Should this domain be occupied by, say, one thousand families of a population of 50,000, an immediate result, affecting the whole city, would be a fall in rents. In fact, the mere existence of the public domain, with a probability that his tenants would remove to it, might cause a landlord to reduce his rents. Besides, the value of all land, in the city and about it, held on speculation, would fall. Save in instances of particular advantage, the price of unimproved residence lots would gravitate toward the cost, all things considered, of residence lots in the public domain. This, for these reasons: The corner in land would be broken. Home builders would pay a private owner no more for a lot than the cost of a similar one in the public area. As houses went up on the public domain, the chances of landholders to sell to builders would be diminished. Sellers of land, besides competing with the public land, would then compete with increased activity with one another. Finally, just taxation of their land, valueless as a speculation, would oblige landowners to sell it or to put it to good use. Even should the growth of the city be rapid, the value of land in private hands could in general advance but little, if at all. With the actual demands of an increased population, the public domain might from time to time be enlarged; but not, it may reasonably be assumed, at a rate that would give rise to an upward tendency of prices in the face of the above-mentioned factors contributing to a downward tendency. At this point it may be well to remember that, conditions of land purchase by the city being subject to the Referendum, the buying could hardly be accompanied by corrupt bargaining. When the effect of the public land in depressing land values, in other words in enabling producers to retain the more of their product, was seen, private as well as public agencies might aid in enlarging the scope of that effect. The philanthropic might transfer land to the municipality, preferring to help restore just social conditions rather than to aid in charities that leave the world with more poor than ever; the city might provide for a gradual conversion, in the course of time, of all the land within its limits to public control, first selecting, with the end in view, tracts of little market value, which, open to occupiers, would assist in keeping down the value of lands held privately.