influence of powerful private interests. It has served to promote the special privileges of the few at the expense of the general welfare of the many who live in the District. In support of this statement the following facts are submitted regarding taxation, assessments, housing, the expenditure of public funds, the operation of public utilities, and general living conditions in the city of Washington.

TAXATION AND ASSESSMENTS.

On August 20, 1912, there was submitted to Congress the report of a I committee on assessment and taxation of real estate in the District of Columbia." (Doc. No. 1215, 62d Cong., 2d sess.) As might be expected in a city where the people have no control over the taxing power, this report reveals the most glaring inequalities in the assessment of property. While the law requires that both land and improvements shall be assessed at not less than 66 of their true value, this report (p. 21) shows that the land values of the District are assessed at only 34 per cent of their true value, while improvements are assessed at about 67 per cent of their actual value. This report also reveals unjust discriminations between different sections of the city, as shown by the following figures, which represent the ratio between assessments and full values:

These figures tell their own story. They justify the charge made on page 6 of this report of heavy discrimination against the small home ín comparison with the better house and the business property, while the large suburban speculative area bears less than a third of its proper burden. Similar inequalities and discriminations prevailed as far back as 1892, as shown by the report of a congressional committee. (No. 1469, 52d Cong., 1st sess.) It is impossible to escape the conclusion that powerful private interests, owning large tracts of land in the suburban area, valuable lots and buildings in the business area, and mansions and apartment houses in the fineresidence area of this city have for many years been exerting pressure on the District government to keep assessments in the privileged sections of the city, especially the assessments on land values, far below the legal rate of 663 per cent, while the deficiency in revenues has been made up by unnecessarily high assessments on the other sections of the city. The legal rate of taxation on the assessed value of the real estate is 1 per cent. If all real estate in the District were fairly and honestly assessed at two-thirds of its real value, as required by law, the rate of taxation could be reduced to 1 per cent without diminishing the total amount of revenue now derived from real-estate taxation. The taxes which are evaded by those who are best able to pay them are shifted to the shoulders of the small-home owners, who are least able to bear the burden of taxation.

Increase in land values.-According to the George report, the capitalized land values of the District amount to $504,000,000. The annual ground rentals, computed at 5 per cent of that amount, are approximately $25,200,000, which is equal to about $72 per capita, or $360 for an average family of five. In other words, the average family pays, directly or indirectly, $360 per annum to our local landowners for the privilege of living in Washington.

There are two factors that have accelerated the rise of land values in this city. The first of these is the so-called half-and-half system of taxation, established by the act of June 11, 1878. The masses of the people living in the District have derived little or no benefit from this Federal contribution to our local revenues. For them rising land values have merely resulted in more expensive home sites, higher rentals, and higher prices. The local benefits resulting from the half-and-half system have been largely monopolized by wealthy land speculators who have built up immense fortunes from the resulting boom in land values.

This is a national city, laid out on national lines, and it is but fair that the Federal Government should contribute to its development and beautification. But a scientific system of taxation which would tax into the Public Treasury the annual unearned increment of land values resulting from the expenditure of public funds in the District is urgently required in order that landowners and land speculators may be prevented from monopolizing the benefits of the half-and-half system of taxation. In new subdivisions expenditures made by the Government on streets, sidewalks, and other improvements produce a corresponding increase in the selling price of the adjacent land, and it is but just that these increments of value should be taxed back to the Treasury and made available for public purposes.

Another contributing factor in the rise of land values has been special privilege in the distribution of public expenditures in the District. There are thickly populated sections of the city where for many years it has been impossible to secure paved streets and good sidewalks. In other sections of the city, where subdivisions are owned by real-estate rings and syndicates, there are miles of asphalted roadbeds and concrete sidewalks with scarcely a house in sight. Charges have been publicly made and have never been successfully refuted that real-estate rings owning large tracts of suburban land have influenced the appropriation of District funds for the construction of costly bridges and other public improvements whereby they have been enabled to sell their land holdings to home builders at enormous profits.

Housing conditions.-In every large city where land values are rising low wages and increasing rentals crowd great numbers of people closer together into insanitary hovels and tenements. Washington has been no exception to this rule. In the report of the committee on social betterment, published in 1908 by the President's Homes Commission, there appears on pages 223 and 224 a sociological study of 1,217 families in this city by Mr. G. A. Weber. Of these families 476 had a family income of less than $500, averaging $351.35 per annum, and from this income the average amount paid for rent was $72.69 per annum, or about $6 per month. Mr. Weber reported that "cases of overcrowding were common, especially among the

colored people, in some instances as many as 8 or 10 people occupying one bedroom at night."

One of the natural results of this overcrowding is an alarmingly high death rate in the alleys. The report of the District health officer for 1910 shows a death rate per 1,000 of 17.56 in the streets and 30.09 in the alleys, and for children under 1 year of 158.66 in the streets and 373.49 in the alleys. Over one-third of the children born in the alleys die before they reach the age of 1 year.

Ever since 1872 public-spirited citizens and organizations have been appealing to Congress for the improvement of local housing conditions, but only a small part of the necessary legislation has been secured. The health and well-being of the city are still menaced by vile alley slums. Congress is preoccupied with national affairs and the people of the District see no hope of relief under the present system of government. The plutocratic interests which now dominate our local affairs are constantly advocating larger appropriations for "the city beautiful." They demand magnificent parks, speedways, and pleasure drives, contributing not only to their own personal enjoyment but to the value of their property. They ignore the fact that the health of the people is of primary importance and that sanitation should take precedence over beautification.

In a matter so vital to their health and welfare the people of this city should be allowed a controlling voice. Other cities in Europe and America are solving their slum problems by taxing land values, by providing cheap transportation, by demolishing slum dwellings, and by building sanitary homes for rental to the people at cost. It is safe to say that if the people of Washington were permitted to own and control their city government they would find ways and means to abolish the slum conditions which are now a disgrace to the National Capital.

Public utilities. In this, as in nearly all American cities, private corporations have been granted exclusive rights to occupy the public streets and to supply the people with lighting, transportation, and telephone service. The people of this city have no voice in determining rates, character of service, or labor conditions. The District Electric Railway Commission, which is a subordinate branch of the National Interstate Commerce Commission, has recently made some praiseworthy efforts to compel the corporations to render better service to the public, but the power of this body is limited; it is not coordinate with the District government and it is beyond the control of the people of the District.

reason

That the residents of this city, who provide nine-tenths of the revenues of our public-utility corporations, are not receiving "a square deal" from them, is evident from the following facts: 1. The rates charged are higher than is necessary to pay able rate of interest on the actual physical value of the public-utility systems. Judging from the experience of other cities, street-railway fares could equitably be reduced to 3 cents, gas to 60 cents per thousand feet, and telephone charges to less than half the present rates.

2. While the corporations pay over to the District government 4 per cent of their gross receipts, as required by law, they are permitted to evade a very large share of their rightful taxes.

For the fiscal year 1911 the Capital Traction Co., for example, paid taxes on real estate at an assessed valuation of $898,081. In this company's report to Congress for the year ending December 31, 1911, the total cost of the road and equipment, including real estate, was reported to be $17,381,032 and the total of its capital stock and funded debt $17,639,500. In this respect Washington fares no worse than other cities which are governed by corrupt political machines in alliance with predatory corporations. Here, as in other cities, tax dodging will continue until the people acquire real political power through the initiative, referendum, and recall.

3. The service rendered is in many cases inadequate, and in other instances involves a positive menace to life. The overcrowding of street cars is one of the most common grievances. To collect full fare from a passenger who is compelled to stand is an arbitrary exercise of power.

Several lives have been lost in this city by the escape of carbonmonoxide gas, a component of the cheap water gas supplied by the Washington gas monopoly. A few years ago the matter was investigated by Congress, but nothing was done to protect the people of this city. It has been stated by a daily newspaper of Washington that the failure to get results was due to the fact that the gas monopoly misrepresented conditions, misled Congress, and created the utterly unjustified impression that a safe gas could only be provided at greatly increased cost." The people of this city should have the power to protect themselves against such dangerous conditions.

4. The residents of the District, from whom these private corporations derive their revenues, should have the power to control the corporations by means of a public-utilities commission, and the commission itself should be under popular control and be officially responsible to the people of the District. The proposed commission should be empowered to make a physical valuation of the publicutility systems, so that the people of the city may no longer be taxed to pay dividends on water securities, and should be empowered to fix such rates and to enforce such standards of service as will secure justice to the people as well as to the corporations.

During the first and second sessions of the Sixty-second Congress no less than three bills were introduced to provide a public-utilities commission for the District of Columbia. All three of these bills failed to be enacted into law. It has been publicly charged by citizens of good standing and reputation that they were defeated through the influence of certain corporate interests, who are planning a gigantic merger of our public-utilities corporations under outside control a merger which would involve the injection into these corporations of still larger quantities of water-on which the people would be required in the future to pay interest and dividends. The very fact that such a merger is contemplated emphasizes the necessity for a public-utilities commission which will protect the rights of the people.

5. The stocks of one of our local corporations have recently been so manipulated as to secure enormous profits for the insiders at the expense of the investing public. It is said on good authority that the sensational advance which recently occurred in the price of this stock was engineered by a group of the directors of the road, who had inside information regarding the proposed merger. Such scandalous

manipulations and "gambling in prices" would be impossible if our local corporations were properly controlled by a public-utilities commission.

Extortionate rates, tax dodging, inadequate service, neglect of public safety, stock watering, stock gambling, and the blocking of necessary legislation-those are some of the charges made against our privately owned corporations. The people of the District will remain powerless to right such wrongs until they regain control over their city government.

Municipal progress.-In other cities, where the people actually rule, progressive measures are being adopted for the benefit of the people, including more suitable systems of taxation, municipal ownership of lighting and transportation systems, the establishment of municipal markets, ice plants, and coal yards. In this city the special interests are so strongly intrenched that plans for municipal betterment are hopeless unless they promise increased profits, rents, and dividends for the privileged few.

From the viewpoint of the general welfare the water power at Great Falls, within a few miles of this city, should be brought under municipal ownership and utilized to lower the cost of lighting our public streets and buildings, and for other purposes, but we fully realize that under present conditions a project of this kind must contend against the combined opposition of our local gas and electric monopolies. The common welfare of the many is sacrified for the special interest of the few.

The people of the District are in accord with the people of the States in their desire that Washington shall become in every respect the model city of the Nation, the city healthful, the city efficient, and the city beautiful. But this ideal can never be realized in any genuine or worthy way except under just economic conditions, which will allow the services, the advantages, and the beauty of the city to be shared and enjoyed by all.

Police protection. Within the past few months the city has been shocked and terrified by several brutal assaults on women. Citizens' associations and other organizations, as well as the chief of police, have been demanding increased police protection. If the question could be submitted to a referendum vote, the people of the city would vote overwhelmingly for larger appropriations for police purposes, even if required to meet the increased expense by heavier taxes on District property. But the people of the city have no control over congressional legislation, and they are helpless until Congress sees fit to take action. Under a modern and democratic system of municipal government, the people of the city would be free to adopt without delay such measures as were felt to be necessary for public safety and security.

Efficiency and apathy. With few exceptions, our District officials are honest and efficient. Some of them are men of exceptional ability. But they are not in close touch with the people and they are not always responsive to popular sentiment. Our system of local government lacks the spirit and soul of democracy. The people, knowing that their city government is beyond their control, naturally take but little interest in its operations. Autocracy and bureaucracy have produced their natural result in civic apathy, indifference, and inertia.