tary conditions; nor that politicians will do the best service in regulating educational enterprises. To a remarkable extent the work of the Federation was conducted as a business man would manage his commercial enterprises, viz., by securing specialists for special work, and by depending upon them to know their business. The persons organized in connection with the Federation were not people who had previously failed to find any employment in which they could make a success for themselves, and who imagined that they could regulate other people's affairs better than they had their own. They were people on the contrary who had been in the habit of bringing things to pass, and consequently were wanted by their fellow citizens for their well known ability. For instance, the ablest lawyers in the city were enlisted for different kinds of legal work; people who had been long familiar with various philanthropies were drafted for new service in charitable organizations ; defects in the educational system were inspected and reported upon by persons of long experience and mature judgment; the committees on ways and means were men who had been among the commercial leaders of the city; and men who were well known as successful organizers of large numbers of employés were willing to accept the arduous duty of organizing vagrants for labor upon the streets, or of creating an independent force to supplement the work of street cleaning which the city appropriations were inadequate to perform. Thus the different branches of effort undertaken by the Federation were successful, because they were superintended by people fitted by talent and experience to carry on for themselves work requiring similar qualifications.
I will not add to this account of the Civic Federation in Chicago any conclusions of my own with reference to the policy proper for other cities. This paper is an attempt to give a faithful report and interpretation of some of the most important features connected with the first year's history of this Chicago institution. Possibly the record may seem to be of little consequence elsewhere. It represents, however, a most important advance along natural lines of progress in our city, and I believe it to contain
