to its rival. The consolidated company promptly increased its stock
by at least the amount which had been spent in purchasing and laying
this extra and entirely needless set of gas mains. The public has to pay
interest on this sum, and suffer besides the damage done to the
pavements by tearing up and re-laying.

In at least twenty cities of the United States has this farce been
repeated, and in every case with the same result. It is now generally
acknowledged that the attempt to regulate the price of gas by
competition is unwise and harmful. Prof. E. J. James, of the University
of Pennsylvania, in a monograph entitled "The Relation of the Modern
Municipality to the Gas Supply," has treated this subject most fully. He
describes the experience of cities in England, France, and Germany,
where competition has been tried and abandoned, it being found by dear
experience that the gas business is necessarily a monopoly. A
Congressional Committee, who reported on the application of a rival gas
company which proposed to lay mains in the city of Washington, declared
that "it is bad policy to permit more than one gas company in the same
part of the city." One of the best informed men in the gas business
says: "The business is almost outside of the domain of rules governing
other enterprises. Competition is so deadly to it that it is impossible
for rival companies to occupy the same street without ruin to both, or
without consolidation with its attendant double investment, and cheap
light is thus rendered an impossibility."

Hon. T. M. Cooley says:

"The supply of public conveniences to a city is usually a monopoly,
and the protection of the public against excessive charges is to be
found first in the municipal power of control. Except in the very
large cities, public policy requires that for supplying light and
water there should be but one corporation, because one can perform
the service at lower rates than two or more, and in the long run
will be sure to do so. In some kinds of business competition will
keep corporations within bounds in their charges; in others it will
not. When it will not, it may become necessary to legislate upon
profits."

Considering it determined, therefore, that the gas industry is a
monopoly, let us inquire something of the manner in which this monopoly
regulates the prices for its service. According to recent statistics,
collected from 683 gas compan