1909. The imports were $3,153,609 in 1896 and $7,100,659 in 1909.
As a manufacturing city, Detroit holds high rank. The total number of manufacturing establishments in 1890 was 1746, with a product for the year valued at $77,351,546; in 1900 there were 2847 establishments with a product for the year valued at $100,892,838; or an increase of 30.4% in the decade. In 1900 the establishments under the factory system, omitting the hand trades and neighbourhood industries, numbered 1259 and produced goods valued at $88,365,924; in 1904 establishments under the factory system numbered 1363 and the product had increased 45.7% to $128,761,658. In the district subsequently annexed the product in 1904 was about $12,000,000, making a total of $140,000,000. The output for 1906 was estimated at $180,000,000. The state factory inspectors in 1905 visited 1721 factories having 83,231 employees. In 1906 they inspected 1790 factories with 93,071 employees. Detroit is the leading city in the country in the manufacture of automobiles. In 1904 the value of its product was one-fifth that for the whole country. In 1906 the city had twenty automobile factories, with an output of 11,000 cars, valued at $12,000,000. Detroit is probably the largest manufacturer in the country of freight cars, stoves, pharmaceutical preparations, varnish, soda ash and similar alkaline products. Other important manufactures are ships, paints, foundry and machine shop products, brass goods, furniture, boots and shoes, clothing, matches, cigars, malt liquors and fur goods; and slaughtering and meat packing is an important industry.
The Detroit Board of Commerce, organized in 1903, brought into one association the members of three former bodies, making a compact organization with civic as well as commercial aims. The board has brought into active co-operation nearly all the leading business men of the city and many of the professional men. Their united efforts have brought many new industries to the city, have improved industrial conditions, and have exerted a beneficial influence upon the municipal administration. Other business organizations are the Board of Trade, devoted to the grain trade and kindred lines, the Employers’ Association, which seeks to maintain satisfactory relations between employer and employed, the Builders’ & Traders’ Exchange, and the Credit Men’s Association.
Administration.—Although the city received its first charter in 1806, and another in 1815, the real power rested in the hands of the governor and judges of the territory until 1824; the charters of 1824 and 1827 centred the government in a council and made the list of elective officers long; the charter of 1827 was revised in 1857 and again in 1859 and the present charter dates from 1883. Under this charter only three administrative officers are elected,—the mayor, the city clerk and the city treasurer,—elections being biennial. The administration of the city departments is largely in the hands of commissions. There is one commissioner each, appointed by the mayor, for the parks and boulevards, police and public works departments. The four members of the health board are nominated by the governor and confirmed by the state senate. The school board is an independent body, consisting of one elected member from each ward holding office for four years, but the mayor has the veto power over its proceedings as well as those of the common council. In each case a two-thirds vote overrules his veto. The other principal officers and commissions, appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the council, are controller, corporation counsel, board of three assessors, fire commission (four members), public lighting commission (six members), water commission (five members), poor commission (four members), and inspectors of the house of correction (four in number). The members of the public library commission, six in number, are elected by the board of education. Itemized estimates of expenses for the next fiscal year are furnished by the different departments to the controller in February. He transmits them to the common council with his recommendations. The council has four weeks in which to consider them. It may reduce or increase the amounts asked, and may add new items. The budget then goes to the board of estimates, which has a month for its consideration. This body consists of two members elected from each ward and five elected at large. The mayor and heads of departments are advisory members, and may speak but not vote. The members of the board of estimates can hold no other office and they have no appointing power, the intention being to keep them as free as possible from all political motives and influences. They may reduce or cut out any estimates submitted, but cannot increase any or add new ones. No bonds can be issued without the assent of the board of estimates. The budget is apportioned among twelve committees which have almost invariably given close and conscientious examination to the actual needs of the departments. A reduction of $1,000,000 to $1,500,000, without impairing the service, has been a not unusual result of their deliberations. Prudent management under this system has placed the city in the highest rank financially. Its debt limit is 2% on the assessed valuation, and even that low maximum is not often reached. The debt in 1907 was only about $5,500,000, a smaller per capita debt than that of any other city of over 100,000 inhabitants in the country; the assessed valuation was $330,000,000; the city tax, $14.70 on the thousand dollars of assessed valuation. Both the council and the estimators are hampered in their work by legislative interference. Nearly all the large salaries and many of those of the second grade are made mandatory by the legislature, which has also determined many affairs of a purely administrative character.
Detroit has made three experiments with municipal ownership. On account of inadequate and unsatisfactory service by a private company, the city bought the water-works as long ago as 1836. The works have been twice moved and enlargements have been made in advance of the needs of the city. In 1907 there were six engines in the works with a pumping capacity of 152,000,000 gallons daily. The daily average of water used during the preceding year was 61,357,000 gallons. The water is pumped from Lake St Clair and is of exceptional purity. The city began its own public lighting in April 1895, having a large plant on the river near the centre of the city. It lights the streets and public buildings, but makes no provision for commercial business. The lighting is excellent, and the cost is probably less than could be obtained from a private company. The street lighting is done partly from pole and arm lights, but largely from steel towers from 100 ft. to 180 ft. in height, with strong reflected lights at the top. The city also owns two portable asphalt plants, and thus makes a saving in the cost of street repairing and resurfacing. With a view of effecting the reduction of street car fares to three cents, the state legislature in 1899 passed an act for purchasing or leasing the street railways of the city, but the Supreme Court pronounced this act unconstitutional on the ground that, as the constitution prohibited the state from engaging in a work of internal improvement, the state could not empower a municipality to do so. Certain test votes indicated an almost even division on the question of municipal ownership of the railways.
History.—Detroit was founded in 1701 by Antoine Laumet de la Mothe Cadillac (c. 1661–1730), who had pointed out the importance of the place as a strategic point for determining the control of the fur trade and the possession of the North-west and had received assistance from the French government soon after Robert Livingston (1654–1725), the secretary of the Board of Indian Commissioners in New York, had urged the English government to establish a fort at the same place. Cadillac arrived on the 24th of July with about 100 followers. They at once built a palisade fort about 200 ft. square S. of what is now Jefferson Avenue and between Griswold and Shelby streets, and named it Fort Pontchartrain in honour of the French colonial minister. Indians at once came to the place in large numbers, but they soon complained of the high price of French goods; there was serious contention between Cadillac and the French Canadian Fur Company, to which a monopoly of the trade had been granted, as well as bitter rivalry between him and the Jesuits. After the several parties had begun to complain to the home government the monopoly of the fur trade was transferred to Cadillac and he was exhorted to cease quarrelling with the
