THE CIVIC PROBLEM 211
of dollars. That this is a mild illustration of graft could be shown by other experiences of Chicago, and by that of other cities; but it is a typical illustration. Now, graft is, of course, a crime, according to any legitimate definition of that word ; but until it is recognized as such, and its punishment is as swift and as severe as that of other crimes of equal enormity, a problem which might well absorb the whole attention of a body like this is how to abolish it.
Official waste, however, great as it is, is only one phase of the civic problem, as it appears from our present standpoint. Wealth and energy not utilized for the public good ; unemployed labor power, whether in the slums or on the boulevard ; the per- formance of labor socially unnecessary; the premature exhaus- tion of labor power by too early, too long, or too strenuous employment, or by the unsanitary, dangerous, or degrading con- ditions imposed upon it, are all forms of municipal waste. All the money and energy put into the art of industrial competition ; in puffing articles, good, bad, and indifferent; in pushing trade, is an expenditure for which there is no adequate return. The lives enfeebled and shortened by preventable diseases, and by the conditions of the slums and the sweat-shops, the needlessly dangerous and brutalizing conditions under which many are compelled to work, represent an incalculable economic loss. The employment of women and children in hours and conditions which injure their vitality, however profitable it may be to the individual employer, is plainly municipal folly. The civic ideal is an ideal of humanity and economy.
In view of all the waste of our municipalities, and the nar- row conception of government commonly accepted, Mr. Bryce's oft-quoted statement, that the government of cities is the one conspicuous failure of the United States, is extremely charitable. From the standpoint of wholesome and happy human life, the city itself is a failure. Who can contemplate the dirt and dis- order, the ugliness and filth, the smoke and noise, of a great city, the tenements and flats, and the fact that human beings live in them, without pitying the necessities of the people, or questioning their sanity? Ruskin has doubtless uttered many
