< Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 86.djvu
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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

nessed, along both physical and general lines, and I am not at all sure that the war will check the latter. That it has seriously interfered with the former, however, there can be no doubt. This condition is partly due to the unsettled financial condition of the country, and would have prevailed even had there been no war. Municipal credit, as such, however, does not seem to have been seriously hurt, or jeopardized.

There has been a natural disclination of capitalists to invest in municipal, or, for that matter, in any other issues, although this timidity and unwillingness is beginning to show signs of disappearing with the opening of the stock exchanges and the reestablishment of the financial machinery. This hesitancy to take municipal issues in large blocks has accelerated the tendency to market municipal bonds in a new and more democratic way, namely, in small denominations, over the counters of the city treasurer. In this way municipal undertakings will be brought more directly home to the attention of the voters and their interest in the construction and up-keep thereby stimulated. In addition municipal finances will be placed upon a more substantial basis in that cities will consider more carefully their expenditures for permanent capital account and for maintenance, and will eventually cease to borrow on the future for the expenses of to-day. Here again, however, the war has helped on a movement already well started. There seem? to be a great difference of opinion among social workers as to the effect of the war on social problems. Miss Addams's opinion has already been quoted. On the other hand, however, we have the opinion of another Chicagoan, who speaks out of a long experience, and a profound sympathy with every forward social movement. Dr. Graham Taylor declares as a result of his personal observations:

That first week in August, which threatened Europe with the greatest destruction which has ever overtaken its civilization, was signalized by the most constructive, or reconstructive, legislation ever enacted in any one week throughout the long history of the British Parliament. And it did so in the rush of its gigantic defensive and offensive preparations for war. Although all these measures are temporary provisions to meet the emergency demanding immediate relief from the present or possible disasters of war, yet they can not fail to affect profoundly the social legislation and administration which had already become the permanent policy of the British empire and of its county and municipal governments.

So far as my personal observation has gone, there has been no substantial falling off of interest in American constructive programs, and in many directions there has been an increased effort to offset any possible slackening of interest. The obvious reply to Miss Addams's lament (and we all deeply sympathize with the feeling which gives rise to it) is that the very greatness of the European cataclysm will emphasize the need for even greater social and civic effort. In the words of a Milwaukee student of the problem:

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