Animated by a desire to make the best possible showing, for use at the next election, a false economy would be exercised under Municipal Ownership, and no attention would be paid to obtaining useful new inventions; and needed improvements and extensions would, likewise, be ignored.
On the other hand, under private ownership, the best professional talent is employed, at salaries unheard of in public office; and all the latest inventions and improvements are at once utilized, giving the public up-to-date service.
The active, modern business man, keenly alive to the requirements necessary to ensure profit and success, perceives at a glance the evils and mischievous results that would infect everything carried on under this Socialistic plan. And as John Stuart Mill well says: “The mischief begins when, instead of calling forth the activity of individuals, the municipality substitutes its own activity for theirs.”
No serious attempt has ever been made to show the possibility of securing and retaining, under some rule of municipal civil service, or otherwise, the best men to assume the burden of management and responsibility. As already explained, it would be practically impossible to secure the best men, and no system of civil service has yet been formulated, intended and able to provide for their retention.
In this connection, a fitting illustration is the case of Colonel Waring, who instituted and maintained the best street-cleaning system we have ever seen. His work was simply marvelous, and he made New York City a model of cleanliness.
No one ever questioned his ability or integrity; yet, while at the very zenith of his success, he was asked to resign, and obliged to leave the city employment to make room for the choice of a new city administration.
The defects and fallacies of Municipal Ownership which I have described permeate all government ownership. Official reports and statistics furnish convincing proofs and conclusive evidence of the failure of this system as conducted abroad, and more signal loss and damage—in an incalculable degree—would surely follow its adoption here. Just in proportion as our interests and enterprises are the greatest and most successful, as compared with other nations, would be the immensity of our depreciation and collapse.
The United States is so different from other nations in its political system that this fact alone precludes serious consideration of our adoption of this imported Socialistic hobby and political heresy. It is also a country whose every chapter of growth, progress, and prosperity is a continuous narrative of individual efforts of its citizens. They, naturally, prize individuality as they do independence itself, and have every reason to believe that the present system of government is the best for them, and that this land of Individualism is no place for Socialism.
Imagine New York under Municipal Ownership of our public utilities! We should then have fastened upon us a more colossal and more corrupt Tammany than even existed in Tweed’s times. Graft would thrive beyond all dreams of avarice. Let us take a lesson from England in this respect, where public ownership has been tried on a larger scale and under more favorable conditions than elsewhere. In a few instances the running of street railways or city lighting plants has been successful, but exceptions do not always prove the rule, and the conditions under which these enterprises have been operated there must be taken into consideration. English cities are comparatively free of political corruption, and are, moreover, often served by men of high character, wealth, and ability—men having a strong sense of civic duty, who deem it an honor to give their community efficient service. Unfortunately, we have not yet developed a class of this sort in the United States; perhaps in due time we shall; but, until then, the experiment of Municipal Ownership had better be indefinitely postponed. A weak point of Municipal Ownership has usually been the financial end of the business concerning which the public has been poorly informed. Many of these enterprises in English cities have proved unprofitable. The accounts have been juggled, and expenses that should be charged against the plant were often transferred to city accounts. Not a few of the English cities have so run into debt as to injure their credit and impair the sale of their securities. Already, the British taxpayer is beginning to complain about the costliness of these Municipal Ownership schemes, and a decided reaction against them is setting in. The London County Council has launched heavily into these ventures, many of which have proved losing ventures, and some prominent experts have gone so far as to predict that London will be bankrupt before long, unless present tendencies are reversed. If Municipal Ownership has failed under the highly favorable conditions which exist in England, how can it succeed here? Again, the English telegraph system operated by the British Government does not compare with the private systems of the United States, either in efficiency or cheapness, and England with its public telephones is very far behind the United States in efficiency and cost. London does not begin to have the number of telephones per capita that New York can claim. American railroads under private ownership perform the best and cheapest service in the world.
If any further argument were needed to convince you that the United States is no place for Socialism, its root or branches, it may be found in the radical and quite amusing change of front shown by Major Dalrymple, of Glasgow, upon the occasion of his visit to this country. He came here at the request of Major Dunne, of Chicago, and the Municipal Ownership League of New York, to aid the forces of Socialism in their efforts in behalf of Municipal Ownership. He was the great Apostle of that doctrine in Glasgow, and the very man, in their opinion, to convert our people to that system.