CHECKING THE TENEMENT
INVASION IN NEW YORK CITY

For many years New York City has been the great, compelling example of how to build a city wrong, and its misdeeds have been faithfully imitated by cities, towns, and villages from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Because Broadway is too narrow for trees, villages on Long Island and towns in Michigan have chopped down the trees that made their business streets presentable. Because New York permitted sky-scrapers to turn the narrow streets of its financial district into canyons, every ambitious city in the country refuses to be content until it too has sky-scrapers. cause New York packs a large proportion of its people into tenement and apartment houses, the socially elect of prairie towns be-lieve that to live in a multiple dwelling, especially if it boasts an elevator and a darky in brass buttons, is a patent to distinction. For, above all things and at no matter what cost, we Americans must be metropolitan.

Be

Occasionally New York returns the compliment and adopts something that another city has originated, thanks to those citizens who are able to do their own thinking. Some years after Cleveland had proved the value of a high-pressure water. system for fire-fighting New York took it over, and is now considering a still further extension of this conflagration preventive. After Chicago had proved the practicability of steel-frame construction New York took it up and is still piling story on story, while Chicago, the originator, has for years been limiting by law the size of its Frankenstein monsters. Later a few of the progressive cities began to district themselves in order to protect their residence sections. Now New York has this also under consideration.

If New York really carries to a definite conclusion the preliminary recommendations of its first Commission on the Heights of Buildings, and so makes them fashionable, it will go a long way toward undoing the harm it has done in the past to American civic planning. The report of this Commission shows in no uncertain language how the crowding of tall buildings has injured the community, injured life and health, depreciated property values, handicapped business, increased costs, and put unnecessary burdens on the taxpayers. In conclusion, it makes recommendations de

signed to save the outlying sections of the city from ever developing the evils with which the older sections are permanently afflicted. That is, it wishes to keep the unspoiled parts of the metropolis as much as possible like the smaller cities which, in spite of all their strivings, have as yet been unable to make themselves as bad as New York.

PLANNING

FOR THE FUTURE

The city dwelling-house that is to approximate the ideal must be near the ground, so that the members of the family, especially the children, may be out of doors without being out of touch with the home. The tall tenements of Manhattan, whose inhabitants must either stay within the narrow limits of their little rooms or else lose themselves in the crowded streets, are the antithesis of suitable dwellings for families. In the past the community has been powerless to prevent the erection of such barracks even on its farthermost edges. One law has applied to every section of the city, the packed East Side and the sparsely settled outskirts of Queens Borough. And as a result of this lack of power to control the housing situation rows of tall tenements are invading open fields miles away from the City Hall. The Borough of the Bronx, which a few years ago was open country, is now almost as solidly filled with six-story tenements as are the newer sections of Manhattan; Brownsville, in Brooklyn, is duplicating all that has been deprecated on Hester and Rivington Streets. This invasion of the tenement is graphically shown by illustrations in this week's picture section.

The proposals of its first Heights of Buildings Commission offered New York the hope that this devastating march might be stopped and the yet unspoiled sections of the city saved for individual homes. These proposals have been made the basis of a law enacted by the Legislature at its recent session-a law which will doubtless have to stand a test as to its constitutionality in the courts-giving the Board of Estimate and Apportionment of New York City the required power to carry them into effect.

The Board of Estimate and Apportionment has now delegated the duty of determining how this power can best be exercised to a second City Planning Commission. This Commission has a twofold work before it to devise a method of restricting the height of buildings,

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taken pains to let no moths loose where their liberation could possibly add to the natural damage of the pest, believes that with the better knowledge of the habits of the insect to be gained from this experiment it will be possible more completely to control the spread of the nuisance in the future. However, it is worth while knowing now that a mixture of one pound of paris green, fifty pounds of wheat bran, and the juice of half a dozen oranges mixed to a stiff dough and spread about an infested field is very efficacious in destroying the worms which hatch from the eggs of the moths. Clean cultivation, the rotation of crops, the cleaning up of fence corners, and the burning over of waste grass land in the spring or fall serve to prevent a recurrence of the army-worm. Against immediate invasion from uncared-for pasture lands farmers have at times been forced to guard their cultivated fields by actual intrenchments. A furrow is made with a plow. between the plot to be protected and the line of attack. Into this furrow the army-worms fall as did the cavalry at the sunken road of Waterloo, and may then be crushed to death or burned up with kerosene according to taste.

BIRTH RATES, WAR, AND

CIVILIZATION

The Berlin correspondent of the "Medical Record" tells us that before war furnished an all-engrossing topic of conversation for Germans there were few subjects discussed with as much interest in the Fatherland as the recent rapid diminution in the birth rate. At a meeting of the German Public Health Society a few weeks before the beginning of hostilities Krohne, who is an authority on such matters, pointed out that since 1876, when a high-water birth rate of 40.9 per thousand was reached, there had been a steady decline to 28.2 per thousand in 1912. In the cities and among the laboring classes, as well as in the country districts and among the higher classes, the number of births had decreased. Since there had been no falling off in the marriage rate and no increase in venereal disease, the conclusion was that the diminution had been the result of deliberate intention on the part of individuals because of the increasing expense of bringing up children and because of the fact that the child becomes productive much later now than formerly.

In some American medical circles the

opinion has been put forward that the diminishing birth rate was a potent factor in deciding the Kaiser to strike now rather than a few years later. However this may be,

it is certain that the immediate effect of the war will be to make the birth rates of the warring countries lower than ever. History shows that when a country goes to war, its birth rate drops off almost immediately and does not return to normal for several years after peace is established.

Germany, however, is not the only country in which parenthood has become scarcer recently the same tendency to some extent is found in every civilized country. In the large cities this tendency is particularly marked-in fact, New York is almost the only large city in which there are more babies born to every thousand persons now than there were thirty years ago. The following table, with the approximate birth rates of New York, London, Berlin, Paris, and Brussels in 1880 and in 1912, is interesting:

Among the many difficulties which face the establishment of popular government in China is the absence of a common language and of means of rapid and complete communication of news. There are probably hundreds of thousands of Chinese who do not yet know that the Manchu dynasty has fallen. The report in the New York "Tribune" of an official of the Chinese postal service recently in this country is therefore very significant.

After calling attention to the fact, known to every one who knows anything about China, that the people are supremely interested in work and that as long as they can work under proper conditions they care nothing about politics, and that they want to be let alone, to be at peace among themselves and with the whole world, this official said that

ten years ago the postal service of China, organized as a part of the customs service under that very able administrator Sir Robert Hart, handled about ten million pieces of small mail per annum; at present it handles about six hundred million pieces. It is international in scope; its officials represent eight or ten different nations; wherever railways go the mails are carried by trains, but many thousand miles are covered by couriers on foot or horseback, or by any other means of conveyance. In many places the service is not only up to the standard of service in American cities, but is superior to it. In the city of Peking there are twelve deliveries a day. Letters are carried everywhere within the country for one cent. The parcels post and money order systems are in successful operation all over China. The special delivery letter service is especially efficient. Mail marked " express letter service" is placed in special bags as soon as it is deposited. These bags often contain only two or three letters. They are taken out by couriers in waiting, who, mounted on bicycles, go at full speed to the address, deliver the letter, and wait to receive an answer. This service is confined to large towns, and the cost of sending such a letter is five cents.

It will be a long time, despite the progress made, before the great mass of people who speak the various dialects get into close communication with one another and the mind of the vast population of the republic is accessible to ideas and responsive to them.

A NEW USE FOR TRIAL BY JOINT BOARD"

"the

Whether or not government is by consent of the governed" is the acid test for democracy among peoples. The more "consent there is on the part of employees in relations between employer and employed, the less of autocracy there is in that relation also; and, generally speaking, the more efficient will be the service rendered. Mr. Marcus M. Marks, President of the Borough of Manhattan in the City of New York, has recently inaugurated in the government of that borough a system of trial for accused employees by joint boards of employers and fellows of the accused which marks a new advance in democracy.

When a man who works for the Borough of Manhattan is brought up for trial on charges, his case is heard by a board consisting of two officials of the borough and two

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weeks. They look forward with pleasure to these study periods, during which they are receiving full pay, by the way, and they are just as much interested in learning matters relating directly to their daily work-as, for instance, that the first slit skirt was decreed by Lycurgus-as they are in mastering the intricacies of batting and catching in the gymnasium during the play period.

While in this way the human side of the girls is reached and their interest aroused in their work, at the same time their efficiency is carefully studied so that each girl may get credit on the pay-roll for her own work. Instead of the unfair and unpopular percentage system," the girls are paid on a graded weekly salary basis, and when it is necessary to reduce expenses, instead of immediately lopping off salaries the plan will be to look for possible leakages and wastes. In the short time it has been in operation the school of salesmanship has won the approval of the girls, while it has demonstrated to all store managers that scientific education of employees pays in dollars and cents as well as in the increased contentedness of employees.

FIGHTING FOR THE MASTERY

The defense offered for the war is thus expressed by a German supporter :

This war had to come. Everybody in Europe has known it for years. Sooner or later it had to be decided which was to be master in Europe, the West or the East. The West-that means Germany, France, England, and Italy. The East-Russia.'

It is because France and England refused to join Germany and Austria in war against Russia that Germany is peculiarly incensed against France and England.

Why must either West or East be master in Europe? Why must either the Teuton or the Slav dominate?

In the eighteenth century Roman Catholicism and Protestantism fought to determine which should dominate Europe. In England the Puritans and the Episcopalians fought to determine which should dominate England. To-day neither Roman Catholicism nor Protestantism dominates Europe; neither

1 Dr. Hanns Heinz Ewers, born in Düsseldorf, on the Rhine, is said to be one of the most celebrated authors of the day. His article in "The Fatherland," an American weekly published for the purpose of defending Germany and Austria, begins with the sentence quoted above.

Puritanism nor Episcopalianism dominates England. The Roman Catholic Church is better because it has a Protestant neighbor. The Protestant Church is better because it has a Roman Catholic neighbor. Nowhere

are Protestantism and Roman Catholicism more efficient religious forces than in America, where neither attempts to dominate.

In the eighteenth century France and England fought to determine which should be master on this continent. England won, only to lose her mastery in half the continent through the American Revolution, and to divide her mastery with France in the other half. It is true that Canada is an English dependency. But it is also true that in Canada the English do not dominate and do not try to dominate the French. The two races live in peace and friendship, each learning from the other. English Canada has had a French Premier. In Quebec a FrenchCanadian solution of the school question is adopted. In Manitoba an English-Canadian solution of the school question is adopted.

The United States is occupied by a heterogeneous population in which all races live peaceably together. Politically the Irish have dominated New York City; the Germans have dominated Wisconsin. But the Anglo-Saxons have not fought with the Celts in New York nor the native Americans with the Germans in Wisconsin. The AngloSaxons have learned something from the Irish and the Irish something from the Anglo-Saxons. The native Americans have learned something from the Germans and the Germans something from the native Americans. All races live peaceably together because each race recognizes and respects the good qualities of its neighbor, and there is a free commerce in ideas as well as in goods.

We Americans repudiate absolutely this idea that either the East or the West, either the Slav or the Teuton, must dominate Europe, as we absolutely repudiate the idea that either the East or the West, either Slav, German, or Celt, must dominate America. Once the South attempted to dominate, and a terrible war resulted. Then, for a little time, the North attempted to dominate, and. a disastrous political anarchy resulted in the South. Now neither North nor South attempts to dominate. The whole country recognizes the truth that the interests of North and South, of East and West, are one. At one time, in America, the white race dominated

the colored race. The result, slavery, was equally disastrous to both races. Then, int the reconstruction period, the colored race dominated the white race. The result, politi

cal corruption, was equally disastrous to both races. Now the constitutions of the six most progressive Southern States provide that intelligence and thrift shall dominate ignorance and idleness. And where this solution is honestly accepted and honorably lived up to, peace and prosperity follow.

We do not deny the right of a nation to exclude from its territory a foreign and inharmonious race. We affirm that right. Austria may forbid the migration of Slavs to her Empire. But it is one thing for a nation to exclude from her territory a foreign and inharmonious race; it is quite another thing for one race in a nation to demand the right to dominate another race in the same nation, or one nation to demand the right to dominate other nations in the family of nations.

Russia wants free access to the Mediterranean. She needs it and ought to have it. But that does not give her a right to wrest Constantinople from Turkey. Austria wants free access to the Ægean. She needs it and ought to have it. But that does not give her a right to annex Servia. Canada wants free access, winter and summer, to the Atlantic Ocean. She needs it and ought to have it. But she does not make war on the United States and seek to annex Maine. She

would not if she had the power. She builds a railway to Portland, and enjoys the same access to that port that is enjoyed by the citizens of Maine.

Political domination is not necessary for commercial extension. To suppose that one nation or one race must dominate Europe in order to secure peace and order in Europe is to assume that international law is nothing but an application to international affairs of the law of the jungle.

Europe will not win peace by the domination of East over West or West over East, of Slav over Teuton or Teuton over Slav. It will win peace only when the various European races respect each other, recognize the truth that each race can learn from the neighboring races, and all the peoples-Russian, German, Austrian, Servian, Belgian, English, French-realize that they possess a common interest in the success of Europe overwhelmingly greater than any possible gain in the domination of one people over another.

It is the attempt of Russia to dominate