In its origin the public will was destructive no doubt, that was the inarticulate disgust born of the long endurance of inadequate service, all the miseries of that contemptuous exploitation of the people so familiar in all the cities of America. To this, on the customary revelations of a corrupt domination of the political machinery of the city by the street railway company, there was added a moral rage--the one element needed to provide the spark for the mine. At first this rage against the company was such that any action taken by officials was popular so long as it injured or harassed or was somehow inimical to the company. And in consequence there was developed a kind of local jingoism or chauvinism; whenever popularity slackened or it was felt necessary to remind the electorate back in the ward of the sleepless vigilance of their representative in the council, a councilman had only to introduce some resolution that would be against the company’s interest. It was unfortunate, and had its evil phase, as any suggestion of intellectual dishonesty must ever have, and it made serious dealing with the subject extremely difficult and hazardous. It was difficult to recognize any of the company’s rights; and it was always at the risk of misunderstanding, and with the certainty of misrepresentation that this was done. But of course it was necessary to do this, in the course of the long and complicated transaction, that constant and inflexible opposition of the public with the private interest which now assumed the aspect of a noisy and furious war, and now the softer phases of diplomatic negotiations. Of course there were always those in town who knew exactly what was to be done; they could settle the vexatious problem with a facile gesture, between the whiffs of a cigarette on the back platform of a street car, or in an after dinner speech between the puffs of a cigar. The one was apt to advise that the “traction company be brought to time at once,” the other that an “equitable” settlement be “arranged” by conservative business men. Meanwhile the problem obviously consisted in the necessity of recognizing the private right in the proprietors and of securing the public right to the people, and to do this it was necessary to search out, and isolate, like some malignant organism, the injustice that somewhere lurked in this complex and irritating association.