One of the few specific charges brought against Mayor Mitchel’s administration is the assertion that a coterie of real estate speculators has profited unduly by the sale of park sites and other real estate to the city and State during recent years. In reply the supporters of Mayor Mitchel’s administration say that the acquisition of these properties was indispensable to great public improvements planned; that whatever payments have been made have been paid by the regularly determined award of the courts; and that there is not the slightest evidence of collusion on the part of city officials.

Thus far the opponents of Mayor Mitchel’s administration have devoted much of their energy to attempts at personal onslaughts. This line of action has called forth the comment that it is because of the very absence of administrative scandals that the administration’s adversaries resort to vague personal attacks. From these opponents has come the persistent innuendo that because of Mayor Mitchel’s occasional social associations with rich and powerful personages, his official activities must necessarily be influenced by that contact. It is aptly pointed out that the hypocrisy and demagogery of such an aspersion may be properly estimated when it is recalled that the elements mainly concerned in spreading it have been the identical organized forces that year after year were the tools of designing men and corporations that by the adroit use of corrupt politics vested in themselves huge corporate privileges and powers and enormous wealth.

THE END

INDEX