A second line of reform appeared in the "model franchise"for utility corporations.An illustration of this tendency was afforded by the Chicago street railway settlement of 1906.The total capital of the company was fixed at a definite sum,its earnings were agreed upon,and the city was given the right to buy and operate the system if it desired to do so.In many states,about the same time,it was provided that no franchises to utility companies could run more than twenty-five years.
A third group of reformers were satisfied with nothing short of municipal ownership.They proposed to drive private companies entirely out of the field and vest the ownership and management of municipal plants in the city itself.This idea was extensively applied to electric light and water works plants,but to street railways in only a few cities,including San Francisco and Seattle.In New York the subways are owned by the city but leased for operation.
Tenement House Control.-Among the other pressing problems of the cit-ies was the overcrowding in houses unfit for habitation.An inquiry in New York City made under the authority of the state in 1902revealed poverty,misery,slums,dirt,and disease almost beyond imagination.The immediate answer was the enactment of a tenement house law prescribing in great detail the size of the rooms,the air space,the light and the sanitary arrangement for all new build-ings.An immense improvement followed and the idea was quickly taken up in other states having large industrial centers.In 1920New York made a further invasion of the rights of landlords by assuring to the public "reasonable rents"for flats and apartments.
Workmen's Compensation.-No small part of the poverty in cities was due to the injury of wage-earners while at their trade.Every year the number of men and women killed or wounded in industry mounted higher.Under the old law,the workman or his family had to bear the loss unless the employer had been guilty of some extraordinary negligence.Even in that case an expensive lawsuit was usually necessary to recover "damages."In short,although employ-ers insured their buildings and machinery against necessary risks from fire and storm,they allowed their employees to assume the heavy losses due to acci-dents.The injustice of this,though apparent enough now,was once not gener-ally recognized.It was said to be unfair to make the employer pay for injuries for which he was not personally responsible;but the argument was overborne.
About 1910there set in a decided movement in the direction of lifting the burden of accidents from the unfortunate victims.In the first place,laws were enacted requiring employers to pay damages in certain amounts according toCrowded Conditions in New York Citythe nature of the case,no matter how the accident occurred,as long as the injured person was not guilty of willful negligence.By 1914more than one-half the states had such laws.In the second place,there developed schemes of industrial insurance in the form of automatic grants made by state commissions to persons injured in industries,the funds to be provided by the employers or the state or byboth.By 1917thirty-six states had legislation of this type.
Minimum Wages and Mothers'Pensions.-Another source of poverty,es-pecially among women and children,was found to be the low wages paid for their labor.Report after report showed this.In 1912Massachusetts took a sig-nificant step in the direction of declaring the minimum wages which might be paid to women and children.Oregon,the following year,created a commission with power to prescribe minimum wages in certain industries,based on the cost of living,and to enforce the rates fixed.Within a short time one-third of the states had legislation of this character.To cut away some of the evils of poverty and enable widows to keep their homes intact and bring up their children,a de-vice known as mothers'pensions became popular during the second decade of the twentieth century.At the opening of 1913two states,Colorado and Illinois,had laws authorizing the payment from public funds of definite sums to widows with children.Within four years,thirty-five states had similar legislation.
Taxation and Great Fortunes.-As a part of the campaign waged against poverty by reformers there came a demand for heavy taxes upon great fortunes,particularly taxes upon inheritances or estates passing to heirs on the decease of the owners.Roosevelt was an ardent champion of this type of taxation and dwelt upon it at length in his message to Congress in 1907."Such a tax,"he said,"would help to preserve a measurable equality of opportunity for the people of the generations growing to manhood....Our aim is to recognize what Lincoln pointed out:the fact that there are some respects in which men are obviously not equal;but also to insist that there should be equality of self-respect and of mutual respect,an equality of rights before the law,and at least an approximate equality in the conditions under which each man obtains the chance to show the stuff that is in him when compared with his fellows."
The spirit of the new age was,therefore,one of reform,not of revolution.It called for no evolutionary or utopian experiments,but for the steady and progressive enactment of measures aimed at admitted abuses and designed to accomplish tangible results in the name of public welfare.
QUESTIONS
1.Who were some of the critics of abuses in American life?
2.What particular criticisms were advanced?
3.How did Elihu Root define "invisible government"?
4.Discuss the use of criticism as an aid to progress in a democracy.
5.Explain what is meant by the "merit system"in the civil service.Review the rise of the spoils system.
6.Why is the public service of increasing importance?Give some of its new problems.
7.Describe the Australian ballot and the abuses against which it is directed.