Here is the story of an individual whose political and social example, if such things are ever worth anything (the moralists to the contrary notwithstanding), should have been, at the time, of the greatest importance to every citizen of the United States. Only it was not. Or was it? Who really knows? Anyway, he and his career are forgotten by now, and have been these many years.  
He was the mayor of one of those New England mill towns in northern Massachusetts—a , pleasureless realm of about forty thousand, where, from the time he was born until he finally left at the age of thirty-six to seek his fortune elsewhere, he had resided without change. During that time he had worked in various of the local mills, which in one way and another involved nearly all of the population. He was a mill shoe-maker by trade, or, in other words, a factory shoe-hand, knowing only a part of all the processes necessary to make a shoe in that fashion. Still, he was a fair workman, and earned as much as fifteen or eighteen dollars a week at times—rather good pay for that region. By a , or possibly because of his own state one who was compelled to take cognizance of the difficulties of others, he finally expressed his mental unrest by organizing a club for the study and propagation of socialism, and later, when it became powerful enough to have a candidate and look for political expression of some kind, he was its first, and thereafter for a number of years, its regular candidate for mayor. For a long time, or until its membership became sufficient to attract some slight political attention, its members (following our regular American, unintellectual custom) were looked upon by the rest of the people as a body of harmless kickers, filled with fool notions about a man's duty to his fellowman, some silly dream about an honest and economical administration of public affairs—their city's affairs, to be exact. We are so wise in America, so interested in our fellowman, so regardful of his welfare. They were so small in number, however, that they were little more than an object of pleasant jest, useful for that purpose alone.
 
This club, however, continued to put up its candidate until about 1895, when suddenly it succeeded in polling the very modest number of fifty-four votes—double the number it had succeeded in polling any previous year. A year later one hundred and thirty-six were registered, and the next year six hundred. Then suddenly the mayor who won that year's battle died, and a special election was called. Here the club polled six hundred and one, a total and astonishing gain of one. In 1898 the candidate was again nominated and received fifteen hundred, and in 1899, when he ran again, twenty-three hundred votes, which elected him.
 
If this fact be registered here, it was not so regarded in that typically New England mill town. Ever study New England—its Puritan, self-defensive, but unintellectual and selfish ? Although this poor little of a mayor was only elected for one year, men paused , those who had not voted for him, and several of the older conventional political and religious order, to their church and all the routine of the average puritanic mill town, actually cried. No one knew, of course, who the new mayor was, or what he stood for. There were open assertions that the club behind him was —that ever-ready charge against anything new in America—and that the courts should be called upon to prevent his being seated. And this from people who were as poorly "off" commercially and socially as any might well be. It was stated, as proving the worst, that he was, or had been, a mill worker!—and, before that a grocery clerk—both at twelve a week, or less!! division of property, the forcing of all employers to pay as much as five a day to every (an unheard-of sum in New England), and general and of individual rights (things then unknown in America, of course), in the minds of these conventional Americans as the natural and immediate result of so modest a victory. The old-time politicians and corporations who understood much better what the point was, the significance of this straw, were more or less disgruntled, but satisfied that it could be later.
 
An actual conversation which occurred on one of the outlying street corners one evening about dusk will best the entire situation.
 
"Who is the man, anyway?" asked one citizen of a total stranger whom he had chanced to meet.
 
"Oh, no one in particular, I think. A grocery clerk, they say."
 
"Astonishing, isn't it? Why, I never thought those people would get anything. Why, they didn't even figure last year."
 
"Seems to be considerable doubt as to just what he'll do."
 
"That's what I've been wondering. I don't take much stock in all their talk about . A man hasn't so very much power as mayor."
 
"No," said the other.
 
"We ought to give him a trial, anyway. He's won a big fight. I should like to see him, see what he looks like."
 
"Oh, nothing startling. I know him."
 
"Rather young, ain't he?"
 
"Yes."
 
"Where did he come from?"
 
"Oh, right around here."
 
"Was he a mill-hand?"
 
"Yes."
 
The stranger made as to other facts and then turned off at a corner.
 
"Well," he observed at parting, "I don't know. I'm inclined to believe in the man. I should like to see him myself. Good-night."
 
"Good-night," said the other, waving his hand. "When you see me again you will know that you are looking at the mayor."
 
The inquirer stared after him and saw a six-foot citizen, of otherwise medium proportions, whose long, youthful face and mild gray eyes, with just a suggestion of washed-out blue in them, were hardly what was to be expected of a notorious and otherwise political figure.
 
"He is too young," was the earliest comments, when the public once became aware of his personality.
 
"Why, he is nothing but a grocery clerk," was another, the and possibilities of which need not be upon here.
 
And he was, in his way—nothing much of a genius, as such things go in politics, but an interesting figure. Without much taste (or its cultivated shadow) or great vision of any kind, he was still a man who sensed the evils of great and often unnecessary social inequalities and the need of reorganizing influences, which would tend to narrow the vast between the unorganized and ignorant poor, and the huge beneficiaries of unearned (yes, and not even understood) . For what does the economic wisdom of the average capitalist amount to, after all: the narrow, gourmandizing hunger of the average multi-millionaire?
 
At any rate, people watched him as he went to and fro between his office and his home, and reached the general conclusion after the first excitement had died down that he did not amount to much.
 
When introduced into his office in the small but pleasant city hall, he came into contact with a "ring," and a condition, which nobody imagined a young mayor could change. Old-time politicians sat there giving out contracts for street-cleaning, , improvements and supplies of all kinds, and a bond of profit bound them closely together.
 
"I don't think he can do much to hurt us," these individuals said one to another. "He don't amount to much."
 
The mayor was not of a talkative or turn. Neither was he cold or wanting in good and natural manners. He was, however, of a turn of mind, "up in the air," some called it, and smoked a good many cigars.
 
"I think we ought to get together and have some sort of a conference about the letting of contracts," said the president of the city council to him one morning shortly after he had been installed. "You will find these gentlemen ready to meet you half-way in these matters."
 
"I'm very glad to hear that," he replied. "I've something to say in my message to the council, which I'll send over in the morning."
 
The old-time politician eyed him , and he eyed the old-time politician in turn, not aggressively, but as if they might come to a very pleasant understanding if they wanted to, and then went back to his office.
 
The next day his message was made public, and this was its key-note:
 
"All contract work for the city should be let with a proviso, that the workmen employed receive not less than two dollars a day."
 
The dissatisfied roar that followed was not long in making itself heard all over the city.
 
"Stuff and nonsense," yelled the office in a chorus. "Socialism!" "Anarchy!" "This thing must be put down!" "The city would be bankrupt in a year." "No could afford to pay his ordinary day two a day. The city could not afford to pay any contractor enough to do it."
 
"The prosperity of the city is not greater than the prosperity of the largest number of its individuals," replied the mayor, in a somewhat and economically argument on the floor of the council hall. "We must find ."
 
"We'll see about that," said the members of the . "Why, the man's crazy. If he thinks he can run this town on a goody-good basis and make everybody rich and happy, he's going to get badly fooled, that's all there is to that."
 
Fortunately for him three of the eight council members were fellows of the mayor's own economic beliefs, individuals elected on the same ticket with him. These men could not carry a resolution, but they could stop one from being carried over the mayor's veto. Hence it was found that if the contracts could not be given to men satisfactory to the mayor they could not be given at all, and he stood in a fair way to win.
 
"What the hell's the use of us sitting here day after day!" were the actual words of the leading members of the opposition in the council some weeks later, when the fight became wearisome. "We can't pass the contracts over his veto. I say let 'em go."
 
So the proviso was on, that two a day was the minimum wage to be allowed, and the contracts passed.
 
The mayor's were exceedingly jubilant at this, more so than he, who was of a more cautious and less hopeful temperament.
 
"Not out of the woods yet, gentlemen," he remarked to a group of his at the reform club. "We have to do a great many things sensibly if we expect to keep the people's confidence and 'win again.'"
 
Under the old system of letting contracts, whenever there was a wage rate , men were paid little or nothing, and the work was not done. There was no of doing it. Garbage and ashes accumulated, and papers littered the streets. The old contractor who had pocketed the appropriated sum thought to do so again.
 
"I hear the citizens are complaining as much as ever," said the mayor to this individual one morning. "You will have to keep the streets clean."
 
The contractor, a , thick-necked, heavy-jawed Irishman, of just so much as the sudden acquisition of a comfortable fortune would allow, looked him quizzically over, wondering whether he was "out" for a portion of the or whether he was really serious.
 
"We can fix that between us," he said.
 
"There's nothing to fix," replied the mayor. "All I want you to do is to clean the streets."
 
The contractor went away and for a few days after the streets were really clean, but it was only for a few days.
 
In his walks about the city the mayor himself found garbage and paper uncollected, and then called upon his new acquaintance again.
 
"I'm mentioning this for the last time, Mr. M——," he said. "You will have to your contract, or resign in favor of some one who will."
 
"Oh, I'll clean them, well enough," said this individual, after five minutes of rapid fire explanation. "Two dollars a day for men is high, but I'll see that they're clean."
 
Again he went away, and again the mayor sauntered about, and then one morning sought out the contractor in his own office.
 
"This is the end," he said, removing a cigar from his mouth and holding it before him with his elbow at right angles. "You are discharged from this work. I'll notify you officially to-morrow."
 
"It can't be done the way you want it," the contractor exclaimed with an oath. "There's no money in it at two dollars. Hell, anybody can see that."
 
"Very well," said the mayor in a well-modulated tone. "Let another man try, then."
 
The next day he appointed a new contractor, and with a schedule before him showing how many men should be employed and how much profit he might expect, the latter succeeded. The garbage was daily removed, and the streets carefully cleaned.
 
Then there was a new manual training school about to be added to the public school system at this time, and the contract for building was to be let, when the mayor threw a bomb into the midst of the old-time jobbers at the city council. A contractor had already been chosen by them and the members were figuring out their profits, when at one of the public discussions of the subject the mayor said:
 
"Why shouldn't the city build it, gentlemen?"
 
"How can it?" exclaimed the councilmen. "The city isn't an individual; it can't watch carefully."
 
"It can hire its own architect, as well as any contractor. Let's try it."
 
There were tempers in the council after this, but the mayor was . He called an architect who made a ridiculously low estimate. Never had a public building been estimated so cheaply before.
 
"See here," said one of the councilmen when the plans were presented to the chamber—"This isn't doing this city right, and the gentlemen of the council ought to put their feet down on any such venture as this. You're going to waste the city's money on some cheap thing in order to catch votes."
 
"I'll publish the cost of the goods as delivered," said the mayor. "Then the people can look at the building when it's built. We'll see how cheap it looks then."
 
To head off political trickery on the part of the enemy he secured bills for material as delivered, and publicly compared them with prices paid for similar amounts of the same material used in other buildings. So the public was kept aware of what was going on and the cry of cheapness for political purposes set at . It was the first public structure by the city, and by all means the cheapest and best of all the city's buildings.
 
Excellent as these services were in their way, the mayor realized later that a powerful opposition was being generated and that if he were to retain the interest of his he would have to set about something which would endear him and his cause to the public.
 
"I may be honest," he told one of his friends, "but honesty will play a lone hand with these people. The public isn't interested in its own welfare very much. It can't be bothered or hasn't the time. What I need is something that will impress it and still be worth while. I can't be reëlected on promises, or on my looks, either."
 
When he looked about him, however, he found the possibility of independent municipal action pretty well by legislation. He had promised, for instance, to do all he could to lower the gas rate and to abolish grade crossings, but the law said that no municipality could do either of these things without first voting to do so three years in succession—a little precaution taken by the corporation representing such things long before he came into power. Each vote must be for such action, or it could not become a law.
 
"I know well enough that promises are all right," he said to one of his friends, "and that these laws are good enough excuses, but the public won't take excuses from me for three years. If I want to be mayor again I want to be doing something, and doing it quick."
 
In the city was a gas corporation, originally capitalized at $45,000, and subsequently increased to $75,000, which was earning that year the actual sum of $58,000 over and above all expenses. It was getting ready to the capitalization, as usual, and water its stock to the extent of $500,000, when it occurred to the mayor that if the corporation was making such enormous profits out of a $75,000 investment as to be able to offer to pay six per cent on $500,000 to , and put the money it would get for such stocks into its pocket, perhaps it could reduce the price of gas from one dollar and nineteen cents to a more reasonable figure. There was the three years' voting law, however, behind which, as behind an , the very corporation lay comfortable and indifferent.
 
The mayor sent for his corporation counsel, and studied gas law for awhile. He found that at the State capital there was a State board, or commission, which had been created to look after gas companies in general, and to hear the complaints of municipalities which considered themselves unjustly treated.
 
"This is the thing for me," he said.
 
Lacking the municipal authority himself, he to present the facts in the case and appeal to this commission for a reduction of the gas rate.
 
When he came to talk about it he found that the opposition he would generate would be something much more than local. Back of the local reduction idea was the whole system of extortionate gas rates of the State and of the nation; hundreds of fat, luxurious gas corporations whose would be threatened by any on this question.
 
"You mean to proceed with this scheme of yours?" asked a prominent member of the local bar who called one morning to interview him. "I represent the gentlemen who are interested in our local gas company."
 
"I certainly do," replied the mayor.
 
"Well," replied the uncredentialed representative of private interests, after expostulating a long time and offering various "reasons" why it would be more profitable and politically for the new mayor not to proceed, "I've said all I can say. Now I want to tell you that you are going up against a combination that will be your ruin. You're not with this town now; you're dealing with the State, the whole nation. These corporations can't afford to let you win, and they won't. You're not the one to do it; you're not big enough."
 
The mayor smiled and replied that of course he could not say as to that.
 
The lawyer went away, and that next day the mayor had his legal counsel look up the annual reports of the company for the years of its existence, as well as a bulletin issued by a firm of , into whose hands the matter of selling a vast amount of watered stock it proposed to issue had been placed. He also sent for a gas expert and set him to figuring out a case for the people.
 
It was found by this gentleman that since the company was first organized it had paid dividends on its capital stock at the rate of ten per cent per annum, for the first thirty years; had made vast improvements in the last ten, and notwithstanding this fact, had paid twenty per cent, and even twenty-five per cent per annum in dividends. All the details of cost and were figured out, and then the mayor with his counsel took the train for the State capitol.
 
Never was there more excitement in political circles than when this young representative of no important political organization arrived at the State capitol and walked, at the appointed time, into the private audience room of the commission. Every gas company, as well as every newspaper and every other representative of the people, had curiously enough become interested in the fight he was making, and there was a band of reporters at the hotel where he was stopping, as well as in the commission in the State capitol where the hearing was to be. They wanted to know about him—why he was doing this, whether it wasn't a "strike" or the work of some rival corporation. The fact that he might foolishly be sincere was hard to believe.
 
"Gentlemen," said the mayor, as he took his stand in front of an august array of legal talent which was waiting to pick his argument to pieces in the commission chambers at the capitol, "I miscalculated but one thing in this case which I am about to lay before you, and that is the extent of public interest. I came here prepared to make a private argument, but now I want to ask the privilege of making it public. I see the public itself is interested, or should be. I will ask leave to my argument until the day after tomorrow."
 
There was considerable and hawing over this, since from the point of view of the corporation it was most , but the commission was practically powerless to do aught but grant his request. And meanwhile the interest created by the newspapers added power to his cause. Hunting up the several representatives and s............