Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/233

 THE CIVIC PROBLEM 2 1 7

in turn, is a problem of education. Hence, education in the school and in adult life should be consciously turned toward that end. The evils of city government are due in part to defective teaching in the schools. If the sociological standpoint were there taken; if relative social values were there always consid- ered, and the habit of estimating them were there formed, there would be a readjustment of the curriculum and an improved quality of citizenship. If the voters of this generation had been taught in the schools the economic value of health and life, and the social effects of individual ignorance and action, the passage of a health ordinance as, for instance, against spitting in public places would never have been described as "four-flushing." As the school, however, is not the only educational agency, we need not rely altogether upon it for civic education. There should be the widest diffusion possible of civic knowledge among adults. General publicity of the work of all departments of the municipal service should be secured, not merely by publications of interest to scholars only, but in a form that will appeal to the understanding and the interest of every voter.

Formal education, however, is not the only method of devel- oping the collective will. It should be supplemented by experi- ence. For this reason the public ownership of public utilities is to be encouraged, not only upon economic grounds narrowly con- ceived, but upon the highest civic grounds. Until the govern- ment of a city is lifted into the high prominence and command- ing dignity which the performance of great functions, which touch closely the daily life of every citizen, gives it, the exercise of the right of suffrage will not be in the highest degree educa- tional. From the sociological standpoint, then, municipal owner- ship is not merely an ideal to be striven for, it is an educational necessity.

By this general view of the civic problem I am led, then, to the conclusion that education and municipalization should be the watchwords of municipal reform. Of the details of legisla- tion and governmental machinery I have not spoken; for time would not permit, even if I were competent to do so. But the things to which I have referred are fundamental. The socio-