Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 53.djvu/639

Rh were freely circulated, and the newspapers took a very active part in the matter.

The vote was taken February 20th. Out of 734,000 citizens entitled to vote, 570,000 exercised their right. The result was a surprise to all. The measure was carried by a vote of 386,634 to 182,718, 200,000 majority, or by more than two to one, when few anticipated a difference of more than 50,000 or 80,000, and some persons considering themselves well informed thought, even the day before the voting, that the scheme would be rejected.

Only a year before—February 28, 1897—the Swiss people had voted against a project for a state bank which had been recommended to them by the same parties that advocated state railroads. Still, we can not infer from this that the people have reversed their position and favored a state socialism this year which they rejected last. The motives that determined their vote seem to be of a different order. The majority of the electors evidently regarded the railroads as a public service of the same kind as the post office, telegraph, etc., and sought to remove all private influences and sense of personal benefit from their management, as well as to free it from foreign influence. The mass of the people trusted to the promises held out of reduction in rates and improvements in all the features of the service. The men employed on the roads exerted a strong and solid influence in favor of the purchase, because they believed they would fare better in the hands of the state than under private owners.

By the vote of the 20th of February the Swiss people have made a decision of extreme importance, which will be certain to react upon the whole political, economical, and social life of the country. It is now for the federal council to see the law carried into effect. On the 2 2d of February it withdrew the concessions from a part of the Northeastern lines. If the repurchase goes on successively according to the terms of the concessions, the confederation will secure possession of the Jura Simplon, Central, Northeastern, and Swiss Union systems in 1903, and of the St. Gothard in 1909. For the purchase of the St. Gothard, negotiations will have to be gone into with Germany and Italy, which furnished considerable subsidies for the construction of the line; and it is further possible that the confederation will secure possession of the whole network before 1903 if it decides to negotiate with the companies, as the law authorizes it to do. If it does not do this, and does not succeed in coming to an understanding as to the price, the federal tribunal will be called upon to decide important questions relative to the calculation of the indemnities to be paid to the stockholders.

The experiment which Switzerland is trying is certainly very instructive. It will be interesting to observe how the confederation