rk any hardship upon property owners, but rather
to give them the power to authorize the employment of credit for their
own advantage. They were protected against the abuse of this particular
kind of indebtedness inasmuch as the consent of the owners of a majority
of the property affected was quite generally required.

One influence which helped to mold a public sentiment in favor of
constitutional provisions limiting the amount of municipal indebtedness
was the rapid increase in the debts of American cities during the period
that immediately followed the Civil war. For this condition of affairs
the state government itself was largely to blame. It had prescribed a
form of municipal organization which was scarcely compatible with an
efficient and responsible management of financial matters. Moreover, the
state government, as we have seen, could empower its own agents to
borrow money for a purpose which it had authorized and obligate the city
to pay it. The effort to correct these evils, first noticeable about the
year 1870, took the form of constitutional provisions limiting the
amount of indebtedness which could be incurred by or on behalf of
cities. The main object of these provisions was to protect municipal
taxpayers against an extravagant use of the borrowing power for local
purposes, whether exercised by state or municipal authorities.

Another advantage which these provisions seemed likely to secure to the
capital-owning class deserves at least a passing mention. This policy of
limiting the amount of municipal indebtedness was adopted at a time
when, owing to the rapid growth of urban population, the local
monopolies of water, light, transportation, etc., were becoming an
important and extremely profitable field for the investment of private
capital. The restrictions imposed upon the power of cities to borrow
money would retard, if not preclude, the adoption of a policy of
municipal ownership and thus enable the private capitalist to retain
exclusive possession of this important class of industries.

That the constitutional restrictions upon the general indebtedness of
cities have retarded the movement toward municipal ownership is beyond
question. It is not likely, however, that they will much longer block
the way to municipal acquisition of those industries in which private
management has proven unsatisfactory, since it may be possible to evade
them by resorting to the device of a _special fund_. The same line