necessary the lowering of all connecting sewers, entailing an expense difficult to calculate, and a possible damage not to be estimated.

Sixth-The company are permitted to deprive the people along the route of the proposed work, for a period of time on which no limit is placed except that it shall be reasonable, of the use of gas, water and the sewers, conveniences absolutely essential to their daily comfort. The supply of water necessary to the extinguishment of fires may also be cut off for a time, to the possible loss of property greater in amount than the whole capital of the Arcade Company. It is obvious that the reasonable time named in the bill, for which the company may stop the use of gas and water, would be claimed to mean so long as the work of the company made such stoppage necessary; and it is still more obvious that if the supply of gas and water were once cut off, the people would be practically at the mercy of the company in this respect, for a long time and without immediate or effectual remedy; while the city government, in all its departments, would be powerless to afford relief, for it is expressly prohibited, by one section of the bill, to permit anything to be done which shall embarrass the operations of the company.

Seventh-The bill proposes to surrender a large portion of the Battery for a surface or open-cut railway.

Eighth-The bill violates private rights of property in prescribing a special rule of estimating damages or compensation when such property is to be taken for the purposes of the company, which special rule, varying from that established in all other cases, is in effect this: that title may be acquired by the company to a valuable lot of ground on Broadway, against the will of the owner, and instead of paying for the same, the company may offset the benefit which, it may claim, will accrue to property on the

upper part of Fourth avenue belonging to the same owner, by reason of the increased communications the road will open.

It is claimed that the bill does not establish such a rule. I quote its language: "In proceedings to ascertain the value of the property taken, &c., the question of benefit shall be considered, and when it shall appear that the construction of said road will enhance the value of the property of the person claiming damages to an amount greater than the amount of injury sustained, &c., the claimant shall not be entitled to recover more than nominal damages." The enhanced value of the property of the person claiming damages cannot, of course, refer to the property taken, but must of necessity refer to property on some other portion of the road. Notwithstanding this rule of assessment and the great promise held out of facilitating the travel from the upper part of the city, the company is under no obligations to build its road up Fourth avenue at all. It may, if it choose so to do, confine its operations to Broadway between the Battery and Fourteenth street, or to a less distance. The bill provides that failure to construct one portion of the road shall not work a forfeiture of the franchise in respect of any section which may have been commenced.

Ninth-The language used for the protection of the present sidewalks, and elsewhere in the bill, is loose and careless, or else purposely delusive and deceptive.

Tenth-A proper power of supervision is not given to the Commissioner of Public Works, except for the limited portion of the work below Fourteenth street.

Eleventh-The company is authorized to take possession of all that portion of Broadway which is below Wall street, before one dollar of capital is subscribed; and as the original corporators named in the bill are empowered to assign their privileges

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at any time to others, they may take possession of this portion of Broadway and break it up, through the agency of irresponsible parties and as a preliminary experiment, and do irreparable

injury.

Twelfth-The contract between the State and the company is, by this bill, wholly one-sided. Everything is given to the company; nothing required in return. No guarantee or security is provided that the work shall be completed, so as actually to afford to the public the facilities for travel for the whole length of the island, which is the consideration for the grant of their great privileges. The time is, indeed, limited to six years and six months within which to finish their work; but it is also provided that they may construct any small section of it and leave all the rest undone, and yet their franchise shall not be forfeited as to the small portion they may have chosen to build. They may thus reap high profits from a small and the most valuable portion of the route, and leave the great mass of the public wholly unprovided for.

Thirteenth-The bill authorizes this company to take portions of the Battery, Bowling Green, the City Hall Park, Union Square, Madison Square, and Central Park, which are the prop erty of the city, without compensation. It is claimed that, except in the Battery, no part of the surface of these public grounds is to be taken. An examination of the bill shows that this is The company may take in any of the public parks a space of five hundred feet wide by one hundred in length, for constructing and operating their railway, and for platforms, stairways, station depots and buildings, and for proper communication between the same. In no case is the city to receive any compensation for its property. Having thus attempted to give away city property to a private corporation, the bill, by sec

not so.

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tion 14, in effect enjoins the authorities of the city from any at tempt to defend its property and rights.

The public parks and other property of the city are pledged. for the payment of the city debt, and for this and other reasons I deny the right of the Legislature to take any such property and give it to a private corporation, under the plea that being now devoted to one public use, it may be diverted to the purposes of this company, as being for another public use. If it is competent for the Legislature to do so in this instance, then it may, some day, give away to the street railways of New York city, for depots and stables, the City Hall Park, Union and Madison Squares, and such portions of the Central Park as may be deemed necessary, and this bill, if passed into a law, would be taken as a precedent for so doing. A portion of the Battery was ceded by adjoining owners to the city for the purpose of a public place and for no other. The city itself cannot convey this portion without a quit-claim from these grantors, and yet this company is authorized to appropriate this property to its own use. The property of the city proposed by this bill to be, practically, confiscated, for the benefit of this company, is estimated to be worth between six and seven millions of dollars; and the application of these public grounds to the purposes proposed would utterly destroy some of them and disfigure all the others.

It is claimed that like privileges with these, as to the public grounds and parks, have already been given to the Central Underground Railroad Company, and that I approved the law granting them. This is not so. The charter of the Underground Company was passed in 1868, before I came into office, and was approved by my predecessor. The only bill relating to the last named company which has been submitted to me, is the act of 1869, amending certain sections of the original act. The section under which it is claimed the Underground Road has had

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given to it the privileges in and to the public parks proposed to be extended by the bill to the Arcade Company, was not amended, nor referred to in the act of 1869, and so, strictly speaking, was not put before me, for my official approval or disapproval. My attention, in considering the Amending Act, was of course not attracted to any but those sections of the original act which were amended. If, however, it can be justly said that by signing the act of last year, I aided in reviving privileges which had then expired and sanctioned the taking of city property without compensation, then my action was wrong. If I have once committed an error, through mistake or oversight, that is no reason why I should commit another.

I have heretofore refused my assent to a bill giving to a railroad company the partial use of streets in New York, without compensation; it could not be expected that I should sanction a bill which undertakes to grant to a private corporation, as this does, a large and valuable portion of the property of the city, with the express condition that nothing shall be paid to the city treasury in return.

I shall not pause to recite other objections which occur to my mind; those already stated seem to me to be sufficient, and I therefore send the bill to the Secretary of State without approval. JOHN T. HOFFMAN.