XIX
OF THE GOVERNMENTAL FUNCTION, INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS, AND THE PUBLIC DOMAIN
The matter of most interest in modern American legislation for municipal government is probably the home-rule principle. That is, statutes permitting cities or towns, or even villages, to draw and adopt their own charters and govern themselves in their own way. The charter thus adopted may, of course, be the old-fashioned government of mayor, aldermen, common council, etc., or it may be the newly invented government by commission, based substantially on the theory of permanent officials chosen at infrequent intervals, and officers, in so far as possible, appointed, and not elected. The one makes for efficiency, the other for democracy. At present the American people seem to have a craze for efficiency, even at the expense of representative government, and of principles hitherto thought constitutional. It is impossible to tell how long it will last. It may carry us into the extreme of personal government, national, State, and local, or history may repeat itself and we may return to the principle of frequent elections and direct responsibility to the voters under the arbitrament of the courts of law. We may go on to special courts (declared odious in the Great Case of Monopolies) and administrative law, or be content with improved understanding of the law we already have.
These matters are too large for us; coming down to more concrete facts, we find that the general tendencies of legislation upon State, and particularly municipal, government are to somewhat enlarge its functions, but considerably to limit its expenditure. Greater distrust is shown in legislatures, municipal as well as State, and a greater trust and power reposed in individual heads, and a much greater power intrusted to more or less permanent boards and commissions, usually not elective, and often clothed with vast powers not expressly submitted to the scrutiny of courts of law. The purposes of education are somewhat extended, generally in the direction of better education, more technical and practical and less "classical."[1] Charity includes a largely increased recreation for the people, State provision for many more classes of the invalid and incompetent, specialized homes for various sorts of infirm or inebriate, and some little charity in the guise of bounties of seed, etc., to needy farmers, which latter, however, have usually been held unconstitutional.
[Footnote 1: Though a lady orator in Boston this year complains to an audience of labor unionists that trades schools and industrial education tend to "peasantize" the poor. Peasanthood was the condition of the agricultural laborer; it was skilled labor that made him free—neither peasant, peon, nor villein. See p. 20, above.]
Thus, in 1890 North Dakota limits the debt of cities to five per cent.; but permits county loans to raise seed grain for needy farmers; other States extend the principle of socialism to electric lighting, gas, natural gas, water, sewers, agricultural drainage, irrigation, turnpikes, and cemeteries. That is to say, all may be built, maintained, or run at the municipal expense, or under municipal control. In 1895 Wisconsin, North Carolina, Texas, and other States carefully limit State, county, town, or city taxes to prescribed rates. Texas requires a two-thirds vote on the issue of municipal bonds, and fixes the debt limit at five per cent. In 1896 Missouri rejects a constitutional amendment permitting municipal gas and water socialism on majority vote of the voters. The same year the failure of such enterprises begins to show itself in a statute of Iowa authorizing municipal plants to be sold upon a popular vote. The socialist town of Hamilton, Ohio, actually went into the hands of a receiver; a similar result followed the English experiments in the towns of Poplar and West Ham.
In 1897 many other States adopted a limit for State, city, county, or town taxes. Indeed, it may be stated generally, without going into further details, that such laws are practically universal throughout the South and West, and prevail to some extent as to cities only in New England, and the same may be said of laws fixing a debt limit which States, counties, cities, or towns may not exceed. Such laws are very generally evaded, as by leasing desired improvements of a private company, or (in Indiana at least) the overlapping of municipal districts; thus there may be (as formerly in England) city, town, school district or poor district, each separate and not conterminous.
While it is obvious that municipal socialism has rather decreased in the last ten years, laws restricting the granting of franchises have become far more intelligent and are being generally adopted. The best example of such legislation is probably to be found in Kansas. The general principles are that no franchise can be given but for a limited time, that it must be bought at public auction, that the earnings beyond a certain percentage on investment must revert to the city, and that there must be a referendum to popular vote in the locality interested. In 1899 Michigan declares the municipal ownership of street railways unconstitutional, but Nevada passes a statute for municipal ownership of telephone lines. In 1903 the municipal ownership of gas and oil wells is permitted in Kansas, and of coal or fuel yards in Maine. A law similar to the latter was declared unconstitutional by the Massachusetts Supreme Court. Missouri adopts a sweeping statute for the municipal ownership of "any public utilities" in cities of less than thirty thousand population. In 1904 Louisiana permits small towns to own and operate street railways. Other States copy the Missouri statute as to municipal ownership of all or any public utilities, and generally the principle is extended, but only in a permissive way; that is to say, upon majority vote, and this seems to be the present tendency. The most striking present experiment is in Milwaukee; both Haverhill and Brockton tried socialistic city government in Massachusetts, but abandoned it.
Civil-service reform has very generally made progress during the past twenty years in State and city governments, and probably the principle is now more or less recognized in a great majority of the States.
Comparatively little is to be said as to internal improvements. The Michigan Constitution provides that the State shall go into no internal improvement whatever, and this, of course, was the older principle without any express constitutional provision. North Dakota and Wyoming provide that the State cannot be interested in works of internal improvement except upon two-thirds vote of the people.