The Seattle Republican. [volume], June 09, 1905, Image 1

About The Seattle Republican. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1???-1915

Image provided by: Washington State Library; Olympia, WA

                
SEATTLE REPUBLICAN
VOL. XII. NO. 2
POPULISM AND SOCIALISM.— If it is Populism and Socialism
to indorse the act of March 17, 1897, passed by the Populist legislature,
then the Republican legislature of 1905 went the full length when it
re-enacted the first section of the act of March 17, 1897, with addi
tional powers, which act was approved on March 11, 1905, and is now
in force. The Republicans are now estopped to claim that providing
for the condemnation, purchase, construction, ownership and opera
tion of street railways is not Republican doctrine; Laws 1905, Chap.
159, House Bill No. 276.
CHEAP STREET CAR FARES.— HuII, England, under municipal
ownership, has a 2-cent fare on all lines for all distances, and made a
net profit, during the year 1903, of $122,000. Cologne, Germany, in
1898, had a clear profit of $244,600, and as the profits have increased
regularly, it is hoped that in 1914 they will amount to $566,400. There
is a charge for yearly tickets on all lines of $28.56; monthly tickets
good on all lines, $2.38. Liverpool, England, fares reduced 50 per cent,
wages increased 10 to 15 cents per day. Glasgow, Scotland, fares re
duced 50 per cent, wages increased 25 per cent. Leeds, England, fares
reduced 62 per cent, wages raised 5% cents per hour for conductors.
Sheffield, England, fares reduced 50 per cent, wages increased 8 cents
per hour. Hull, England, fares reduced 50 per cent, wages increased
15 per cent to 50 per cent. Salford, England, fares reduced 25 per
cent to 30 per cent, wages increased 30 per cent. Aberdeen, Scotland,
fares considerably reduced, wages increased $1 per week. Cardiff,
Wales, fares reduced 50 per cent. Dundee, Scotland, fares reduced
50 per cent, wages increased 50 per cent. In the cities above named
the fares range from 1.7 cents to 3 cents; none more than 3 cents.
GREAT BRITAIN. Ninety-nine municipalities own their own
street railways; 240 own their own gas works; 931 their water works;
181 their electric light works.
SWITZERLAND.— NearIy all of the telephone systems are owned
by the municipalities. In Germany, Wurtemberg Bavaria, Bulgaria,
and some of the Australian states, all telephones are owned by the pub
lic. In Norway and Sweden most of the telephone systems are owned
by the municipalities. Holland, Amsterdam and Rotterdam secured
franchises for municipal plants. In France the telephones are owned
by the government. In Denmark telephones owned by the govern
ment. In Trondhjem, Norway, the average rental of the telephone is
$13.25 per phone per year; subscribers speak to eleven towns within a
radius of 50 miles for five minutes for 5 cents; Stockholm, $20 per
phone, communication within a radius of 43 miles; Duchy of Luxem
burg, 44x30, uniform yearly charge $16 per phone, and each subscriber
can talk all over the duchy; Switzerland, $8 per phone, plus 1 cent for
each call; Zurich and other cities, $15 per phone per year; Sweden, the
average rate is $10 per phone per year. If in the countries mentioned
telephones can be furnished so cheaply, why is it that we are required
to pay $6 for an ordinary office phone and such high rates on communi
cating on long distance phones? Why allow the telephone companies
to take from this city $500,000 pear year and send it east when we
need the money here just the same as we need the blood in the body
to sustain life !
WATER WORKS. —Nine towns in State of Illinois own their own
water works and furnish water to the citizens from $4 to $6 per year
to the family, while in Seattle the cost, under the present management,
is $15 per year. Yet there is no reason why water cannot be furnished
cheaper in Seattle than in any other city in the world.
ELECTRIC LIGHT.— In 18 cities of the United States owning
their own electric light plants, the arc lights have been reduced 50 per
cent, so that the arc light that in Chicago cost from $105 to $125 per
year, only costs on an average of $50 per year. Seattle can multiply
the power of its electric light plant over and over again as it comes
down tin' Cascade Mountains. The power is unlimited and inexhaust
ible, and can lie furnished cheaper than in any other city in the world.
GAS. Under private ownership, gas is furnished to the people of
Seattle at .+1 per thousand feet, hut in all the municipalities owning
their own gas works, in this and foreign countries, gas is furnished on
an average of 50 cents per thousand feet.
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON, FRIDAY, JUNE 9, 1905
MUNICIPAL OWNERSHIP THE SLOGAN
MORTGAGE. —In municipal ownership, the whole city is not
mortgaged; the taxes are not increased; but the franchises of the
works are mortgaged, and the operating expenses and payment for the
franchises are all paid out of the income from the franchises. In pur
chasing the street car system and the telephone systems, there will
be no mortgage and no increase of taxes upon the city generally; but
the street car franchises will be mortgaged and the telephone fran
chises mortgaged to pay the expenses and purchase price; when paid,
the profits will belong to the city. It will save to this city per year,
at the present rate, more than $2,000,000, and in the near future, per
haps double that sum, all of which will remain in Seattle and.furnish
the money to carry on business and build up the city and surrounding
country. But if the blood is taken from Seattle at the rate of two or
three million dollars per year and shipped away, it will keep us in an
exhausted condition.
WILL ENCOMPASS THE WORLD.- The people of the world
are becoming enthusiastic for municipal ownership of public utilities.
Denver, Colorado, has a red-hot fight on hand now in favor of municipal
ownership of street railways. Chicago has voted in favor of owning
its own transportation system, and the private owner of street car
lines has seen the handwriting on the wall and has offered to sell out
cheap to the city, as no more franchises can be secured by it or them.
In Ontario, the city of St. Thomas owns and operates its own street
railway within its corporate limits. In Canada, Toronto, Ottawa,
Hamilton, West Mount, Montreal, Calgary and Kingston are all agitat
ing the municipal ownership of public utilities, and within the next
few years, all of the cities of Canada will have municipal ownership
of public utilities.
SEATTLE.— SeattIe cannot afford to allow private corporations
to fatten off of the profits made in the private ownership of the public
utilities. If the street car system and the telephone systems can take
from the pockets of the peolpe, as profits, at this time, near $2,000,000,
then when the city has a population of 1,000,000 inhabitants, they will
take five times that sum. You may talk about your Lake Washington
canal and your Alaska gold, but when it comes to taking from the
people the enormous sums of money that is now being- taken and will
be taken and shipped east, it is perfectly astonishing. The only salva
tion or this city is to immediately purchase, condemn or build street
car lines, and furnish to the people transportation, telephone service,
water and light at the least possible cost. This city cannot stand back
when all the civilized world has realized the necessty of municipal
ownership. There is no argument in saying to put it off to some other
time. Now is the time. The longer it is put off, the more it will cost
the people to get it back. The people now have given away their fran
chises, and it will cost them a large sum of money to get them back.
If managed rightly, the public utilities can be owned by the city, and
the Lake Washington canal can be built by the people of this city, and
all of them be paid for within the next ten years for less than the net
profits made by the private ownership of public utilities.
Why pay tribute and great profits to foreigners when we need
the money at home? If this city and county increases in population
as we expect it will increase within the next thirty years, the private
owners of public utilities, if allowed to hold them during that time,
will take in net profits from this city not less than #100,000,000. It
staggers us to think of #300,000,000 being expended in building the
Panama Canal, yet, in the next thirty years, at the present rate of
profit being gathered in by the private owners of the public utilities,
we will have given away one-third enough money with which to con
struct the Panama Canal. It is no wonder that the people of other
(•(Minifies find other cities have become alarmed ;ii thf greed and avar
ice of private corporations and have resolved to own the public utili
ties. Did you ever think that the saving of $100 per year
I'di- each family lor thirty years would mean, with fi per
cent compound interest, more than $5,000? You owe it to your chil
dren and your children's children to save for them the enormous leak
thai is now going on. You will meet with opposition, Private cor
porations will have strikers, clackers, hired servants, rustlers and
PRICE FIVE CENTS