seemed to be a fair prospect that the necessary disclosures could be made. But the committee was compelled to give up the undertaking, for the reason that the time which its members were able to devote to the work hardly sufficed for the raising of the necessary funds. It may be said that this was always the chief difficulty in prosecuting the work of the City Reform Club. The young men who were active in it could take from the task of earning a livelihood only a certain amount of time. It was always found necessary to spend so much of this time in persuading citizens to contribute, that the activity of the Club was greatly limited.

In its investigations of election frauds, the Club became convinced that the fact that the liquor saloons were open on election day rendered the commission of fraud easier than it would otherwise have been. On election day, in 1888, the members of the Club visited many liquor saloons, and procured conclusive evidence that the saloons were not "closed and kept closed," as the law required. Complaints against some forty or fifty saloon-keepers, many of them men with political influence, were laid before the board of excise commissioners, and the revocation of the licenses was demanded. The commissioners delayed the hearings as much as possible, and sought in every way to tire out the citizens who were seeking to make the board perform its duty. At length indictments for "willful and corrupt neglect of duty" in failing to decide some of these cases, were found against the three commissioners,-Edward T. Fitzpatrick, Joseph Koch, and Alexander Meakim. Once the accused escaped upon a very fine legal question decided in their favor; and once through an amendment to the law, procured for their benefit. The cases have been delayed at every step, and are still pending in the Court of Appeals.

After The City Club was organized in 1892, the active members of the City Reform Club transferred their activity to The City Club and the Good Government Clubs; and the City Reform Club, as a separate body, has not since taken part in municipal reform work.

GOOD GOVERNMENT CLUBS.

T the polls on Election Day, November 6, 1894, there appeared over two thousand men wearing badges of a strange device, "Good Government Club," which worked a spell hitherto unknown, and operated with an influence until then unfelt. Behind that little badge stood a compact organization of not less than five thousand men, who were ready, if need be, to die as Robert Ross died at Troy-in defense of the rights of citizens in the exercise of the elective franchise. No opposition was manifested by election inspectors or police. The poll clerks were generally respectful, and Tammany heelers deferential-in striking contrast with the fraudulent conduct of elections in 1893.

This change was brought about in large measure by the steady growth and strong purpose of the Good Government Clubs, whose members were known to be determined to prevent a repetition this year of the crimes committed in previous years at the polls.

In 1893 certain members of the City Club, then only a year old, deemed it wise to organize clubs in each Assembly District, in such manner that its membership might include men of honorable occupation in every street and representing every phase of city life, who were favorable to reform in municipal affairs. These members of the City Club went out as missionaries full of energy, hope and sympathy, regardless of previous political relations and social condition. They were soon joined by other men of like faith, and went into streets and avenues, lanes and by-ways, and with earnest and fraternal greeting assured men that the city was in danger, that the liberties of the people were in peril, and unless open revolt from misrule should come at once, the city and nation would become a by-word and reproach at home and abroad. And thus by house-to-house visitation the number of adherents to the new gospel of honest government on business principles, regardless of National politics, multiplied rapidly, so that it was possible to organize four clubs in different parts of the city, before the end of '93, and they were incorporated under the names of Good Government Clubs A, B, D and E respectively.

As soon as fifty men or more could be pledged to work together for reform, a temporary organization was formed, and when encouraged by promise of increase and adequate financial support from dues at the rate of fifty cents a month from each member, they opened club rooms at central points, where social and

educational aims might be realized among neighbors and people whose local interests made it desirable for them to know each other and to confer on matters of mutual concern. One club elected as its vice-presidents a butcher and an iron moulder. Founded thus on principles imbedded in human nature, and stimulated by daily revelations of unspeakable corruption in the police and other departments, the standard set up by these clubs was recognized by the people as emblematic of civic pride and purity and their confidence was given without reserve. It was in no spirit of dissatisfaction, but rather from a desire to aid and supplement them, that the Committee of Seventy was called into being by the older men in the organization. Many Good Government Club men were placed on that Committee in order to secure that combination which provides old men for counsel and young men for action.

Twenty other clubs were organized in 1894, representing almost every shade of political opinion, religious creed and nationality, but in whose gatherings only matters common to all as citizens were discussed, and only the action approved by all was undertaken.

In these clubs, at their several headquarters, every municipal subject has been discussed, regardless of its bearing upon State or National politics, and thousands of men who were strangers have come to know and rely upon each other as friends and neighbors, and newly-awakened citizens have mutually pledged their support. Masses of men have thus become solidified, civic truths crystallized, and economic principles of municipal administration, once unfamiliar, have become as household words.

The efforts made for the overthrow of the enemies of Good Government were heroic, in view of the personal sacrifices made by club members, and for a time were all-absorbing, but it was recognized and declared that the recent election was merely an incident in the plan and scope of club work. It is clearly understood that the movement was not intended to be spasmodic, periodic or volcanic, but continuous, persistent and aggressive. Its educational work includes weekly lectures and debates, in which all members, in their respective clubs, are invited to join-and the range of subjects includes every department of municipal government, every principle of administrative reform, and every subject of interest to citizens, who are the owners of a vast urban estate; to fathers of children to be educated; to householders, with families to be cared for, and to merchants, citizens and workers in every sphere of activity, who require peace for the development of their enterprises. The following list of subjects discussed before one club, whose report is before me, will illustrate : "How to get Good Government."

"Civil Service Reform."

"Political Partnerships for Public Plunder."

"The Abuses of the Elective Franchise at Troy, where the Martyr, Robert Ross, was Slain."