City government in the United States

Front matter

ote ees

See eer eae Se

The American State Series

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I INTRODUCTORY: THE CrtTy as A SocraL Fact 3 Meanings of the Term ‘‘City”’. . cinOnc Aecemocwa 3 Cities Formerly not SelPpecpsuuating rex Sudoytio ane roma” x! Cause of Recent Increase of Urban Population: ah rea se RO aETS 7 Causes of Cities 5 Ba Patch erin... cp Ps ek ae oer eS Character of Urban Population! Gand MAME. soap Boe s Cake aa 2 Improvement of Urban Conditions . ........... 19

11 THE CITY AS AN ORGAN OF GOVERNMENT. ... . . 22 Political Position of @ltaes: 2 i. sus ko vey sce es sees eee te FD City Subordinated to the State. . . . 2... 1. 2. ss « « «© 2 Municipal Home Raley. sss 9s) ue 6) ie hice a) eee ae fe EO MEVMIOINaAseanetlONs a ih wh tc Wessel tind ech) he, Seboe i, Boa eT OO Present CositionioLOitesio sy se-cla ie ao dee elcley Vei bande even AOD mi THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE CITY IN THE UNITED

Preface

In two little books entitled ‘‘Municipal Home Rule’’ and ‘‘Municipal Problems,’’ published respectively in 1895 and 1898, the author of the following pages attempted, in some cases, somewhat exhaustively, the treatment of what appeared to him to be the most important problems connected with the study of city government as they presented themselves in the United States. The method of treating these questions, on the one hand, did not involve a systematic exposition of the subject, but, on the other hand, did involve a comparison of American institutions with those of some of the more important European countries.

In the book now presented to the public the author’s intention has been to confine himself almost exclusively to a study of American conditions and at the same time to broaden the scope of the inquiry so as to embrace the entire field of city government so far as that is regarded from the viewpoint of organization and structure. No attempt has been made to describe the methods adopted by different American cities in the discharge of their functions of government nor to comment upon the success or

ix

PREFACE failure of such cities in the attempts which they have made.

The accomplishment of the author’s purpose has naturally involved a treatment of some of the subjects treated in the books to which allusion has been made. Indeed, in some cases the same language has been employed. Such repetition was possible owing to the eourtesy of the Columbia University Press, which has kindly permitted the author to borrow from his former works published by them what he saw fit.

The author desires in closing this preface to extend his thanks to his many friends who have aided him in his work, and particularly to Professor Leo S. Rowe of the University of Pennsylvania, and Professor W. W. Willoughby of Johns Hopkins University, who have both read his book either in manuscript or in proof, and to both of whom he is indebted for many valuable suggestions.

FRANK J. GoopNow.

CoLuMBIA UNIVERSITY, July 30, 1904.

Chapter I Introductory: The City As A Social Fact?

Meanings of the Term “City.” The term ‘‘city’’ has two meanings: the one sociological, the other legal or political. When we speak of the city in the first sense we refer to it as an aggregation of people living within a comparatively small area. When we use the term in its legal or political meaning we have reference to the fact that the city constitutes a political unity—that it has specific political duties to perform, and for that purpose is endowed by the state with more or less definite legal powers. The peculiar social conditions produced by urban life, to a very considerable degree, determine the form of the political organization of the city and the extent of its powers, and also exert a profound influence upon the manner in which its government is administered and its powers exercised. While, therefore, in the following pages we

1 Authorities: Giddings, “Principles of Sociology;” Weber, “The Growth of Cities in the Nineteenth Century ;” Columbia

University Studies in History, Economies, and Public Law, Vol. XI; Abstract of the 12th Census of the United States.

shall consider the city mainly from the legal point of view, it will be well for us first to direct our attention to some of the more important consequences flowing from its existence as a social fact.

From the sociological point of view, the city belongs to that class of phenomena known as aggregations of individuals. These aggregations may be classified as internally recruited aggregations and externally recruited aggregations.t Internally recruited aggregations are characterized by the fact that they are due to blood-relationship ; externally recruited aggregations by the fact that they are aggregations of strangers drawn together by some cause other than the attractions of blood-relationship.

Cities Formerly not Self-perpetuating. If we attempt to give the city a place within this classification, we must say that until very recent times the city has been an externally, rather than an internally, reeruited aggregation. This has been due to the fact that the sanitary and other conditions which affect the production and continuation of human life have been such in cities that, from the point of view of population, cities have not been even self-sustaining. That is, their birth-rate has been less than their death-rate, so that, had it not been for the immigration into cities from the rural districts, the city populations would soon have been depleted.”

1Giddings, in his “Principles of Sociology,” p. 93, makes the same distinction under the terms ‘genetic aggregations” and “congregations.”

2 See Weber, “ The Growth of Cities in the Nineteenth Century.” On p. 231 Dr. Weber says: “The most conclusive evidence of a

What was true of the centuries preceding the nineteenth century is still true of the cities of many countries at the present time. Dr. Weber, whose excellent work on ‘‘The Growth of Cities in the Nineteenth Century’’ has already been referred to, sums up his conclusions on this point as follows: ‘‘ In France the cities do not sustain themselves, nor do many of the Italian cities. In Germany, Sweden, Austria, Hungary, ete., the cities furnish from one fourth to one half of their increase according to size. But in Great Britain immigration has so diminished that even the largest cities provide three fourths and often more of their increase. In the United States, where the cities now show a larger natural increase than do the rural districts, there is still a vast immigration,—four or five times as large as the natural increase.’’? That cities large migration from the fields to the towns, however, is afforded by the bills of mortality begun in several cities in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. These death reports formed the first material of the new science of demography or population statistics, at first known as ‘ Political Arithmetic.’ Now these early bills of mortality almost uniformly show more deaths than births each year, the natural result of which would be the decadence of the city. But on the contrary, the city grew; its population even inereased more rapidly than the rural population. The simple explanation of such a state of affairs was a large emigration from rural districts to the city. And this was the conclusion of Captain John Graunt, the founder of the new science. He estimated the annual immigration to London to be 6000 persons. While this number is purely conjectural, it raises a very strong presumption that migration to the metropolis was relatively greater 250 years ago than it is to-day. For, between 1871 and 1881, with a population of nine or ten times as large as in 1650, London’s net immigration amounted to less than 11,000 per annum.” 1 Tbid., p. 246.

during the past two centuries have not only held their own, but have in many instances increased in the number of their inhabitants, is particularly true of the nineteenth century. Finally, it is to be noticed that the population in cities increased more rapidly in the latter part than in the early part of the nineteenth century.’

Several conclusions at once suggest themselves on the consideration of these facts. The first, naturally, is the vast and rapidly increasing importance of city

1Thus in 1801 in England and Wales the percentage of the population residing in cities of over 100,000 was 9.73; in cities of over 10,000, 21.30. The percentages for the year 1890 were respectively 31.82 and 61.73. In Prussia in 1816 those in cities of over 100,000 constituted 1.8 per cent., in 1900 12.9 per cent. of the population, while those in the cities of 10,000 and over constituted in 1816 7.25 per cent., in 1890 30 per cent. of the population. What is true of England and Prussia is also true of France. There in 1801 2.8 per cent. and in 1891 12 per cent. of the population lived in cities of 100,000 and over. In the former year 9.5 per cent., in the latter year 25.9 per cent. of the population lived in cities of 10,000 and over. In the United States there was in 1800 no city of 100,000 inhabitants. In 1890 15.5 per cent. of the population lived in cities of that size. In 1800 3.8 per cent., in 1890 27.6 per cent. of the population of the United States lived in cities of 10,000 and over. Jbid., p. 144, where will be found an elaborate table covering most of the countries of the world.

2 Thus in England and Wales, while the percentage of the population in cities of 10,000 and over increased in the period from 1801 to 1851 from 21.3 to 39.45, during the period from 1851 to 1891 this percentage increased from 39.45 to 61.73. In Prussia the corresponding percentages were: in 1816, 7.25; in 1849, 10.63; and in 1890, 30; in France in 1801, 9.5; in 1851, 14.4; in 1891, 25.9; in the United States in 1800, 3.8; in 1850, 12; in 1890, 27.6.

life. The problems, political and otherwise, which city life involves are really problems which hardly existed prior to the beginning of the nineteenth century. The second is that some causes must have been at work in the latter half of the nineteenth century not at work before, which have caused the enormous increase in city population. This increase is too rapid to be due to the same causes to which the increase prior to the beginning of the nineteenth century was due.

Cause of Recent Increase of Urban Population. The first suggestion which is usually made as to the cause of this rapid increase in urban population is an increased immigration to the cities from the rural districts. This is not, however, believed to be the cause. For, as has been shown, immigration into cities was as characteristic of past centuries as of the nineteenth, and indeed in countries like Great Britain, apparently is decreasing at the present time. The real reason for the increase is to be found in the improvement of sanitary conditions which has taken place within the cities during the whole of the nineteenth century, and is going on with increasing rapidity at the present time. This is the conclusion reached by Dr. Weber, who says: ‘‘The manner in which the modern growth of cities has taken place is rather a larger natural inerease in the city populations themselves (lower death-rate!) than an increase in immigration from rural districts; the current of migration cityward has been observed for several centuries, but it is only in the nineteenth century that any considerable number of u cities have had a regular surplus of births over deaths.’’ 1

What significance to us now does this change in the cause of the increase of urban population have? It is that cities are somewhat changing their character, and are being recruited from within instead of from without. This change in the sociological character of cities must have an important result on their political organization. For capacity for local self-government is due in large part to the existence of neighborhood feeling and friendly relationships which arise from inherited traditions. The population which existed in large cities, prior to 1800, was certainly not of the kind in which we should expect a form of government based on this neighborhood feeling and these friendly relationships to be highly developed. In so far, however, as external is giving place to internal aggregation, we may expect that this neighborhood feeling and these friendly relations will have a greater opportunity for development. It may well be that the greater interest in municipal problems and the improvement of municipal government by which the latter part of the nineteenth century was characterized, were, in large part, due to the difference in the character of the city population which has resulted from the substitution of internal for external aggregation as the method of increasing the city population. It is certainly significant that the cities of both England and Germany, which show the effect of this movement more than do those of any other country, made such marked improvement in their government during the nineteenth century.

Causes of Cities. But whatever may have been or may be the character of cities, whether as aggregations they are recruited from within or from without, the mere presence of the aggregation demands explanation. What now are the causes which either bring about the congregation of people in a city or permit the increase of its population? It may be said, in the first place, that the cause must be a permanent one. Mere temporary congregations of people will not result in the establishment of a city of any permanence. Thus that kind of immigration which is due, for example, to the discovery of an oil-well or a mine, will not result in the formation of permanent municipalities, unless the oil-well continues permanently to flow, or unless there be an almost inexhaustible supply of ore, or unless other conditions are present which make for permanence in settlement.

The only conditions where these permanent congregations of people are possible are those which both permit and require a great division of labor. No city can exist in a country where a considerable proportion of the population cannot live without direct recourse to agriculture. A considerable urban population is possible only in two eases: first, where the cities themselves are situated in a country of great fertility upon which they may rely; or, second, where the means of transportation are so highly developed that the cities may obtain with reasonable cheapness their food supply from a distance. In former times, when transportation was difficult, both because of its undeveloped character and because of the dangers of war, cities could develop only under the first conditions mentioned. In modern times, however, it is possible for conditions to exist, such as we have seen exist in England and Wales, where much more than 50 per cent. of the inhabitants of the country live in cities of ten thousand and over.

Cities are then possible only when men may live from other pursuits than agriculture; only when from the agricultural point of view there is a large surplus population. What now are the reasons which cause this surplus population to settle in any particular spot? In other words, what are the reasons why cities are located in the places in which we find them? These reasons are three in number. They are: first, commercial; second, industrial; and third, political. Facilities for transportation are not merely some of the most important causes of the development of cities generally ; they are as well the causes why cities grow up and flourish in particular places. It is to secure such facilities that cities are founded at some place on the ocean, or other great body of water, where there is a favorable situation for the receipt and shipment of merchandise. The mere shipment and receipt of such merchandise offer employment to many people. But further, the business subsidiary to commerce, such as banking, insurance, ete., aids in attracting to such commercial centers those who are looking for work.

In the second place, the use of machinery has been and now is of the greatest impcrtance in attracting an urban population. For this reason all places which are favorably situated for the development of the power necessary to drive machinery tend to become centers of population.

So far as transportation facilities or means of power are removed from a state of nature, so far of course do the natural advantages cease to attract population. Thus, so far as transportation is conducted more advantageously by rail than by water, so far do the natural advantages of the seaport or the river town as a center of population diminish. Again, so far as steam replaces water-power to that extent does the neighborhood of a waterfall cease to be chosen as a town site. At the same time ic is well to remember that natural conditions are apt always to exercise an important influence on urban population. For railways are built only where the topography of the country will permit, and the development of steam-power is possible only where coal can be conveniently obtained.

Finally it must be admitted that cities which are unfavorably situated for either commerce or industry still have been founded and continue to flourish. At the time of their origin they may have been so situated as to be able to share in the existing commerce and industry. Later on new commercial and industrial conditions may have sprung up to which they could not accommodate themselves. Yet other causes may have enabled them to overcome their disadvantages. This is particularly true of political centers which may continue to exist and increase in population, although situated unfavorably from the point of view of existing industrial and commercial conditions. Indeed if we look at the political capitals of the world, which, with very few exceptions, are not naturally favorably situated for trade or manufacture, we cannot but feel that the political causes of urban growth are of the greatest importance. In the case of one city, namely Washington, the political causes seem to have been the only causes for the urban development. Washington has practically no trade, absolutely no manufactures, and yet is continually growing in population.

From what has been said it will be seen that the saying of Cowper that ‘‘God made the country, and man made the town,’’ is probably true in a sense which he did not intend; that is, the location of cities is due very largely to what we may eall artificial causes. This is particularly true since the development of the modern business of transportation by means of canals, highways, and railways. It is still, of course, the ease that cities situated on large bodies of water, such for example as the oceans or bodies like the Great Lakes, have natural advantages which cannot be overcome by anything that man can do. But apart from such cities it may safely be said that the reasons for urban growth are often to be found in the favorable situation of given areas for transacting the commercial business of a given period. This favorable position may be due not to natural but to artificial causes. Cities which, at one time, were favorably situated from this point of view lose the advantages of their situation, owing, either to the discovery of methods of natural transportation which were at one time unknown, or to some change in the method of transportation which has been due solely to the work of man. This fact accounts largely for the rise and fall of those great cities of antiquity, whose situation we now know only from the presence of the ruins of their most important buildings. This fact again accounts for the greater degree of prosperity which existing cities have had at different times in their history. Palmyra, at one time the center of the trade between the Orient and the Roman Empire, now offers to the view of the adventurous traveler merely a few ruins in the midst of a sandy waste. Venice, at one time the mistress of the Mediterranean and the commercial eenter of Europe, became, with the discovery of the all-water route to India, a city of only secondary importance. Genoa, whose history resembles that of Venice, is, since the completion of the Suez Canal, becoming again a city of commercial importance.

Character of Urban Population. The nature of the motives which bring about an aggregation of population cannot fail to have an important effect upon the character of the population. Making their living, as they do, from commercial, industrial, and, so to speak, political occupations, the inhabitants of cities ean hardly fail to be molded in their character and intellectual qualities by the influences of commerce, industry, and politics. Now it must be admitted that while commerce and industry tend to develop intelligence, it may well be, as compared with the occupations of rural life, they do not develop that character 13 which lies at the basis of good government. The larger part of the population of cities may become very expert in some detailed line of work, but it may well be doubted whether such expertness is accompanied by that breadth of view which is apt to be developed in a man whose daily task embraces more varied experiences. Furthermore, the division of labor which lies at the basis of city life, it would seem, tends to develop in the city inhabitant an inability to take care of himself. If disorder occurs in a city it is to be put down by a professional police force; if a fire breaks out it is to be extinguished, again, by a professional fire service; if contagious disease appears it is to be dealt with, again, by a professional health department. In a word, city life not only encourages narrowness of views, but also favors the development of habits of submission to government. It tends to make good subjects rather than good governors. Property appears to be much more unequally distributed in the urban than in the rural communities. This is certainly true in the United States. The census of 1900 shows that 64.4 per cent. of the farm families own their own homes, while only 35.6 per cent. hire their homes. In the ease of families other than farm families, the figures are almost reversed. Only 36.3 per cent. of such families own their homes, while 63.7 per cent. of such families hire their homes.”

*See Hobson, ‘‘The Evolution of Modern Capitalism,’’ pp. 338-339, quoted by Weber, op. cit., p. 399.

*In the largest cities the percentage of persons owning their own homes is almost incredibly small. Thus in New York only 12.1 per cent. of the families resident in the city own their

The degree to which family life is affected by the conditions existing in cities is seen from the tables of the census of 1900 relative to dwellings and families. The average number of persons to a dwelling in the United States as a whole is 5.3. In cities of 25,000 inhabitants and over, the average is 6.8. In the city of homes, the balance of 87.9 per cent. being renters. In the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx only 5.9 per cent. own their homes, and less than half of this number, namely 2.3 per cent., own their homes free and clear of mortgage. The percentages of the families owning their homes in some of the other large cities in the United States are as follows:

The city in the United States having over 25,000 inhabitants which has the highest percentage of home-owning families is Akron, Ohio, with a population of about 43,000. Here 53.7 per cent. of the families own their homes. The city of over ~ 25,000 inhabitants having the lowest percentage of home-owning families is Hoboken, N. J., with a population of 60,000. Here 9.6 per cent. of the families own their homes.

New York it is 13.7, while in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx it is 20.4.*

It is difficult to reach any very definite conclusions as to the effect on the political capacity of the population of cities of this greater inequality in the distribution of property which is to be found in cities or as to the degree to which family life is permitted by the conditions obtaining within cities. As to the latter point it will be noticed in the figures given that in quite a number of instances the number of persons to a dwelling is very little, if any, greater in even some of the larger cities than it is throughout the country as a whole. As to the former point, it is rather interesting to note that in some of the cities— for example, Chicago, St. Louis, and Philadelphia— whose governments are not unusually regarded as of the best, the percentage of home-owning families is a comparatively large one.

Formerly it was believed by many that city life had a bad influence, not merely on social and political character, if we may speak of it in that way, but as well on individual character, both from the physieal and the moral point of view. It is doubtful, however, if there is anything in city life which inherently and inevitably conduces to physical or moral degeneracy. So far as the former is concerned it may be pointed

*The average number of persons to a dwelling in the other large cities of the United States is: Baltimore, 5.7; Boston, 8.4; Buffalo, 7.1; Chicago, 8.8; Cincinnati, 8; Cleveland, 6; Detroit 5.55 fndlabiipalis: 4.7; Milwaukee, 6.2; Misneaote 6.4; New Onleans 5.4; Philadelphia, 5.4; Pittsburg, 6.3; San Francisco, 6.4; St. pate de out ‘‘that the believers in town degeneracy base their arguments on antiquated statistics. There can be no doubt that down to very recent times the health of urbanites compared unfavorably with that of men who worked in the open air, just as their death-rates did. But in the last quarter century the evidence in both cases has changed. In 1874 a French authority declared that fitness for army service depends less on the density of population than on wealth, climate, daily life. Health and vigor may always be preserved if men in cities will make proper provision for openair exercise, cleanliness, and a pure food supply.’’! It is, however, true that the death-rate of cities is still higher than that of the rural districts. The last census of the United States shows that the death-rate of the rural districts, of which statistics were obtained, was 15.4; that of the urban districts, 18.6 per thousand.?

1 Weber, op. cit., p. 395. Dr. Weber gives, in a note, certain statistics taken from the three densest departments of France, comparing them with the three least dense. In these statistics it is shown that the number of men who had to be examined to secure one thousand soldiers was less in the former than in the latter.

2The city in the United States recorded in the census as having the highest death-rate is Natchez, Miss., which, with a population of a little over 12,000, has a death-rate of 39.7 per thousand. The city having the lowest death-rate is St. Joseph, Mo., which, with a population of nearly 103,000, has a death-rate of 9.1 per thousand. Most of the Southern cities of the United States have a high death-rate, which is largely due to the great mortality among the colored population. The lowest death-rates are found in the cities of the Northwest, which contain a large population of young people.

2 17

Tails, OA ed Ss ee Oa ea

So far as concerns moral degeneracy, all that can be said is that city life conduces to certain forms of vice and crime while country life seems to favor the development of other forms.’

Our review of the intellectual and moral qualities which seem to be especially favored by city life would seem to force the conclusion that city life with its lack of neighborhood feeling and of inherited traditions, its intellectual narrowness, its habits of submission to government, and the great inequality in the distribution of wealth, is, notwithstanding the possibility of reasonably healthy and moral conditions, on the whole not favorable to the development of good government.

While the social qualities developed by city life are not thus those which favor the development of good government, the kind of government which must be carried on by cities is of the most complex and diffieult type.” It is small wonder then that city goyernments fall far short of what is demanded of them. It is not surprising that city government is on the whole the worst kind of democratie government.

For a long time many thinking people have been conscious of the failure of city government, and of the demoralizing influences on character of city life. This was one of the contentions of Thomas Jefferson, who regarded the development of cities in this country as presenting one of the most serious obstacles possible to good government, and particularly to good democratie government. The consciousness of these influ-

* Weber, op. cit., p. 399 et seq. ?See infra, p. 114.

ences had for its effect the development of a distinctly pessimistic view of the situation. It was then decided that cities were distinctly and inherently bad, but with the nineteenth century a somewhat more hopeful view has come to be entertained.

Improvement of Urban Conditions. Attention has already been called to the improvement which has been made in the sanitary conditions of cities. This improvement is so marked that a city need no longer be regarded as a devouring monster for whose existence the rural population is sacrificed. But it is not alone the sanitary conditions of cities that have been improved. A similar improvement may be noticed in the intellectual and moral conditions. At any rate it cannot be questioned that serious attempts are being made to bring about an improvement in these conditions. These attempts are being made both by city governments and by private voluntary effort on the part of city dwellers. City governments have very generally, during the nineteenth century, and particularly during the latter half of that century, been spending vast sums of money in order to offer to their citizens greater opportunities for intellectual development and mental and physical recreation. The welldeveloped school systems, the great public libraries, the lecture courses, public concerts, botanical and other gardens, the means of recreation offered in the universally present public parks and playgrounds are all evidences of the change from the feeling of hopelessness with regard to the future of cities which was characteristic of the early part of the nineteenth century. 19