The New York situation is just the reverse. For New York, after having tried private ownership of water and abandoned it as early as 1850 on account of the corruption that resulted therefrom, undertook public ownership of water with such success that no disinterested citizen to-day wants to go back to the old plan. So a New Yorker can advocate municipal ownership of water and still be regarded as a perfectly respectable citizen; but should he venture to favor municipal ownership of gas he is at once classed with those whose heads are only fit to be beaten with a club.
How long are we going to allow our opinions to be manufactured for us by water companies in London and gas companies in New York? Obviously we cannot take an impartial and intelligent view of this great question until we have divested ourselves of the prejudices created by vested interests. If the propertied class, which is committed to existing conditions by the fact that it profits by them, is willing to yield no inch to the rising tide of popular dissatisfaction and the awakening of popular conscience, it is probable that the revolutionary wing of the Socialist party will prevail, if only because under these circumstances the evolutionary wing will not be allowed to prevail. If, on the other hand, the propertied class become alive not only to the danger of undue resistance, but also to the reasonableness and justice of the Socialist ideal, there is no reason why vested interests, save such as owe their existence to downright robbery and crime, should materially suffer in the process of Socialist evolution. If this be true the words "menace of Socialism" will turn out to be inappropriate and unfounded. Sound Socialism has no menace for any but evil-doers.
Having now climbed out of the forest of prejudices created by private or so-called vested interests, let us next consider the different points of view created by temperament and economic conditions, from which the subject of Socialism tends to be regarded.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] "Municipal Year Book," 1909, p. 482.