The Eleventh Census will give very full statistics of cities, but though some of the results have been announced in bulletins, none of the final reports have yet been issued. These results have been summarized by Hon. Carroll D. Wright in the Popular Science Monthly for 1892, vol. 40. On “Urban Population” see p. 459; on “Social Statistics of Cities” p. 607, and on “Rapid Transit,” p. 785.

The following Reports of the Tenth Census treat of this subject: vol. 1, Population; vol. 7, Valuation, Taxation and Indebtedness; vol. 18, Social Statistics of Cities: New England and Middle States (reviewed in the Nation, vol. 44, p. 256); and vol. 19, Social Statistics of Cities: Southern and Western States.

Scribner’s Statistical Atlas of the United States, N. Y., 1883, exhibits the figures of the census graphically (p. xlv, statistics of population). Plate 21 illustrates the growth of American cities since 1790. There were then only eight cities of eight thousand inhabitants, and the population of New York was 33,131. Plate 30 gives ratios of different nationalities to total population in the largest fifty cities. Plate 76 gives net per capita debt in the largest one hundred cities.

On movement of population see an article by B. G. Magie, Jr., in Scribner’s Monthly, January, 1878, vol. 15, p. 418; Prof. Richmond Smith’s “Statistics and Economics,” p. 264 in vol. 3 of the Publications of the American Economic Association; a study on the “Rise of American Cities” by Dr. A. B. Hart in the Quarterly Journal of Economics, January, 1890, vol. 4, pp. 129-157; an article by Lewis H. Haupt on “The Growth of Great Cities” in the Cosmopolitan for November, 1892, and another by John C. Rose, on “The Decrease of Rural Population” in the Popular Science Monthly for March, 1893, vol. 42, pp. 621-38. Cf. work by E. Levasseur, entitled Les Populations Urbaines en France, comparees a celles de l’Etranger, Paris, 1887.

The Annual Statistician, published by L. P. McCarty, San Francisco, gives the following statistics for leading cities: Number of votes registered and polled; number of voting precincts; strength of police; losses by fire and number of fire-engines and firemen; value and capacity of gas and water works; number and character of street lights; vital statistics; number of murders, suicides, and executions; length of street railroads and cost of motive power; telegraph and telephone mileage; number of saloons and cost of licenses; attendance and cost of schools, annual tax-rate, expenditure and the public debt.

3. FINANCE.

Volume 7 of the Reports of the Tenth Census, compiled by Robert P. Porter, gives statistics of local taxation and indebtedness, and a summary of the provisions of the several state constitutions limiting the rate of taxation, the amount of municipal debts, and the purposes for which they may be contracted. See p. 674 for an analysis of the purposes for which the debt outstanding in 1880 was contracted. The Eleventh Census will give similar data. Mr. Porter published an article on municipal debts in the N. Y. Banker’s Magazine for September, 1876, and another in Lalor’s Cyclopædia of Political Science, vol. 1, p. 730. Cf. also his article in the Princeton Review, n. s., vol. 4, p. 172. For a further study of this subject, read Prof. H. C. Adams’s Public Debts, N. Y., 1887, Part 3, chap. 3. See also G. W. Green’s article on “Municipal Bonds,” Lalor’s Cyclopædia, vol. 2, p. 920; Prof. S. N. Patten’s “Finanzwesen der Staaten und Stædte der Nordamerikanischen Union”, Jena., 1878; C. Hale’s “Debts of Cities,” Atlantic, vol. 38, p. 661, for the law of Massachusetts; D. L. Harris’s “Municipal Economy,” Journal of Social Science, vol. 9, p. 149, for the experience of Springfield, Mass., the articles in Bradstreet’s for February 10 and March 3, 1883, for a comparison with local debts in England, and H. B. Gardner’s “Statistics of Municipal Finance” in the Publications of the American Statistical Association, June, 1889, vol. 1, pp. 254-67. On the debt of New York City see the paper by Wm. M. Ivins cited below. A Statement of Facts Concerning the Financial Affairs of the City of Elizabeth, N. J., which has the largest per capita debt in the United States, was published by some of the citizens of that place in January, 1886.

Municipal taxation is treated at length in Prof. R. T. Ely’s Taxation in American States and Cities, New York, 1888. The Reports of the Commissioners Appointed to Revise the Laws for the Assessment and Collection of Taxes in New York, 1871 and 1872, contain much valuable material. The members of the Commission were David A. Wells, Edwin Dodge, and George W. Cuyler. The first report was reprinted in New York by Harpers, and both were reprinted in England by the Cobden Club. Cf. also Wells’s “Theory and Practice of Local Taxation in America,” in the Atlantic Monthly for January, 1874; “Rational Principles of Taxation,” a paper read in New York, May 20, 1874, Journal of Social Science, vol. 6, p. 120; and his “Reform of Local Taxation” in the North American Review for April, 1876. On the evils of double taxation see a paper on “Local Taxation” by William Minot, Jr., read in Saratoga, September 5, 1877, and printed in the Journal of Social Science, vol. 9, p. 67. See Report in 1876 of New Hampshire Tax Commission, composed of Geo. Y. Sawyer, H. R. Roberts, and Jonas Livingstone; and Report of the Michigan Commission, House Journal, February 23, 1882. A similar Commission, appointed by the City of Baltimore, reported in January, 1886. The Report contains, in addition to the recommendations of the Commission, a paper by Prof. R. T. Ely, entitled “Suggestions for an Improved System of Taxation in Baltimore.” A further article on “Municipal Finance” may be found in Scribner’s Magazine, January, 1888, vol. 3, pp. 33-40, and a thesis entitled “Special Assessments: A Study in Municipal Finance,” by Victor Rosewater, is announced for vol. 2 of the “Studies in History, Economic and Public Law,” issued by Columbia College.

4. GENERAL DISCUSSIONS.

Adams, Charles Francis. “Municipal Government: Lessons from the Experience of Quincy, Mass.” Forum, November, 1892, vol. 14, pp. 282-92.