"And yet even now, while our political power is still small, the charge of opportunism, or the neglect of principle in pursuit of some practical advantage, is continually being raised, sometimes justly, sometimes unjustly." The following from the _New York Evening Post_, illustrates both the political and the economic difficulty of enacting Socialistic or even radical measures in municipalities. It is taken from a special article on the situation in Schenectady, where a Socialist, Dr. George R. Lunn had just been elected mayor:-- "Schenectady is trying hard to take its dose of Socialism philosophically. Its most staid and respectable citizens, who have been staid and respectable Republicans and Democrats all their life, console themselves with the thought that, after all, Old Dorp is Old Dorp--Old Dorp being the affectionate way of referring to Schenectady--and that her best citizens are still her best citizens, and that Rev. George R. Lunn and all his Socialist crew can't do a great amount of harm in two years to a city that possesses such an ironclad charter as that with which Horace White, when he was a Senator, endowed every city of the second class in the Empire State. The conservative element in town back that charter against all the reforms that the minister who is to be mayor and his following of machinists, plumbers, coachmen, and armature winders from the General Electric Works, who are going to be common councillors and other things, can hope to introduce.... "The General Electric works--as everybody agrees--'made' Schenectady. Census figures show it and statistics of one sort or another show it. The concern employs more than 16,000 men and women--as many persons as there are voters in the whole town. It owns 275 acres of land, and of this about 60 acres are occupied with shops and buildings. Its capital stock is valued at $80,000,000. The General Electric, or as it is called up here, the 'G. E.,' has given work to thousands, has brought a lot of business into town, has made real estate in hitherto deserted districts valuable. On the tax assessors' books its property is assessed at $4,500,000. It is safe to say that this is less than 25 per cent of its true value.