THE CHAIRMAN: Mr. Alden Freeman, a militant citizen of East Orange, is unable to be with us today but he makes the following contribution which he calls Victory in Defeat: the Value of Non-Partisan Movements in Municipal Campaigns. MR. FREEMAN: "The country is full of winners; what we need is the good loser."---Lincoln Steffens. In East Orange on November 3 we failed for the fifth time to elect our independent candidate for mayor; but I am one of those who believe that no honest effort is ever wasted and that sincerity of purpose is bound to produce good results; hence I never feel discouraged or disheartened because few or sometimes none of our candidates are elected in these non-partisan campaigns that have been carried on in our city for the past dozen years. Whatever our platforms contain that is of really practical benefit to the city will be carried out, because those in office know very well, if Ideas Carried they don't carry out these reforms, that at the next election the citizens will elect the men who propose the reforms. Among such measures that have already been carried out I may mention the sprinkling of all the streets by the municipality and stated salaries for aldermen in place of fees for meetings without limit. The few candidates that we have from time to time succeeded in electing have without exception made good. One of these men installed an Work Carried up-to-date system of audit of the city's accounts; another codified the rules of the police department, reformed the method of issuing city bonds and provided for their proper advertising and sale; a third installed and managed with success our million-dollar water plant, inaugurated an unique plan of municipal farming for supplying fodder for the horses in the fire, road and sewer departments, and established the tree-planting commission; while a fourth conducted courses of free lectures for adults in the public schools during his term as school commissioner. Our campaign in 1902 resulted in a saving of several hundred thousand dollars in the price paid by the city to the water company for its pipe system. We now have greater publicity in every department of our municipal affairs and a courteous hearing for citizens as a scheduled part of the proceedings at every meeting of the city council. This is a distinct advance over the days of 1902, when citizens and taxpayers were not permitted to speak in opposition to the granting of perpetual franchises to trolley companies. No matter how excellent the reformer's ideas, if they are only advocated through letters to the newspapers, or by papers read to gatherings of men and women of like opinions, they influence the practical politician not a bit; but let the reformer get into the political field and win votes for his measures, then the politicians begin to take notice. Your It is the votes that count, whether you have a majority or not. oldtime politician knows how few votes it takes to change a minority into a majority. The real triumph of the reformer is to see his ideas carried out by his opponents, for that is real progress. When the practical man, long in public office, carries out the new ideas, actual progress is made; for that is the conversion of your opponent, who always wants to get on the popular side and he will not so readily recede from a position once taken as the less conservative reformer. I find also that local non-partisan campaigning often has a strong effect on larger political struggles outside the municipality. In 1902 the turning down of the friendly advances made to the Citizens Union of East Orange by the county boss of the dominant party largely contributed to his defeat as the candidate for sheriff; he being the only candidate of his party defeated and falling 13,000 Effects Outside of the Municipality behind the rest of his ticket. It was before our non-partisan organization that the first of our independent candidates for mayor, the late Henry H. Hall, sounded the keynote of the anti-corporation fight in New Jersey. Over six years ago, on October 18, 1902, Mr. Hall made his notable address on "Domination of Corporations through Control of Party Machinery," in which he described his examination, in the course of his own business affairs, of the re-organization of a public utilities company and his discovery of the assignment Activity of Corporations in Politics of stock to leading Democratic and Republican officials in the city where the business was conducted, as well as to prominent national politicians. Mr. Hall asserted that the corporations which had dealings with the city government of East Orange had actually dictated appointments in the cabinet of the president of the United States; that they had made a vice-president of the United States; had named a United States Senator and various governors of New Jersey; in fact that they "dictated policies at Trenton and influenced them at Washington." These statements, which were included in an ardent appeal for the entire separation of municipal from county, State and national politics, caused his hearers to sit up and take notice. Mr. Hall's statements were confirmed three years later by Charles E. Hughes in the insurance investigation in New York State and, if further proof was needed of corporation interference in our government, it has been abundantly furnished by Mr. Hearst in the recent campaign. It takes time for great reforms to work out, and it was nearly three Origin of the years after Henry Hall's initial speech before Everett Colby threw down the gauntlet to the Public Service Corporation of New Jersey in the same hall before a meeting of the same organization presided over by Mr. Hall, who in the interval had been chosen president of the Citizens Union. It was in his address on "The Grasp of the Cor ment porations" that Mr. Colby opened his campaign for the state senatorship in opposition to the bosses and in defiance of the corporations, and here in Commonwealth Hall, East Orange, on March 1, 1905, he inaugurated what has since been known throughout New Jerseyas the Colby Movement. Successful So again I say that although we never elected Henry Hall to any public office, his honest effort for political betterment can in no sense be regarded as a failure. These "lone fighters" in independent and non-partisan campaigns are pioneers and pathfinders, and their guerrilla warfare is like that of the farmers along the Lexington and Concord Road; but they likewise fire shots that echo 'round the world, although the sharpshooters themselves, like those of 1775, go down to unknown graves without a regret or one thought of self, for these are the men who fight for a cause and not for glory. There is still another consideration in connection with non-partisan and independent campaigns that should not be overlooked. There is no telling how many things they prevent by reason of the public interest created by them in municipal affairs. The publicity of the campaign, the calcium light cast upon the city hall and the doings of its various inmates, make even the most strongly intrenched machine politicians think twice before engaging in schemes opposed to the general interest. Finally, I regard these campaigns as especially valuable in educating those who take part in them. The political reformer gets an insight into Education of the Workers practical politics that will convince him that the end does not justify the means; that compromise with wrong or injustice is fatal to a cause; he will cease to be a respecter of persons; only what a man is, and not what he has, will count with him, and he comes at last to realize that no office or public honor, however exalted, can possibly in any way dignify any man, and that service in behalf of his fellow-men can alone shed luster upon any public position. The independent in politics is pretty certain also to realize, after he has studied the conditions of life among the actual producers of wealth, that there can never be a "square deal" under the profit system; for where one man makes a profit out of another man's labor, the man who enjoys the profit gets something for nothing at the expense of the other, which is essentially of the nature of gambling and opposed to justice and square dealing. As there can be no square deal between an armed man and an unarmed man, so there can be no square deal between the man armed with the unearned increment of capital and the man whose only weapon is the labor of his hand or brain. And this brings us to the conclusion that if it be true that the laborer is worthy of his hire, then it follows, as the night the day, that the laborer is entitled to his full hire, which is nothing less than the full product of his labor, else must he share with someone else who does not toil; and this brings us finally to that stern doctrine which I believe will prove to be the chief stone of the corner of the coöperative commonwealth toward which we are moving throughout the world; that he who will not work This doctrine applies with equal force to both extremes of our present social life and places in the same category the hobo and the spendthrift. SHALL NOT EAT. THE PRESIDENT: Ladies and Gentlemen: I regret to say that the session this morning, which has been so exceedingly interesting to the speakers-I mean to the audience [laughter] and so edifying and improving to all of us, must now draw to a close. I believe that we meet again in this room at two-thirty this afternoon, at which time the further work of the League will be continued along the same lines of general disagreement which have marked its course this morning. The meeting now stands adjourned. The convention then adjourned until 2:30 p.m. WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON SESSION. Wednesday, November 18, 1908, 2.30 p.m. The sixth session of the Convention was called to order by Mayor George W. Guthrie of Pittsburgh, Fifth Vice-President of the League. THE CHAIRMAN: The first paper on the program for this afternoon is "The Municipal Library as an Investment," by Dr. Charles McCarthy of the Legislative Reference Bureau of Madison, Wisconsin. This paper will be printed (see Appendix) in the proceedings, and we shall now listen to a discussion of it by Dr. Horace E. Flack, who has so successfully organized the Baltimore bureau. See Appendix for Dr. Flack's paper, entitled "Municipal Reference Libraries." THE CHAIRMAN: The next paper to be presented this afternoon is one on "The Washington Situation." In this paper Mr. Reynolds, whose prominence in municipal and public movements is well known, will give us the benefit of the research made by him in the capital city under the direction of and at the request of the President. I have the honor to introduce James B. Reynolds, Esq. Mr. Reynolds then read his paper on "The Washington Situation." (See Appendix.) A DELEGATE: May I ask Mr. Reynolds a question? Whether the governor once appointed shall serve during life or good behavior or will he have a term? MR. REYNOLDS: Probably the same term as the present district commissioners, four years, to correspond with the term of the chief executive of the nation who appoints him. Personally I was very much surprised on the other side with the success of having a term so long as twelve years in Berlin. In a conversation I had with the mayor of that city, he explained to me the careful plan he outlined for the normal period he would have and the chance he would have to see the realization of his best endeavors, as very few reform mayors in our city ever have a chance. But I do not think that any one here could make a recommendation for such a long term as twelve years with any hope of having it adopted. THE CHAIRMAN: The next paper on the program is "Ten Years of Uniform Municipal Reporting," by Hon. LeGrand Powers, Census Bureau, Washington, and Harvey S. Chase, Boston. I have the pleasure of presenting to you Mr. Powers. [Applause.] Dr. Powers then presented his paper. (See Appendix.) PRESIDENT BONAPARTE (who in the meantime had assumed the chair): I regret to say that as announced this morning Mr. Chase is unable to be present and read the supplementary paper which was to have accompanied the one to which we have already listened with so much interest, and I have no doubt with so much edification. We will now hear a paper on the Bureau of Municipal Research which has been prepared by Dr. William H. Allen of New York, and will be read by Mr. Rufus E. Miles, his first assistant. MR. WOODRUFF: Mr. Chase is only prevented from being here by his doctor's orders. He is in bed and unable to get up. His paper will be printed in the Proceedings. (See Appendix.) MR. RUFUS E. MILES: Were it not, Mr. Chairman, that I believe most of us can stand a great deal of a good thing I should be tempted to believe that the presentation of the case for municipal research this afternoon is somewhat unnecessary from the fact that in every meeting of this conference which I have attended I have heard one or more speakers preaching excellent municipal research doctrine. But in those cases it did not bear the particular label; so I am here to present similar doctrine under the label. Mr. Bryce's It was some years ago that the well known pronouncement of James Bryce came forth that municipal government was America's most conspicuous failure. But to those who have been watching the trend of events and have been attending such meetings as these for the last few years, it is increasingly clear that a tide is rising which will, we hope, soon make Mr. Bryce's dictum obsolete. Some efforts at municipal reform remind one of the experience of a prisoner in a penitentiary in a neighboring state. He was an intelligent fellow and soon gained the position of trusty. In the course of his duties the architect's plans of the institution came into his custody. They indicated under a certain |