ter 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.

"If Dr. Lunn should attempt to meddle with the 'G. E.'s'
assessment, Schenectady knows very well what would happen. The
General Electric Company would pack up and move away to some other
town that is pining for a nice big factory and does not care much
how small taxes it pays. That is the situation. Of course everybody
agrees that the company ought to be paying more, but when it comes
to a question of leaving well enough alone or losing the company
entirely, Schenectady says leave well enough alone, by all means.
The loss of the 'G. E.' works would be a disaster, from which the
Old Dorp would never recover. Why, even now the company has just
opened a brand new plant in Erie, Philadelphia, and if Schenectady
does not behave, what is to prevent the 'G. E.' from moving all its
belongings to Erie?

"Dr. Lunn has not had much to say regarding this phase of his
taxation reforms. The day after his election he issued a statement,
however, which showed that he did not intend to do anything
extremely radical:--

"'In the matter of taxation we have had something to say during the
campaign, but we Socialists are too good economists not to know
that the burdening of our local industries in the way of taxation
above that placed upon them in other cities would be foolhardy.
Under the present system, to which we are opposed, manufactu