
 
 "They certainly would," said a real estate man who was 
 asked about the matter. "The strongest plea that is made for 
 the occupation of the streets is where the company owns the 
 property on both sides for some distance, but if a company 
 owned the property on both sides and in the rear of a lot 
 owned by you, you wouldn't give it privileges on or under that 
 lot without some compensation, even if it would be a good 
 thing for the neighborhood. If you did you would suffer for 
 some one else's gain. When the city suffers the public suffers." 
 
 The following shows some of the concerns that have been 
 granted privileges in the way of switch-tracks on public 
 property. In a few cases the names of the streets to be crossed 
 (there being several) were not given in the ordinance, in others 
 the date of the grant is not given, and in still other there is no 
 limit of time. Most of the latter are subject to repeal, how- 
 ever, although some appear to be grants in perpetuity :
 
 
 Street 
 
 Date of 
 grant. 
 
 1 
 
 liarzovsky & Sledzianowski 
 
 Alley 
 
 July 9, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Braad & Co. 
 
 Snow .. 
 
 
 ?,0 
 
 Ferdinand E. Canda 
 
 Stewart....... 
 
 
 10 
 
 Beigler, Eberthonser & Findesien 
 
 Cherry...... 
 
 April 7, '88 
 
 10 
 
 South Branch Canal Co 
 
 South 
 
 Jan. 5 
 
 
 Consolidated Ice Machine Co 
 
 ( Stewart J 
 
 July 2 '88 
 
 20 
 
 Daniel Corkery 
 
 j Lumber J "" 
 Stewart. .... 
 
 
 10 
 
 Cooper & Nocken. . 
 
 Alley 
 
 Oct 8, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Dowdle & McWhirter. 
 
 
 May 13, '89 
 
 
 J. G. Dwen .. 
 
 Twentieth. 
 
 Feb. 1, '86 
 
 9,0 
 
 J. 8. Ford, Johnson & Co... . 
 
 Indiana av 
 
 June 17, '89 
 
 10 
 
 Zail, Burmiiler & Unzieker 
 
 Hawthorne av.. 
 
 May 20, '89 
 
 10 
 
 James B. Galloway 
 
 Pleetwood 
 
 
 10 
 
 Garden City Sand Co 
 
 ( Rockwell ) 
 
 May 10, '85 
 
 10 
 
 M.Gottfried. 
 
 ( Lexington j 
 Alexander 
 
 Nov. 20, '76 
 
 
 P. C. Hanford Oil Co 
 
 Sixteenth.. 
 
 
 10 
 
 Harpold & Sayers. 
 
 Alley ... 
 
 Feb. 20, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Edwin S. Hartwell 
 
 Chester 
 
 May 28, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Ernest Heldheimer 
 
 Lumber. 
 
 Mar. 10, '80 
 
 10 
 
 G. W. Hinckley 
 
 Twenty-second 
 
 Feb. 4, 'b7 
 
 
 Knickerbocker Ice Co . 
 
 Stewart . 
 
 Oct. 17, '87 
 
 10 
 
 McCormick Harvester Machine Co 
 
 ( Western av ) 
 
 April 30, 88 
 
 10 
 
 Mahla & Chappell 
 
 ( Tw'ty-sixth ) 
 Stewart . 
 
 Dec. 16, '87 
 
 10 
 
 Morier & Kindley. 
 
 16th and 17th 
 
 April 5, '86 
 
 10 
 
 L. Newberry & Co 
 
 North Market 
 
 Fel). 10, '62 
 
 
 O'Conor & Leeson _ 
 
 Rockwell 
 
 Mar. 18, '89 
 
 10 
 
 H. Paepeke & Co 
 
 George .. 
 
 Oct. 8, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Paige Iron Works 
 
 Ontario 
 
 Sept 24, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Elijah Peacock 
 
 Stewart av. 
 
 Jan. 14, '89 
 
 10 
 
 People's Gaa Light & Coke Co 
 
 Elston av 
 
 Mar. 12, '86 
 
 
 R. Rassmussen 
 
 Bloomingdale 
 
 Oct. 24, '87 
 
 10 
 
 D. Reed 
 
 Grove 
 
 July 15, '86 
 
 10 
 
 Rend& Healy 
 
 Hoyne av 
 
 Nov 19, '88 
 
 10 
 
 Steele Taylor 
 
 
 Sept. 7, '63 
 
 
 William F. Tucker 
 
 Egan av. 
 
 Sept. 23, '72 
 
 
 Tudor Buggy Co ... 
 
 Stewart av 
 
 
 10 
 
 Union Iron & Steel Co. 
 
 {Ashlandav. ) 
 33d.... ( 
 
 Jan. 21, '84 
 
 flO 
 
 
 Iron ) 
 
 
 
 Union Stock Yards & Transit Co 
 
 Ogdon av 
 
 Mar. 19, '77 
 
 
 Albert H. Veeder. 
 
 Hawthorne av. 
 
 Jan. 14, 89 
 
 30 
 
 Ward & Gaennslen 
 
 j Archer av.. ) 
 
 Jan. 26, '85 
 
 
 
 1 Waver st .. J 
 f Ullman 1 
 | Fox. | 
 
 
 
 John A. Yale 
 
 { Waterville. V 
 
 April 2, '80 
 
 
 
 | 32d 1 
 
 
 
 
 [ Benson \ 
 

 
 17 
 
 NEITHER MAPS NOR PLATS IN THE POSSESSION OF THE CITY. 
 
 There is not in any department of the City Hall any sets of 
 maps or plats to show whether railroad tracks and switches 
 have been authorized by ordinance, and when any dispute or 
 question arises the only method of determining if the track in 
 question was put down after due authority is to look up the 
 city ordinances on the particular track in question. 
 
 This but goes to show the truth of the statement often made 
 that any mercantile or other business-house run with as little 
 system as the municipal government of Chicago wonld be 
 bankrupt in three months. 
 
 IT WAS PRACTICALLY A GIFT 
 
 TKRMS ON WHICH THE CITY GAVE UP THE WASHINGTON STREET 
 TUNNEL OTHER FRANCHISES. 
 
 The Washington tunnel is wholly occupied by the West 
 Chicago Street railway to the exclusion of the citizens whose 
 money, in the way of taxes, went to pay for its construction. 
 True, if a man cares to take his life in his hands, he may 
 drive through, or walk through for that matter, but any one 
 who would do so would be taking more foolhardy risks than 
 the man who attempts to walk to the crib on blocks of ice. 
 When Carter Harrison was Mayor the use of the tunnel was 
 given the Chicago Passenger railway, which in turn disposed 
 of it to Mr. Yerkes' company. Under the provisions of the 
 ordinance, the street car company was to remove the Madison 
 street bridge to Washington street, which it did, and now 
 enjoys the tunnel usufruct without the payment of one cent of 
 revenue. The same company is now constructing a tunnel on 
 Van Buren street at a cost running well up towards a million 
 2
 
 18 
 
 dollars, a sum that would have had to be expended in a tunnel 
 for the West Madison street and Milwaukee avenue lines had 
 it not been for an obliging City Council. 
 
 The North Chicago Street railway company has the use of 
 the LaSalle Street tunnel under authority of an ordinance 
 passed July 19, 1886, and amended Oct. 5, 1888. This gives 
 the railway company the use of the tunnel for twenty years 
 from the time of the passage of the ordinance, at a yearly 
 rental of $25,000. There were two or three strings to the 
 $25,000 annual tax however, and as has been customary with 
 this corporation when any strings were in sight, they have 
 been pulled, and the result is the city receives no revenue from 
 the tunnel. The ordinance contained the stipulation that if 
 the North Chicago Street railway company should put up a 
 bridge similar to the Rush street bridge, at Clark street, the 
 rent for the tunnel should be reduced to $10,000 a year. Then 
 by constructing a bridge at Wells street, payment for the use 
 of the tunnel was to cease entirely. Both bridges were built 
 and the street car company now pays nothing for the tunnel. 
 
 Under the terms of the contract with the city, the company 
 must keep the tunnel in thorough repair, both the roadway 
 and the footway well lighted and the walls painted. Every 
 person who lives on the North Side and who has occasion to 
 go through it knows how well this part of the agreement is 
 maintained. 
 
 The various street car companies are taxed on the number 
 of cars used in the carrying of passengers, but again the city 
 gets the bag to hold. The Chicago City railway company, the 
 North Chicago Street railway company and the West Chicago 
 Street railway company are requested by ordinance to pay a 
 tax of $50 a year on the cars in service. Thirteen round trips 
 constitute a day's service, and those cars put on for the morning 
 and evening rush must run six and one-half days to constitute 
 a day, or six years and-a-half before they bring in a revenue of 
 $50 to the city. A car purchased now and put in service on 
 the lines in question, for the rush hours, would bring into the
 
 19 
 
 City Treasury the full $50 in the neighborhood of Oct. 4, 1898. 
 Of course summer cars don't pay tax in winter or winter cars 
 in summer, so the time when the payment of the $50 is com- 
 pleted might be extended to April, 1905, this counting on 
 honest and truthful returns from car officials whose memories 
 have been known to fail in times gone by. During the year 
 1891 there was paid into the city treasury by the three com- 
 panies the modest sum of $45,848.55. 
 
 There is a more advantageous clause in the Alley "L" and 
 the Lake Street "L" roads regarding the payment of tax on 
 cars in service. Instead of a clause providing for thirteen 
 round trips constituting a day's run the ordinances in each 
 case provide for a payment of $50 a year for every car in 
 service. 
 
 "When the recent omnibus ordinances for the "West and 
 South Sides were introduced," said Controller May, in dis- 
 cussing this feature of municipal revenue, "I tried to have the 
 tax made so much for each car in service, as is the case with 
 the two elevated roads, but my efforts were without success. 
 The thirteen-trip-a-day clause is of great benefit to the street 
 car companies." There are certain other minor obligations 
 imposed upon the street car lines. The North Chicago street 
 railway company pays $250 a year towards the maintenance of 
 the North avenue bridge and the same amount towards the 
 Division street bridge. 
 
 The Chicago Passenger railway company pays $1,000 
 towards maintaining the Adams street bridge. 
 
 The West Chicago street railway company pays $1,000 a 
 year for repairs on the Lake street bridge for its use of the 
 same. 
 
 The Chicago Telephone company was given permission by 
 the City Council to put electrical conduits under the streets 
 and alleys of the city. For this and the right to string up 
 wires on poles the company paid into the City Treasury during 
 1891 the sum of $26,255, it being 3 per cent, on the gross 
 receipts.
 
 20 
 
 The gas companies comprising the gas trust pay into the 
 treasury of the city a small part of their vast earnings for the 
 right to tear up each and every street and alley in the City of 
 Chicago and to lay as many and big gas mains, pipes, and 
 feeders as the companies may deem necessary. The com- 
 panies are required by ordinance to pay 3^ per cent, of gross 
 income from the sale of illuminating and fuel gas. The re- 
 turns for the year 1891 are interesting in two ways, first, that 
 the gross income of the several companies, as figured out by 
 the officers, is given with the amount paid by each company 
 into the City Treasury. The table is as follows: 
 
 Gross 3% per cent, 
 
 receipts. paid to city_ 
 
 Chicago Gas Light & Coke Co ... .$1,834,534,13 $64,208.69 
 
 Consumers' Gas Co 572,283.81 20,029.93 
 
 Equitable Gas Co 148,370.81 5,192.98 
 
 People's Gaslight & Coke Co. ... 1,335,823.77 46,753.83 
 
 Lake Gas Co 159,111.27 5,568.89 
 
 Hyde Park Gas Co 181,739.33 6,360.88 
 
 Suburban Gas Co 135,105.65 4,728.70 
 
 Total. $4,366,968.77 $152,843.90 
 
 Of the $152,843.90 due the city under this contract, $131,300 
 has been paid, leaving a balance yet due of $21,543.90. The 
 gas trust will no doubt make good its reputation and pay this 
 sum the first bright, sunshiny day that Mr. Billings has no- 
 thing else to do. 
 
 The above statements would have been difficult to obtain 
 had not the Tribune given them to the people. It is good 
 authority for their correctness. Chicago papers, are, as a rule, 
 on the side of reform. They are willing to do what they deem 
 best. It is not expected all editors will agree on the method 
 to be pursued
 
 21 
 
 CORPORATIONS MUST PAY FOR CLEANING STREETS. 
 
 In consideration of the enormous gifts the city has lavished 
 upon her favorite sons controlling these great corporations, 
 now owning nearly all the streets and alleys within the corpor- 
 ate limits, the people, the forgotten million, should now elect 
 a Board of Aldermen and a Mayor who would immediately 
 take measures to impose a tax upon these rich beneficiaries of 
 the Council and compel them hereafter to maintain, free of all 
 expense to the citizens, the streets and alleys, constructing 
 repairing and cleaning them as long as outstanding franchises 
 last. If these clever gentlemen had originally paid what they 
 should, Chicago could now do all this from the revenue 
 obtained. Eventually these corporations should be forced to 
 excavate the streets and alleys in center of city, and bridge 
 them with iron girders from curb to curb, and cover them so 
 heavy teams can pass over them, leaving a free passage under- 
 neath so that the surface need not be disturbed. In the 
 crowded portions of the city, the street cars anJ railroads 
 should be forced to use these underground passages as is done 
 in London. The street cleaning committee appointed by the 
 chairman of the Citizens' Meeting held in Central Music 
 Hall, Dec. 22, 1892, numbering one hundred prominent res- 
 idents of Chicago, will find ample scope for their energy and 
 talent in accomplishing for their fellow citizens this needed 
 and effective remedial act of justice. 
 
 It is evident to all who investigate the manner in which 
 American cities are run, and compare our methods with those 
 governing such cities as Birmingham, Glasgow and even the 
 gay and worldly Paris, that there is a marked difference in 
 favor of the latter. 
 
 The practical distinction between the large cities of Ger- 
 many and Great Britain and those of the United States, is:
 
 9.9. 
 
 the former are governed in fact by public authority, feared and 
 respected by the people, while the latter are not BO governed or 
 respected. They are really controlled by outside business cor- 
 porations, such as street car and gas companies, and by rings, 
 schemers and political parties. The legally elected governing 
 power, in office from time to time, is used by these to subserve 
 their plans, while the greater interests of the commonwealth 
 are ignored. 
 
 COMPARISON OF EXPENSES OF RUNNING ENGLISH AND 
 AMERICAN CITIES. 
 
 In his article on municipal institutions in America and Eng- 
 land, in the November Forum, the Honorable Joseph Cham- 
 berlain points out the differences in expense of running an 
 English city and an American city. As an illustration he 
 compares Boston with Birmingham. "Anyone who knows 
 the two cities," he says, "which have about the same popula- 
 tion (Boston being credited with 448,000 in 1890 and Birm- 
 ingham with 430,000 in 1891) will admit that Birmingham 
 enjoys every result of municipal enterprise, and to at least as 
 great an extent as Boston. Many persons would be inclined 
 to state the case much more strongly in favor of Birmingham, 
 which also possesses many developments of local activity not 
 yet approached by the sister city." He places the total muni- 
 cipal expenses of Birmingham at 333,000, and that of Boston 
 $10.194,000, or more than six times the expenditures of Birm- 
 ingham. Although in the calculation Boston has been taken 
 as a convenient subject of comparison, it must not be sup- 
 posed that Boston stands alone or is comparatively excessive 
 in its expenditures. In the census bulletin, No. 32, published 
 by the census office, the superintendent, the Hon. R. P. Por- 
 ter, gives the statistics of the expenditures of one hundred
 
 23 
 
 principal and representative cities of the United States, with a 
 total population of 12,425,366, or about two-thirds of the 
 urban population of the whole country. The list includes 
 cities of every class, from Burlington, Vt., with a population 
 of 14,590, to New York with 1,515,301; and the respective 
 expenditures vary from $3.79 per head in the case of Little 
 Rock, Arkansas, and Oswego, New York, to $27.61 for St. 
 Paul, Minnesota. 
 
 " The total ordinary expenses for the whole of the hundred 
 cities are given as $234,626,655. Deducting $7,166,901 for 
 charitable objects, and $19,086,751 for water works, which are 
 expenses not represented in the Birmingham statistics, there 
 remains $208,373,003, or $16.78 per head of the population. 
 The corresponding expenditure in Birmingham, including 
 schools, is 403,000 pounds, which is equal to 18s. 9d., or $4.50 
 per head. The expenditure of Birmingham, with a popula- 
 tion of 430,000, is, therefore, little more than one-fourth of the 
 average of one hundred American cities, great and small 
 together. 
 
 " In attempting to find the cause of the great difference in 
 cost of the municipal administration of the two countries, it is 
 of course necessary to take into account the difference in the 
 cost of wages. A second reason frequently given to account 
 for the extravagances of American city expenditures is the 
 alleged existance of deliberate dishonesty and corruption prac- 
 ticed on a gigantic scale. In the popularly elected municipal- 
 ities of England this does not exist and has never existed. 
 
 "There remains only one other possible cause; and that is, 
 that, owing to ineffective control and supervision by the honor- 
 ary members of the Councils in the first place, and secondly 
 by the chief officials, the standard of work has fallen too low 
 and the standard of payment has risen too high. In such 
 cases apathy and carelessness would soon lead to general 
 inefficiency and incompetence. Places without work would be 
 inordinately multiplied to give opportunities for patronage, 
 and we may be sure that, whenever four men are chosen to do
 
 24 
 
 a task which one can easily perform, the work will be badly 
 as well as expensively done; hence there can be no proper 
 sense of responsibility under such conditions. Ignorance 
 would be permitted to review the work of idleness; and dis- 
 honesty, even if it did not take the form of actual theft, would 
 be rife in the shape of neglect of duty and inadequate service.'' 
 One cause in Chicago besides those mentioned above, is the 
 expense of running a City and County government, when the 
 former would answer for the entire County, as shown by the 
 Hon. Mayor "Washburne in his last message. 
 
 A MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENTS' ACT. 
 
 If the question could be brought before congress, and that 
 national representative body could give us a "municipal gov- 
 ernments' act" applicable to all our large cities, as the English 
 parliament gave a uniform framework of municipal govern- 
 ment to all the cities of the United Kingdom, the problem 
 might in a great measure be solved. There is no reason why 
 New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Brooklyn, San Francisco, 
 Boston, New Orleans, and all other such cities in the 
 United States should not be governed substantially by the 
 same municipal form of government. This should be reduced 
 to a science, and be taught like history in all our public 
 schools, so that every one may understand it and act accord- 
 
 The vote on the constitutional amendment submitted to 
 the people in November, 18 91, having been defeated, Illinois 
 has practically tied her hands, temporarily, so that she can 
 not now give Chicago, with over a million inhabitants, a 
 suitable charter without forcing the same on many other 
 cities in the state which do not require it. State legis- 
 latures will continue to annoy and embarrass the larger 
 cities in the states in many ways, as the New York legislature 
 has done, and it will take centuries perhaps to accomplish uni- 
 versally in the United States, what congress with the bright
 
 25 
 
 light of modern intelligence concentrated upon its action, 
 might crystalize in one act for the benefit of all present and 
 future cities in the United States. 
 
 Even if congress could not force its conclusions upon all our 
 large cities, a congressional commission appointed to formulate 
 a system of municipal government would greatly aid state 
 legislatures, and be far more safe to follow than charters 
 and municipal systems, often without a precedent and proposed 
 by experimentalists. A statement which is here ventured, 
 that all large cities in the United States are badly governed ; 
 that their corruption, extravagance, and disorder is a blot 
 upon the proud name of the American republic, can not be 
 contradicted. This being the fact the different states might 
 well call upon congress for an investigation and for a 
 plan of speedy and radical relief in this direction. Neither 
 members of the legislature nor of a common council are 
 as well qualified to handle this important question as con- 
 gress, on account of local political and personal interests. Nor 
 are the private associations springing up here and there under 
 various names, and proposing reforms. These could not be 
 expected to contain the concentrated wisdom of the British par 
 liament which gave the British nation the "municipal govern- 
 ments' act," or the ability of the congress of the United States. 
 
 STRONG MUNICIPAL ORGANIZATION REQUIRED. 
 
 It will require strong permanent municipal organizations to 
 hold in check and direct the great heterogeneous collections of 
 people in our large cities. 
 
 In Bryce's American Commonwealth it is stated "that the 
 number of persons living in cities exceeding 8,000 inhabitants 
 to the total population of the United States, was, in 1880, 22 
 per cent." A still larger proportion, say fifty per cent, would 
 now, in 1892, be found in our cities. .A great part of the wealth 
 is gathered there. Their methods of government are of high 
 concern to Americans. They now absolutely control the gen-
 
 26 
 
 eral government and elect its chief officers. They speak to the 
 nation in tones of authority from the Capitol in Washington. 
 If our cities are badly governed, the effect is speedily apparent 
 in the national government. "Gath," an able correspondent 
 of the Chicago Tribune, writing from Washington, recently 
 pointed out the great power in National politics of large 
 American cities. He says "the vast patronage of American 
 cities has won the multitude. Congress has not as much 
 to give away as has been given away in New York city in 
 street franchises since the presidential election ; $359,000,000 are 
 expended annually by 100 cities. "Shall state legislatures," he 
 says, "register the edict of the municipal caitiffs and elect to 
 the United States senate the brewer who assisted Senator Hill 
 with the power of all the breweries and saloons in the State?" 
 Yes. And " Senator" Murphy is now there. 
 
 " This is the great new question of politics! To this issue 
 tariff is nothing ! " says " Gath " who is an experienced jour- 
 nalist. 
 
 THE THEEE BRANCHES OF GOVERNMENT. 
 
 I n all well regulated governments, whether of the nation, 
 state or municipality, there should be an efficient-and well de- 
 fined executive, legislative and judicial department. 
 
 THE EXECUTIVE. 
 
 Where so many important interests are at stake, and so 
 diversified a population is to be governed, it is evident that 
 the executive should be a personage eminently qualified for 
 the position. He should be clothed with sufficient power to 
 enable him to carry forward, during his administration, with 
 dispatch and regularity, the great organization of which he 
 should be the head.
 
 27 
 
 The Honorable Seth |Low, formerly Mayor of Brooklyn, 
 under whose administration that city was judiciously and pro- 
 perly governed, is in favor of granting a large measure of 
 power to the mayor or executive of the city. He says, "when 
 one reflects that in the government of the United States, the 
 immense administrative departments, like the Treasury and 
 the Post Office, have, from the beginning of the government, 
 been committed to the care of a single man, it seems strange 
 that in their cities Americans should have been so unwilling 
 to proceed upon the same theory." In Brooklyn the 
 Mayor appoints the heads of all departments, who in turn 
 appoint their own subordinates. Philadelphia, Boston and 
 New York are following the example of Brooklyn, by increasing 
 the power of the mayor. 
 
 As the Mayor should devote all his time to the business of 
 the great corporation of which he is the head, he should be 
 paid a salary which would compensate a man who could, in 
 any other department of business, of equal importance, com- 
 mand a salary of $25,000 at least. With its population of 
 362,839 in 1890, Boston paid its Mayor $10,000 a year, while 
 Chicago, with 1,350,000, pays but $7,000. With a salary of 
 $25,000, the mayor should be expected to look after his own 
 corporation's financial and general welfare the same as the 
 president of a railroad. He should not use his position to 
 advance the interests of other corporations, and he and his 
 constituents should be responsible for the administration. 
 
 Professor Bryce compares the municipality "to a business 
 corporation or company in which the tax-payers are sharehold- 
 ers, doing through the agency of the city officers things which 
 each might do for himself with more cost and labor." Hon. 
 Charles Francis Adams holds "the municipality is a mere 
 business organization," and says "it is no part of the proper 
 function of those handling municipal affairs to consider phil- 
 osophical principles of statecraft. They are, on the contrary, 
 persons selected by the constituencies to do the work intrusted 
 to them because the constituent masses have proven so large
 
 that they can no longer meet in one body to do that work them- 
 selves. The function of the municipal officer is, therefore, to 
 administer the affairs of each community in an intelligent and 
 business like way. In accordance with such views, the mayor 
 should be selected not so much on account of his political creed 
 as for his well-known business and executive qualities." 
 
 The lit. Honorable Joseph Chamberlain, in an article in the 
 November Forum, preceding the article on municipal affairs 
 by Hon. Charles Francis Adams, states, that "the leading idea 
 of the English system of municipal government may be said 
 to be that of a joint stock or co-operative enterprise, in which 
 every citizen is a shareholder, and of which the dividends are 
 receivable in the improved health and the increase in the com- 
 fort and happiness of the community. The members of the 
 council are the directors of the great business." The mayor 
 would be in our system, the president of the Board of Direc- 
 tors. 
 
 THE LEGISLATIVE. 
 
 Referring to the Qnincy, Mass., charter, Hon. Charles 
 Francis Adams says: "The analogy of the business cor- 
 poration should have been followed to its full extent, and 
 all the members of the legislative department should 
 have been chosen at large, regardless of Ward lines; with, 
 moreover, some provision for minority representation. This 
 result, it is argued, would have been brought about to 
 manifest advantage, had the charter provided for the elec- 
 tion of a council to be comprised of fifteen, or twenty-one, or 
 twenty-four members, as might be thought best, all to be 
 chosen at large, while no voter could vote for over two-thirds 
 of the entire number to be chosen; but on the other hand, each 
 voter should have been at liberty to concentrate all or any por- 
 tion of the votes he could cast on one or more candidates, or 
 to distribute them among the full number he was entitled to 
 vote for, giving one vote to each. The fifteen, twenty-one or
 
 29 
 
 twenty-four candidates who received in this way the largest 
 number of votes, irrespective of the size of the several votes as 
 compared with the whole or each other, would be elected and 
 would compose the council." 
 
 "It would surely require no great degree of ingenuity to devise 
 a local municipal system under which it would be practical for 
 a scattered constituency, no longer imprisoned in ward lines, 
 so that those composing it may the more conveniently be throt- 
 tled by ward politicians, so to concentrate itself as to escape 
 complete suppression." 
 
 PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION. 
 
 Dr. John M. Yincent, professor of history at Johns Hopkins 
 University, calls attention to the system of proportional repre- 
 sentation in vogue in the Canton of Ticino, Switzerland. He 
 says: "In Ticino, the amendment to the constitution was adopted 
 March 8, 1891, by a very even vote. The test is chiefly 
 devoted to the new division of the country into districts, etc., 
 and simply states that hereafter deputies to the grand council 
 constituent assemblies and municipal councils shall be elected 
 by the proportional system, in which electors have the right to 
 vote for candidates of various groups. 
 
 The constitutions of Neuchatel, Luzerne, Sulothurn, and St. 
 Gallen favor the system indirectly. Various groups signify 
 different parties, and under this system each party will be 
 represented in the assembly. A majority vote of one party 
 will not defeat the entire vote of the minority party, but the 
 latter will still hold a minority representation in the assembly. 
 The sum of all the votes received by all the groups is 
 divided by the number of deputies to be elected, and this 
 gives the "electorial quotient." Each group has a right to as 
 many deputies as the electorial quotient is contained times in 
 the number of votes received by the group. Groups having 
 a less number of votes than the electorial quotient do not 
 participate in the division.
 
 CANDIDATES MUST QUALIFY. 
 
 The city council, which receives its legislative power from 
 the state legislature through the city charter, instead of being 
 left unprotected from ward intriguers and machine politicians, 
 who are always ready to capture it, and who are willing to pur- 
 chase at high figures their election, should be entirely recon- 
 structed. As there will always be a scramble for all offices, 
 and especially that of councilor, the position should be strictly 
 guarded. It should not be easy to qualify. The applicant 
 should be a resident of city and pay taxes for at least five years ; 
 not engaged in keeping a saloon or gambling house, and free 
 from any criminal offence or misdemeanor. 
 
 HOW SHOULD COUNCILORS BE ELECTED? 
 
 In some cities a board of aldermen are elected on a general 
 ticket and a board of councilmen by wards. Two houses are 
 thus formed, as the Senate and House of Representatives in 
 Congress. This would check too hasty legislation. New York, 
 Boston, Baltimore, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Denver 
 and many other American cities have two houses. Hon. 
 Albert Shaw states in the Century, that " A few years ago a 
 council committee, of which Segismond LaCroix was chairman, 
 reported an interesting scheme of municipal organization for 
 Paris. It provided for a council consisting as at present of at 
 least four members from each arrondisement but additional 
 representation for larger ones, increasing the total body from 
 eighty to one hundred and nine members. The council were to 
 be elected for three years, one-third retiring annually, as in Eng- 
 land, and the elections were to be upon general arrondisement 
 ticket, a great improvement upon the present plan of uni- 
 nominal election quarters which necessarily tends to n' 11 the 
 council with obscure men." 
 
 Councilors are elected on a general ticket in London, Bir- 
 mingham, Glasgow, Dresden and many other European cities. 
 Honorable Seth Low is authority for the statement that "as a
 
 31 
 
 general proposition it is found in American cities that the 
 larger the constituency to which a candidate must appeal, and 
 the more important the offices the more of a man the candi- 
 dates must be." 
 
 The council of Brooklyn consists of nineteen members, 
 twelve of whom are elected from three districts, each having 
 four aldermen, the remainings even being elected as aldermen 
 at large by the -whole city. 
 
 In St. Louis the assembly is composed of two houses. The 
 council consists of thirteen members elected for four years by 
 general ticket. The board of delegates consists of twenty- 
 eight members, one for each ward. This city is governed by 
 a charter or scheme of government, which in pursuance of a 
 special provision for that purpose in the last constitution of 
 Missouri, 1875, was prepared by a board of thirteen freehold- 
 ers elected by the people of the city and county of St. Louis, 
 and was finally adopted and ratified by the people themselves 
 by a vote at the polls, August 22. 1876. Boston also has two 
 houses. 
 
 Albert Shaw, in March Century, 1890, states in an article on 
 "Glasgow; a Municipal Study," that "The whole government 
 of Glasgow may be said to be exercised by a grand committee 
 of fifty men chosen by the qualified electors. The election is 
 for a term of three years, and one man from each ward retires 
 annually. From their own number the councilors choose a 
 provost, who corresponds to the mayor in English towns, but 
 he is not an administrative head as the American mayors are." 
 "There is not," he continues, "in British cities any disposition 
 whatever to concentrate appointing power and executive con- 
 trol in the hands of one man as an effective way to secure 
 responsible administration. There is nothing in British organi- 
 zation or experience to sustain the proposition of certain muni- 
 cipal reformers, that good city government can be secured by 
 making the mayor a dictator. All the appointments are made 
 by the council. Heads of departments are selected with great 
 care, and their places are practically permanent." In remodel-
 
 ing our charter this question of the power of the council and 
 that of the major should be carefully considered. If mem- 
 bers of the council were business men, and upright, respected 
 and successful citizens, like those of Glasgow are said to be, it 
 would be safe to leave all this power in their hands while the 
 mayor would act merely as president of the council. But it 
 would not do unless the character of our council, judging 
 by the past, is entirely changed. 
 
 The government of London is under the county council. 
 Mr. Shaw states, "The absolute control of municipal affairs by 
 one central, elective body, representing the masses of the citi- 
 zens, will be the permanent and final government of this chief 
 of urban communities." Such is the British ideal of a per- 
 fect municipal government. 
 
 CoUncilmen should be paid from $3,000 to $5,000 per year 
 instead of $3.00 a session as now, and be subject to removal 
 for malfeasance in office, on conviction. An honest man can 
 then afford to take the office and spend a portion of his time 
 in attending to the affairs of the city, which he could not do if 
 depending on his time and strength for a living. Honest men 
 who can come up to the requirements prescribed, could then 
 compete with men who seek the office only for plunder. 
 
 STOP THE PURCHASE OF ELECTIONS. 
 
 If we punish the corrupt use of money at elections we might 
 succeed in getting better men elected to the council. Mr. 
 Shaw refers to elections in London as follows: "All the 
 stringent regulations against the lavish and corrupt use of 
 money that have-proved so salutary in purifying English par- 
 liamentary elections, have been' made applicable to the elec- 
 tion of London councilors. Under no circumstances may the 
 election expenses of a councilor aggregate more than twenty- 
 five pounds. All expenditures must be made through author- 
 ized agents and these must report the items to the candidate, 
 who within one month must render a complete return of
 
 expenses incurred in his election." These laws are construed 
 strictly, carry heavy penalties and are scrupulously observed. 
 If voters could be compelled to vote or forfeit their right unless 
 good cause for abstaining can be given it would bring out the 
 better classes. 
 
 How are our common councilmen elected in Chicago? 
 What does it usually cost to be elected in some of the thickly 
 settled wards at present ? A " councilor " from the principal 
 saloon in his ward r where the boys get free drinks, lays his 
 plans to capture the ward. He pays $100 or $200 to a num- 
 ber of henchmen well known in each precinct, to work pri- 
 maries and the final election, and before he covers the entire 
 ground it may cost him $3,000 or $4,000, which he willingly ex- 
 pends to be elected to a seat in the council which pays annually 
 $150. Men elected in this way should have every possible 
 power taken out of their hands as has been attempted in New 
 York and Brooklyn. 
 
 DAYLIGHT SESSIONS. 
 
 The city council remodeled for Chicago, if possible, with an 
 upper and lower house, should hold its sessions during broad 
 daylight, two or three times a week, so as to continually and 
 speedily dispose of all routine business and hear reports of 
 standing committees, etc. 
 
 UNITE CITY AND COUNTY. 
 
 To concentrate the municipal business, the county, city, and 
 towns should be merged into one government. 
 
 April 18, 1892, Mayor Washburne, in his message to 
 the council, says: "In this connection 1 would suggest 
 the desirability of taking some action toward bringing 
 about legislation amending the law governing our present 
 method of assessment and collection of taxes. Under the 
 3
 
 30 
 
 our liberty and enlightenment and wonderful achievements. 
 We will learn that tall buildings, gigantic trusts and corrupt 
 officials do not constitute a model city, and that only by eter- 
 nal vigilance can its citizens maintain their rights. 
 
 Frank P. Pritchard, of Philadelphia, publishes an article on 
 
 "THE SCIENCE or MUNINCIPAL GOVERNMENT." 
 
 in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and 
 Social Science for January, 1892, in which he states that in 
 the city of Philadelphia, (where the men and money came 
 from which captured our streets for the dangerous cable 
 system for which Chicago gets little or nothing), " the com- 
 munity was startled by the discovery of the dishonesty of a 
 public official. The same investigations which disclosed his 
 guilt, disclosed also a looseness of administration of state and 
 city finances which gave opportunity to it, if it did not sug- 
 gest the crime." He claims that the system by which our 
 cities are governed is wrong, and that " the control of 
 accumulated capital by corporations has introduced a dan- 
 gerous force into the operations of trade and commerce, 
 and the phenomenal increase of large cities has introduced an 
 equally dangerous factor into the domain of politics. The 
 ordinary administrative machinery of the government, con" 
 etructed for a less complex condition of society, is proving 
 inadequate. A more scientific construction and a more sys- 
 tematic operation is imperative." 
 
 The action of the mayor and common council, if investi- 
 gated by a grand jury in reference to its action in granting the 
 
 " CHICAGO POWER SUPPLY AND SMOKE ABATING ORDINANCE," 
 
 might disclose not only a startling state of crookedness in our 
 council, but also a fatal weakness in our corporate system. 
 
 The Legislature should appoint a commission to investigate 
 the methods which now obtain in the management of our city 
 affairs.
 
 37 
 
 The men who voted for this measure can hardly claim to be 
 friends of the people, and looseness of city affairs have enabled 
 them to act as the tools of monopolists seeking to divest Chicago 
 citizens of valuable municipal properties or privileges, in order, 
 perhaps, to participate in the profits of this new monopoly them- 
 selves. They made no effort to make the best bargain for 
 the city, or to replenish her treasury beyond an uncertain 
 per cent; they yielded all that was asked. If these men 
 had performed their duty as the council of Glasgow, London 
 or Paris would have been expected to do by those cities, they 
 would have obtained a large annual income and charged a 
 round sum of money for the benefit of the city for its princely 
 grant, or they would have retained the rights our council gave 
 away, and operated the same scheme for the direct advantage 
 of the city. But the people's representatives apparently forgot 
 who they were acting for. 
 
 The city of Glasgow is so averse to giving up the control of 
 its streets to any corporation for street car or other uses, that 
 it opposes every bill in parliament asking power to invade its 
 streets. It constructed its own street car lines or tramways, 
 and leased them to the company proposing to operate them, 
 for a term of years, but it retained absolute ownership of 
 streets and tracks. The result of this patriotic interest of the 
 council in the city, will be that the entire cost of the car lines 
 will be paid back and that the city will own them clear, and 
 obtain a large rental annually from leasing them. These 
 councilmen of Glasgow provided in the lease that morning 
 and evening cars should be run for the workingmen at half 
 price. Have the workingmen of Chicago such men in the 
 council to look after their interests? Why not force the men 
 who sell their votes, whether republicans or democrats, out 
 of office, and prosecute them until they are driven out of the 
 city and into the penitentiary for bribery and conspiracy? 
 
 Glasgow has reduced the indebtedness for gas works from 
 $5,330,000 for the entire outlay to $2,400,000, and owns its 
 plant. All this good work for Glasgow was accomplished by
 
 its fifty councilmen who would not be bribed by American 
 street car companies to give up their streets to a greedy mono- 
 poly or hand the people over to a grinding gas trust. Glasgow 
 does not exist under a republican form of government either, 
 like the city of Chicago. But among its voters are included 
 all adults who occupy homes, however small the rent, and pay 
 their poor rates. Women householders are also admitted to 
 vote. In 1890 the male voters thus enfranchised numbered 
 75.000 and the women 14,750. 
 
 The people should have an appeal from the action of a city 
 council so plainly against the public good as the ordinance 
 passed for the benefit of a private corporation like the 
 " Power Supply Company," which simply paid the state $3 50 
 for a license to organize and then sent a draft of the ordinance 
 
 
 
 to the council. Property owners whose property is affected 
 should enjoin the company from tearing up the streets. The 
 Supreme Court of the state should be called upon to interfere 
 and test the right of the council to deprive for all time 1,350,- 
 000 citizens of the State of Illinois of the equitable use and 
 control of their own #treett and alleys. There may be technical 
 points that may invalidate this reckless grab if contested, and the 
 legislature should provide some way to protect the people from 
 such high bounded imposition in the future. 
 
 But this is only another startling illustration proving that 
 the method of conducting our municipal government is wrong. 
 If we possessed an upper house of well-selected aldermen, 
 elected on a general ticket, and a lower house of councilmen 
 chosen by wards, the upper house, if composed of the right 
 material, would have been a check on the lower house and stop- 
 ped the passage of this ordinance. 
 
 r s. 
 
 There is no place in this business of running a great city, 
 for den to introduce their private schemes, nor for public 
 representatives who boldly misdirect and abuse the confidence 
 placed in them by the people electing them. The million or 
 more of citizens in the great free city of the lakes should 
 arise in their majesty, and not rest until their betrayers are
 
 39 
 
 punished. City officials should be promptly compelled to do 
 their sworn duty or suffer instantly for their lack of fidelity, 
 when the lives of thousands are at stake. 
 
 In free America we endure from city officials wrongs the 
 citizens of a German empire or an English kingdom would 
 nc-ver submit to. Paris of to-day is a model city, but we 
 see it after, not before the reign of terror, when it was ruled 
 by a privileged class, corresponding to our monopolists and 
 those who control great corporations. 
 
 The granting of franchises must be submitted to the people. 
 The present Legislature could at least help the forgotten mill- 
 ion in Chicago by passing a law applicable to all cities on this 
 point. The city should only lease privileges. 
 
 WE KEEP * 4 THK BEST " ItEX OUT. 
 
 Hon. Charles Francis Adams says in the Forum of No- 
 vember, '92: "It is true and for us very sadly true that 
 the whole underlying political machinery now in common use 
 in American cities is admirably adapted as admirably as if 
 it were BO designed to put control securely in the hands of the 
 professionals. The caucus system supplements the ward sys- 
 tem. To be in public life in America, whether in the national 
 Congress or the city government, a man must be a member of 
 the political majority in the locality in which he chances to 
 ^ive. A political system better adapted to throwing control 
 into the hands of those who will use it for ulterior and selfish 
 ends, and for keeping the best men out of the field of public 
 usefulness could not be devised: and so it is against this part 
 of the existing political machinery, I submit, that the char- 
 ter-makers and reformers should now direct their efforts, rather 
 than in the direction of more ingenious contrivances for the 
 division of functions of representation. We reach our results 
 today by the process of counting noses, pro and con t within 
 the pale of certain geographical ring-fences, known as district 
 and ward lines."
 
 40 
 
 The puzzle, therefore, the charter reformer has to work out r 
 if he is going to get down to the root of the matter, is some 
 political system which shall secure the utmost free play of the 
 individual citizen, and the representation of minorities in 
 municipal affairs; having done this, and having thus set indi- 
 viduals free and made minorities potent, it will be for those 
 composing the minorities, to put their hands, as of old, on the 
 shoulders of the " best men " and enact of them compulsory, 
 municipal service, those civic tours of public duty. The above 
 statements are given to show some of the difficulties to be 
 overcome before we can have proper men elected to the Coun- 
 cil. 
 
 NEEDED LEGISLATION NEGLECTED. 
 
 Very little good can be accomplished by electing a compe- 
 tent mayor when the council is composed of men elected as 
 now, from wards, without adequate compensation from the city^ 
 who pay no attention to the wishes of the executive when 
 he wants to accomplish anything for the public welfare^ 
 but who lend themselves as willing servants to schemers and cor- 
 rupt corporations who pay them for their services. Hon. Mayor 
 Washburne states in his report April 18, 1893, that "sixty out 
 of sixty -three ordinances for the improvement of streets within 
 the territory named, which had been agreed upon, were 
 defeated." Again, referring to the House of Correction: "At 
 the present time three prisoners are compelled to sleep in one 
 cell, with only one cot, each cell being 6x4 feet in size. 
 Although the state of affairs herein referred to has been re- 
 peatedly brought to the attention of the authorities by the 
 superintendent, it has not been remedied, because the city has 
 not the money wherewith to do it. It is time this community 
 should take up this matter in earnest and see to it that boys 
 should not be subjected to corrupting influences which make 
 criminals instead of reforming vicious and smart children." 
 
 The majority of the councilmen were too busy giving away, 
 for private considerations, rich franchises, which in Glasgow
 
 1 
 
 or Birmingham would have netted the city millions of dollars, 
 or would not have been granted, while the improvement of 
 streets is disregarded. The youth committed to the care of re- 
 formatory institutions, are grossly neglected, when under our 
 present system of ward elections these same neglected vaga- 
 bonds may in a few years be voted into the council and become 
 as prominent and trustworthy as the present incumbents. If 
 Chicago does not have money to meet the demands of reform- 
 atory institutions and streets, it is the fault of the aldermen, 
 who could have demanded and obtained from different cor- 
 porations annually, large revenues. 
 
 THE JUDICIAL DEPARTMENT. 
 
 As to this department, there is no call for an immediate 
 change. Others may find cause for reform here, but it is not 
 considered necessary to open the question in this connection, 
 except in reference to police justices. 
 
 JUSTICES' COUETS. 
 
 All the justices of the peace m Chicago are appointed by 
 the Governor on recommendation of the judges of the Circuit, 
 Superior, and County Courts. From their number are selected 
 the police magistrates, who attend to the city's business, such 
 as breaches of the peace and violations of city ordinances. 
 The city justices are paid $2,500 per annum besides clerk 
 hire, fuel and rent-free quarters. They should, to comply 
 with the terms of their contract, turn in to the city treasury all 
 their receipts for fines, costs, etc. There is, probably, no more 
 prolific source of scandal and reproach than these "justices' 
 shops " as they are not inaptly termed. Of them the June, 
 1892, grand jury report says, " there are many men occupying
 
 4-2 
 
 the position of Justice of the Peace in this county who are 
 wholly unfitted for this responsible position, both from lack 
 of ability and want of proper comprehension of the rules of 
 law, justice or honesty." A later publication by the Xews 
 Record of this city gives the following: 
 
 "Under the law as it now exists, justices of the peace get 
 their compensation out of the fees earned by them. It is 
 therefore important for them to have as many suits brought 
 before them as possible. A collection agency bringing a large 
 number of suits is a valuable customer. If such agencies are 
 pleased with the decisions of the justices they will bring more 
 suits in his court, and the justice will make more fees. If 
 displeased, they will seek some more complacent justice, and 
 take their source of revenue to some other court. Let the jus- 
 tice be ever so fair-minded a man, he will be subject to the 
 continual temptation of resolving judicial questions in favor of 
 his customer; and, if he be corrupt, this system will enable 
 him to make large profits out of a judicial office where, in the 
 majority of instances, the litigants are among the poor and 
 most helpless classes. 
 
 "In the police courts the system is still worse. It is a mat- 
 ter of common notoriety that in these courts policemen bring 
 in hundreds of the unfortunate and disorderly elements of the 
 city without warrants or any other process of law and lock 
 them up in the stations until they are bailed out. One or 
 more professional bailers are attached to each court. These 
 bailers receive from $3 to $10. in accordance with the amount 
 of money possessed by the victim, for signing a bail bond. 
 
 PROFIT BY CONTINUANCES. 
 
 "The justice receives $1 for taking the bond and $1 for each 
 renewal thereof, and such renewal is necessary on each con- 
 tinuance. It will be readily seen that when continuances yield 
 the justice SI apiece for. approving the new bond, there is con- 
 siderable inducement to granting continuances, because they
 
 inure to his profit. Aside from the professional bailer another 
 hanger-on of the police court is the professional shyster, who 
 has a "pull" with the justice and the officers at the station. 
 He frequently acts in the double capacity of attorney and 
 bailer, and it is a recognized fact that these professional atten- 
 dants of the court have more or less influence or "pull" with 
 the justice. How this particular influence is acquired must be 
 left to inference; that it exists is unquestionable. 
 
 "The Citizens' Association of Chicago, which has given this 
 matter careful attention during the last two years, and has laid 
 the facts before the chief of police and the mayor, has caused 
 to be made the subjoined schedule of the number of cases 
 brought, fines paid, amount paid to comptroller, number of 
 discharges, fines suspended and number of cases continued, 
 which furnishes its own commentary as to the mode of admin- 
 istration in the police courts of Chicago: 
 
 
 
 f 
 
 
 
 
 H-k 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 
 !<s> 
 
 
 
 i 
 
 
 
 
 8 
 
 
 8 
 
 
 
 a, 
 
 
 2 
 
 00 
 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 "5 
 
 g 
 
 
 i 
 
 S? 
 
 <e 
 3 
 
 ^. 
 *^* ^ 
 
 JUSTICES. 
 
 i 
 
 a, 
 
 
 ^3 
 oo 
 
 
 1 
 
 1 
 
 
 V 
 
 00 
 
 i 
 
 S 
 
 < 
 s> 
 
 s ** ^* 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 C 
 
 00 
 
 * 
 
 ^ 
 
 <w, 
 
 53 
 
 
 1 
 
 J; 
 
 tj 
 
 ' 
 
 
 ^ 
 
 a. 
 
 * 
 
 3 
 
 u 
 
 ^ ^ ^ 
 
 
 s 
 
 "S 
 
 <j 
 
 S 
 
 ^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 <0 
 
 e 
 
 S 
 
 s 
 
 o 'S 
 
 
 B 
 
 1 - 
 
 .00 
 
 1 
 
 .s 
 
 
 
 
 
 s 
 
 "e 
 
 1 
 
 ^ *** ^ 
 
 M. R. M. Wallace 
 
 522 
 
 $ 229 00 
 
 131 
 
 135 
 
 211 
 
 8 
 
 6 
 
 1 
 
 114 
 
 26 
 
 $0.44 
 
 G. P.Foster 
 
 536 
 
 395.80 
 
 162 
 
 100 
 
 215 
 
 10 
 
 8 
 
 8 
 
 91 
 
 9 
 
 .74 
 
 M. Eberhardt 
 
 1,176 
 
 257.50 
 
 350 
 
 36 
 
 224 
 
 7 
 
 2 
 
 11 
 
 454 
 
 85 
 
 .21 
 
 J. C. Dooley 
 
 732 
 
 263.00 
 
 307 
 
 49 
 
 198 
 
 6 
 
 11 
 
 13 
 
 229 
 
 26 
 
 .36 
 
 J. Blume - 
 
 711 
 
 110.00 
 
 328 
 
 13 
 
 58 
 
 11 
 
 5 
 
 35 
 
 365 
 
 24 
 
 
 C. W. Woodman.. 
 
 1,672 
 
 583.00 
 
 348 
 
 124 
 
 453 
 
 25 
 
 69 
 
 5 
 
 561 
 
 31 
 
 '.35 /Z 
 
 D.Scully 
 
 283 
 
 242.00 
 
 53 
 
 
 
 105 
 
 10 
 
 45 
 
 10 
 
 42 
 
 6 
 
 85 U 
 
 O. Severson 
 
 781 
 
 649.00 
 
 152 
 
 48 
 
 277 
 
 25 
 
 68 
 
 45 
 
 161 
 
 23 
 
 .83 
 
 D. J. Lyon. 
 
 2,017 
 
 951.85 
 
 570 
 
 274 
 
 680 
 
 47 
 
 26 
 
 28 
 
 595 
 
 36 
 
 .47V 
 
 E. T. Glennon 
 
 3,069 
 
 1,493.90 
 
 990 
 
 230 
 
 
 43 
 
 51 
 
 62 
 
 1,278 
 
 49 
 
 : 49 2 
 
 
 
 \ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 JUSTICES ARE INFLUENCED BY THE FEES. 
 
 " From these figures it appears that the arrests made by the 
 police are in nearly one-half of the instances of innocent par-
 
 44 
 
 ties, or, at any rate, without any evidence upon which to base 
 a conviction. It also shows that the j ustices are influenced by 
 the money to be made by continuances, for themselves and the 
 hangers-on of the station. For example, Justice Glennon, out 
 of 3,069 cases brought before him in one month, continued 
 1,27 Scases; Justice Eberhardt fined 224 prisoners $257.50, out 
 of a total of 1,176 prisoners. An analysis of ^the figures in the 
 foregoing schedule leads to the necessary inference that either 
 the police most recklessly and unlawfully arrest innocent par- 
 ties, or else the straw bailers or other hangers-on induce the 
 justices to remit the fines or discharge the prisoners in cases 
 where the parties are guilty. 
 
 " Another effect of these frequent continuances is, that where 
 a law-abiding citizen has been injured in his person or prop- 
 erty and seeks to prosecute the offender, he is worn out by the 
 process of allowing a case to be continued from time to time 
 until he can no further follow it, and the prisoner is thereupon 
 discharged for want of prosecution. 
 
 " The system of inferior courts now prevalent in the city of 
 Chicago was well adapted to the primitive communities which 
 first used it, where the justice was a substantial farmer or citi- 
 zen,well known to his neighborhood, and knew most of the peo- 
 ple who had cases before him, and sat as ah arbitrator of 
 neighborhood differences, and this system still works well in 
 the country at the present time. That it is thoroughly 
 unadapted to a city of 1,500,000 inhabitants is clearly apparent. 
 
 NEED A DIGNIFIED MUNICIPAL COURT. 
 
 "A law that would abolish the entire system uniforimy 
 throughout the state could never pass the legislature. Any 
 legislation, therefore, which could meet the wants of the city 
 would have to be applicable to the city of Chicago alone, and 
 to pass a measure such as is required, wi.hout coming in con- 
 flict with our somewhat outworn state constitution, will be 
 exceedingly difficult. What is needed is a municipal court of
 
 45 
 
 equal dignity with any court in the county, filled by as 
 capable and high-minded men as any that can be obtained as 
 judges, a definite, fixed salary, so as to avoid any interest on 
 the part of the justice in the result of any suit pending before 
 him. As to whether such a measure can be enacted without 
 conflict with the constitution, will be for the legislature to 
 determine, but even without the much-needed reform stated, 
 even without a constitutional convention, something can be 
 done to remedy the evils now existing in our police courts. 
 
 "The salary received by the police justice from the city should 
 embrace all the emolument and profit to which he should be en- 
 titled from his office ; all of the fees for approving bonds or other 
 costs should go to the city, and for the justice to receive any 
 emolument or fee of any kind aside from his salary, should be 
 a misdemeanor, for which he should be immediately removed. 
 It should be the cause for removal of any police officer, clerk 
 of the police court or any other employe or officer of any police 
 court to receive any emolument, reward or compensation for 
 any act or service rendered by him. No arrests should be 
 made for any misdemeanor of the nature of disorderly conduct, 
 breach of the peace or other offence embraced in the term 
 'disorderly conduct' or being inmate of a disorderly house in 
 the first instances, but such procedure should be begun by a 
 summons, and, if failing to appear when so summoned, the 
 offender could be fined and execution issued against the body. 
 This would deprive the straw bailer of his occupation, the 
 justice of the temptation to go in league with the bailers and 
 hangers-on of his station and remove from his court a cor- 
 rupting influence. 
 
 ''Even as the law now stands a vigorous, earnest and honest 
 administration of it could do much to improve the existing 
 condition. If the police court prosecutors employed by the 
 city of Chicago attended to their duties and exercised that dis- 
 cretion and judgment of which they are supposed to be pos- 
 sessed, they could do much to prosecute and prevent the 
 discharge and escape of actual offenders, and to effect the
 
 46 
 
 release of the innocent and unfortunate. It is a notorious 
 fact, and one established by reports made to the Citizen's 
 Association by officers employed for that purpose, that for 
 weeks at a time no one representing the city, other than the 
 policemen, appeared in the police courts to take charge of the 
 city's interests in these cases, and the policeman acts as prose- 
 cutor or as attorney for the defendant, as his interest may sug- 
 gest." . 
 
 " No more important duty rests upon the legislature than to 
 afford us some relief and remedy in the direction suggested. It 
 involves no partisanship or party interest. It involves the 
 welfare of all and most particularly those who are least able to 
 help themselves and the most liable to oppression and abuse. 
 Would we have the law respected we must make it respecta- 
 ble; and to justify the feeling and belief on the part of those 
 it is intended to restrain, protect or punish, that it is an instru- 
 ment to be used by those in power for their oppression and 
 abuse, and that it can be modified or rendered impotent in its 
 application by money, influence or friendship, is to breed law- 
 lessness, disorder and anarchy." 
 
 Another article on the subject gives the following: 
 
 "Legislation is needed that will effect a remedy. The specific 
 measure that can bring about the reform is a matter for the 
 legislature to consider, but many suggestions have been made 
 worthy of attention. The mere statement of the fact that 
 courts organized for the purpose of administering justice, pre- 
 serving the rights of liberty and property, are administered 
 for the financial benefit of the officers of such courts, and that 
 the so-called justices are pecuniarily interested in the result of 
 their decisions, is of itself sufficient to convince any one that 
 the present system is vicious and corrupting. This statement 
 embodies eimply the fact." 
 
 "In many of the minor courts the stern chase after fees has 
 entirely obscured the humble needs of justice. The collection 
 agency which throws its business into a certain channel is 
 likely to get more consideration than the debtor who brings no
 
 47 
 
 fees to the magistrate's hopper. The industry of arresting 
 inmates of disorderly houses for fees, of dividing the loot with 
 professional bailers and other profitable adventures of a similar 
 sort are well recognized by many justices of the peace as a part 
 of their work. It is disgraceful, demoralizing, a prolific 
 source of outrageous wrong." 
 
 Among the suggestions made for relief is that of establishing 
 a City Court of high character with, perhaps, seven judges of 
 similar standing to those of the Circuit and Superior Courts, 
 whose jurisdiction shall extend to all municipal cases; its 
 functions might be so extended as to embrace all the criminal 
 cases occurring within the city. 
 
 THE CHIEF OF POLICE. 
 
 The chief of police should be given a salary sufficient to 
 secure the best man in the country, whether from Chicago, New 
 York or any other city, and should be independent of the city 
 council, so as to take the police force beyond the reach of politics, 
 or aldermanic control. He should be enabled to enforce law and 
 order without respect to persons and parties, and be as independ- 
 ent in some respects as the perfect of police in Paris. The local 
 military companies and the militia, if need be, within the city 
 limits, should be subject to his call to enforce law and order if 
 necessary; he should have a mounted force of 100 picked men, 
 besides a sufficient force of unmounted men, on account of the 
 large area of the city. He should be aided by the detective 
 force and given sufficient power and money to enable him to 
 act quickly and independently, without fear of check or hind- 
 rance from other officials in the city, but be subject to removal 
 by the mayor who appoints him, if he abuses such power. 
 The appropriation for police purposes should be adequate and 
 estimated and applied for by the chief of police and the mayor
 
 4s 
 
 to the common council, and passed upon bj that body. In 
 some states the chief of police is appointed by the governor 
 and is independent of city elections. 
 
 Police Chief McClaughry says: " So long as Aldermen 
 have the right to name policemen, the appointees would con- 
 tinue to recognize the power behind the throne, and discipline 
 would be almost valueless. The patrolmen should be made to 
 recognize that only efficiency would insure their retention." 
 
 If the mayor and council are properly constituted there is 
 no use delegating to the governor of the state the power to 
 appoint the chief of police or any other head of a purely local 
 department. The mayor and every member of the council 
 should be as competent an officer in this respect as the gov- 
 ernor. In a city like Chicago the police force should be as 
 thoroughly equipped as in Paris or London. It should be a 
 little standing army, with its West Point for preparing men 
 for the force, who should be thoroughly drilled and equipped 
 and strong enough numerically to keep the lawless elements 
 in Chicago completely under control. The chief and his sub- 
 ordinates should be permanent officers during good behavior, 
 like those in the army. All should be taken care of, well pro- 
 vided for when sick or old, by pensions. The detective system 
 should be as thorough as that of the police force. The local 
 police force of a great city like Chicago, Paris, or London, 
 should be as formidable to the enemies of good government as 
 the United States government when it is summoned to put 
 down rebellion or an invading armr. 
 
 PDBLIO SCHOOLS. 
 
 The members of the school board of Chicago are appointed 
 by the Mayor and confirmed by the Council. Under the 
 revised charter this need not be changed. However, in Bos- 
 ton the school committee is distinct from the rest of the city 
 government, being elected on a general ticket over the whole 
 city and serving for three years, eight of the twenty-four 
 retiring annually.
 
 THE CITY AND COUNTY TREASURER. 
 
 The city should pay a salary to the city treasurer equal in 
 size to the importance of the office, but provide that all inter- 
 est on funds collected be turned over to the city. The same 
 provision should be made in* reference to the county treasurer, 
 and this should be fixed by a special statute. 
 
 THE COMMISSIONER OF PUBLIC WORKS, ETC. 
 
 The commissioner of public works, and other appointees of 
 the mayor, should be paid adequate salaries, so as to secure the 
 best talent in the city for heads of important departments, and 
 hold their offices during more than one administration, if com- 
 petent, and be srtbject to a prompt removal by the mayor for 
 misusing their offices. The commissioner should be empower- 
 ed to enforce the elevation or lowering of all railroad tracks at 
 once. 
 
 RAISE OR LOWER THE TRACKS. 
 
 Minneapolis can teach Chicago a lesson on now a city gov- 
 ernment should manage the railroads within her boundaries. 
 In the Plarper's of March, Julian Ralf states: "It was five 
 years ago that the city council of Minneapolis ordered the 
 city engineer to prepare plans for the execution of the work. 
 This done, the city attorney began proceedings in court to de- 
 termine why the railroads should not lower their tracks. The 
 Great Northern and Manitoba railroads at once complied with 
 the city's project and the other roads were soon forced to do so. 
 The arrangement that Minneapolis made was a simple one, 
 for the city. It decided that the railroads were to build the 
 entire viaduct approaches, bridges, masonry, walls, excavations 
 and all, and that the city was to stand between the railroads 
 and those property -holders who might claim damages for in- 
 juries growing out of the improvement. The city comes out 
 of the affair at very slight cost, while the railroads have been 
 
 4
 
 50 
 
 put to an enormous outlay. The railroad must keep the 
 bridges and approaches in perpetual repair. The passenger 
 tracks are sunk ten feet at the lowest point; the freight track 
 four or five feet. It will be of interest," he says, "to those 
 officers of other cities who are meditating work of this kind, to 
 know that the railroads which can use the new viaduct are 
 greatly pleased with the reform, and would not go back to the 
 old conditions." 
 
 OTHER IMPORTANT MATTERS TO BE CONSIDERED. 
 
 The mayor should not be confined to Chicago for the 
 material to make up a sufficient and effective administrative 
 force, but should be permitted to gather the best material in 
 America or Europe for engineers, etc. Louis Napoleon ob- 
 tained the services of Baron Haussmann to remodel Paris. 
 
 Every corporation doing business in the city should be made 
 to understand that is it subordinate to the greater corporation 
 known as the City of Chicago, and that it is subject to the will 
 of the mayor and councilmen acting within their legal juris- 
 diction. All franchises should be sold at public auction, as is 
 now done in Brooklyn. It should be impossible to purchase 
 legislation, and if bribes are used and discovered, it should 
 be the law that such legislation could be annuled by the 
 courts. 
 
 Read Seth Low's article in the Century of September, 1891, 
 on " The Government of Cities in the United States." He 
 states, that since the scandal concerning the Broadway railroad, 
 it is now the law that all the charters shall be sold at public 
 auction. Such a sale, he adds, should be in fact a lease for a 
 term of years not exceeding twenty. The new rapid transit 
 bill for New York, happily illustrates this point. It may be 
 too late to remedy the evil as to franchises already granted, 
 but it is not too late to change the policy of our cities for the 
 future. If Illinois, like New York, had taken this precaution,
 
 51 
 
 the Chicago Power Supply and Smoke Abating ordinance, and 
 the Economic Gas Company, would have been offered at public 
 auction. 
 
 The possibilities of the future Chicago can hardly be im- 
 agined, if we are to judge from the past record of this wonder, 
 ful city of the last half of the nineteenth century, but the 
 dangers that threaten her from corrupt legislation and other 
 evils are no less gigantic, and may, if not overpowered, work 
 out her ultimate ruin and degredation. 
 
 Let us take warning in time from other large cities where 
 pauperism, crime, drunkenness, and disease, have done their 
 deadly work, while dishonest and carelessly chosen officials 
 have misused their powers, robbed city treasuries, and left 
 huge debts for future generations to struggle under. 
 
 The property owners of Chicago should hold public meet- 
 ings in the several wards, and zealously take hold of this great 
 subject of municipal reform for the metropolis of the west, and 
 inaugurate measures in time to bring about through the next 
 legislature a change of certain provisions in the city charter, 
 and the adoption of a system suited to a great city like Paris, 
 Berlin, London, or Chicago. 
 
 Instead of getting everything and giving nothing, gas, street 
 car, and other companies should be made to contribute liber- 
 ally to the city. Street car, gas, and other companies should 
 not be permitted to injure the streets simply to carry out their 
 high-handed schemes for stock jobbing purposes on the New 
 York Exchange, or to force some other company to buy their 
 franchise, procured often by corrupt means, and without com- 
 pensation to the city. 
 
 An admirable way to raise money to keep the streets clean, 
 would be to levy a special tax on each lot fronting the streets 
 which are thickly populated, for the purpose of raising money 
 to keep such streets and the alleys clean, and if such money be 
 not promptly used for that purpose, and the health of citizens 
 jeopardized, the owners or tenants should be permitted to 
 clean the streets and alleys opposite their lots and collect the
 
 '0-2 
 
 money from the city. If sufficient water could be obtained, 
 the streets and sidewalks should be flushed every night. 
 
 Albert Shaw states, that in Glasgow, "the streets (181 miles) 
 are swept nightly, most of the work being done by twenty- 
 three horse machines, which are followed by the department's 
 removal carts. A good feature of this work are the iron boxes 
 or bins with hinged lids, sunk in the sidewalks next the curb- 
 ing along the principal streets, at intervals of forty yards. 
 Men and boys are kept busy brushing up the day litter and 
 depositing it in the boxes, the contents of which are removed 
 by night with the sweepings." The city is divided into five 
 main districts for sanitary purposes and a sub-inspector 
 appointed for each, having subject to him ordinary inspectors 
 and lady visitors. There is a central office with necessary 
 clerks. 
 
 The city should be given power to raise the money to build 
 and operate gas and electric light plants, elevated roads, street 
 car lines, telephone lines, stock yards, etc, for its own use and 
 profit, and take advantage of the right as soon as possible. A 
 step in this direction might have been taken long since had 
 we possessed pure and competent councils. 
 
 The city should have the right to levy and collect a small 
 tax, say one-half mill, on all produce brought into the city, 
 the same as is done in Paris by the octroi officers, or Green 
 men, including all stock killed at stock yards, and all fruit, 
 etc., sold on South Water street, etc., to obtain money to aid 
 in charitable work, public instruction and cleaning, lighting 
 and running the city; and maintaining in time the finest opera 
 house and school of vocal, instrumental, and dramatic culture 
 in the world, as well as maintaining the finest art school in the 
 country. Many million francs are collected and disbursed in 
 this way in Paris. The money lost through the common coun- 
 cil by giving away valuable franchises like that recently, 
 granted to the Compressed Air corporation, and to street car 
 and gas companies from time to time, would have established 
 a fund sufficient to pay for all this. Instead of all the profits
 
 53 
 
 accruing from the management and support of the city of 
 Chicago going to private capitalists, stock companies, alder- 
 men, or city and county treasurers, the revised charter should 
 aim to dirert a large portion of these profits into the city 
 treasury. 
 
 HOW SHOULD A CITY CARE FOK ITS POOR? 
 
 "The Elberfeld system is now practically working in at least 
 thirty-six German towns, including most of the principal cities 
 of the country, (Elberfeld, Barmen, Bremen, Konigsberg* 
 Dresden, Leipzig, Frankfurt, Berlin, Stuttgart, Hamburg), and 
 varying in population from Berlin with 1 ,579,244 inhabitants 
 in 1890 to Ruhrort with 11,099. Ten of these towns had in 
 1885 more than one hundred thousand inhabitants; four had 
 between one hundred thousand and fifty thousand; thirteen 
 between fifty thousand and twenty thousand ; and seven less 
 than twenty thousand. Thus the system, if not equally 
 applicable in theory to large and small places, is at least prac- 
 tically accepted in Germany as the only way in which any 
 town, large or small, can hope to deal thoroughly with its 
 question of poor-relief." 
 
 From an article by Francis G. Peabody, in the December 
 Forum: " The Elberfeld system, which is by space, though 
 much harder to administer in America, is, however, the only 
 thorough system. Cases may be ever so freely assigned, and 
 yet other cases, just as needy, may be left uncared for in the 
 same street. The only positive and aggressive way to patrol a 
 whole city is to make a certain sentinel responsible for all that 
 lies within a certain beat, and to make the beat so small that 
 he can easily cover the whole of it. This second point of dif- 
 ference is as much to the advantage of Germany as the first is 
 to her disadvantage. These scattered visitors, each supervis 
 ing his little square, are, first of all, united in small ' ward- 
 conferences ' (Pfleqevereinen). Of these there are forty-three 
 in Dresden, numbering from six to fourteen members each 
 and meeting once a fortnight. The chairman of each confer
 
 54 
 
 ence is the intermediary between it and the central committee, 
 and the forty-three conference representatives are from time 
 to time called to confer with the central board on the more 
 general questions involved in their work. The chairman of 
 each ward conference, moreover, has affixed to his house or 
 shop a conspicuous placard bearing his title, and each case 
 needing relief within the district applies first to him. By him 
 the case is referred to the appropriate visitor, who may relieve 
 immediate necessity by food or fuel pending the action of his 
 conference and of the central board." 
 
 " Another special feature of poor-relief in the town with 
 which I am dealing is the relation of public charity thus 
 administered to private and voluntary help. One might well 
 ask what would become of private initiative under so compre- 
 hensive a plan. Would it not tend to check personal benev- 
 olence and to ruin the work of private societies? Would not 
 citizens come to think of all help as state help and run all 
 risks of a passive socialism? This might be the case if the 
 limits of the two ways of charity were not carefully defined, 
 but with this clear definition a good city system ought to 
 strengthen private charity by giving it a place of its own to 
 fill and a special work to do. This is just what has happened 
 in Germany. Relief by the town carries with it the loss of 
 the right of suffrage and is therefore unwelcome to all except 
 the chronic poor. Cases of temporary poverty fall to the vol- 
 untary societies, and a relation is established between them 
 and the city visitors by means of a thoroughly-maintained 
 charity clearing-house. At the city bureau, where complete 
 records of all cases are kept, there was arranged in 1883 a 
 "central station" through which pass the statements of relief 
 by all agencies in all cases. Thus in 1890 there were seventy - 
 five private charities using this clearing-house for their trans- 
 actions. The city spent in that year one hundred and sixty 
 thousand dollars in its administration of charity, and the pri- 
 vate societies, so far as reported, spent a much larger sum 
 two hundred and thirty-one thousand dollars."
 
 00 
 
 PAUPERISM AND BEGGARY MUST BE CURED. 
 
 Count Rumford, an officer in the revolutionary war in 
 America, later in life went to Bavaria, and through his instru- 
 mentality beggary was effectually stopped in the country once 
 infested with beggars. He accomplished this feat by 
 promptly arresting all beggars and putting them to work in 
 shops and on a farm conducted by the government. Here 
 they were fed and eventually taught trades, and young and old 
 elevated from miserable starving wretches to industrious self- 
 sustaining citizens. (See history of Count Rumford in appen- 
 dix to "In Darkest England." by Booth.) 
 
 THE STATE LAWS AND CONSTITUTION TO BE CHANGED. 
 
 In granting these new increased powers, suitable to the 
 future metropolis of the world, the state laws and even con- 
 stitution of the state must be changed, to meet the require- 
 ments of cities of over one million inhabitants in the state. 
 To accomplish this, right men should be sent to the legislature 
 from this city and other parts of the state until the needed 
 reform is accomplished. 
 
 The right of suffrage in voting for mayor and city council- 
 men in cities of over one million inhabitants, might be 
 restricted in some way, by change in constitution, to those own- 
 ing property, and householders who rent even a small room or 
 tenement, (as in London and in Canada), and those who re- 
 ceive a regular salary, etc., or who have a visible means of 
 support. No man, however poor, if not a vagrant, should be 
 deprived of his vote, but all gamblers convicted of keeping 
 gambling houses, and all employes in same, should be debar- 
 red after conviction, as well as all tramps, criminals, occu- 
 pants of poor houses and jails, from voting at city elections. 
 
 A perusal of the city charter and amendments thereto will 
 show some of the causes which have produced bad results, fol- 
 lowing their practical application in Chicago. One of the 
 principal defects is the method of electing and paying "coun-
 
 56 
 
 cilors." Like evil results have followed the same provisions 
 in New York and Philadelphia. There are many faults in the 
 present system which could be remedied. We might learn 
 many useful lessons from older cities, like Glasgow, Paris, 
 London, and Berlin, and take warning from the experience, 
 of New York, Boston and Philadelphia. 
 
 It is a well-known fact that city government in many of our 
 large cities has been in many respects a failure. They have 
 been plundered for years for the benefit of political parties, 
 corporations of all kinds, and officeholders, as well as private 
 schemers. The power given to ward bosses, expected to 
 serve the city without sufficient legitimate pay, and depending 
 in many cases on the sale of their votes for extra compen- 
 sation, has been abused until nothing better is now expected 
 of them. The present system has produced such bad results 
 that the people cannot be blamed for wanting a change, which 
 will bring to the front business men, who can be elected and 
 properly paid for looking after the business interests of our 
 great city, which under present methods pays out millions 
 where any well regulated business enterprise on a large scale 
 would only spend thousands. 
 
 The lack of business methods and good management in 
 a great American city would ruin any railroad or manu- 
 facturing establishment in a year. The money and property 
 of cities is looked upon as legitimate plunder by ward 
 bosses, and the worst elements within the corporate limits, 
 as well as rich corporations with plenty of money to buy 
 legislation. 
 
 In the report of the Citizens' Association of Chicago, Octo- 
 ber, 1891, attention 'is called to the necessity of reform, as 
 follows: "We need a radical and comprehensive reform; a 
 change of the whole system of municipal government. That 
 was the object this association had in view in its endeavors to 
 obtain a constitutional convention.- 
 
 It is to be hoped these efforts will be followed up at the 
 present legislature and be endorsed by all good citizens.
 
 This organization has done much and is liable to do more 
 for the benefit of Chicago. Boston appointed a commission 
 in 1884 to reform the city government. A memorial was pre- 
 sented to the Pennsylvania legislature in 1883 by a number 
 of the leading citizens of the Quaker city, "asking for a better 
 form of city government." Commissioners were appointed by 
 New York in 1876, "to devise a plan for the government of 
 cities in the state of New York," of which W. M. Evarts was 
 chairman. Those interested in the subject can find all the 
 reports and a full account of the work of these commissioners 
 in the first volume of Bryce's Commonwealth, under the head 
 of "The Government of Cities." 
 
 The time has come in the history of the city of Chicago 
 when a commission should be appointed, composed of some of 
 the best, wisest, and most reliable citizens, who should present 
 the great question of our city government to the legislature, 
 and ask that a new, well-devised and appropriate charter, suit- 
 able to its present and future demands, prepared by them, be 
 granted to the great northwestern metropolis of the United 
 States. The governor might well refer to this subject as one 
 needing prompt consideration. * 
 
 WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION. 
 
 Before the risitors from the great cities of the old world come 
 to Chicago to participate in the celebration of the Columbian 
 Exposition, this city, with so many attractions to commend 
 it, should remodel its present system of government, and 
 place itself upon a higher plane equaling the importance of 
 the great metropolis. 
 
 Our visitors from the cleanest city of the world, the beauti- 
 ful Paris of the nineteenth century, should find our streets 
 thoroughly cleansed, lighted and paved, our police force dis- 
 ciplined, and the railroads, street cars and other corporations 
 respecting and obeying the city ordinances. The mayor whom 
 Chicago is to elect soon should arrest, with the aid of a newly 
 organized police force, and punish all gamblers and criminals
 
 58 
 
 permitting no guilty one to escape for personal or political 
 reasons. 
 
 THE PROHIBITION DISTRICTS SHOULD REMAIN IN TACT. 
 
 Those residence districts annexed to Chicago where saloons 
 are now prohibited, must be watched or else they may be 
 changed to non-prohibition districts at some future election. 
 
 The cable death-traps to surprise uninitiated visitors at 
 Madison and State streets, Michigan avenue and Randolph 
 street, Randolph and Wabash avenue, Randolph and LaSalle 
 and many other cable and railroad crossings should be con- 
 tinually guarded by flag-men employed by the companies, or 
 tracks lowered or elevated, otherwise there will be numerous 
 lives uselessly sacrificed. 
 
 Rest assured our city methods of government as well as 
 everything else connected with Chicago will be investi- 
 gated by these foreign visitors, and written up in French, 
 German, Italian, Russian, etc., as well as English. 
 
 First edition only 1,000. If more we wanted, orders for 
 500 or 1,000 will Refilled at cost by the publishers, Hazlitt 
 <& Co., 97 Plymouth Place.