of
argument which has been accepted by the courts as supporting the
constitutionality of the special fund for local improvement purposes is
no less applicable to special debts incurred for the purchase of
revenue-producing public utilities, such as water works, lighting plants
and street railways. Under this arrangement, however, the city must not
assume any responsibility for the payment of the capital borrowed, the
creditors advancing the purchase price or cost of construction, looking
solely to the earnings under municipal operation for the payment of both
principal and interest. It may be doubted whether the courts in
permitting cities to employ the special fund in relation to local
improvements realized its possibilities in the direction of municipal
ownership.[165]

These restrictions upon the powers of cities indicate a fear that too
much local self-government might jeopardize the interests of the
propertied classes. This attitude on the part of those who have framed
and interpreted our state constitutions is merely an expression of that
distrust of majority rule which is, as we have seen, the distinguishing
feature of the American system of government. It is in the cities that
the non-possessing classes are numerically strongest and the inequality
in the distribution of wealth most pronounced. This largely explains the
reluctance of the state to allow cities a free hand in the management of
local affairs. A municipal government responsive to public opinion might
be too much inclined to make the public interests a pretext for
disregarding property rights. State control of cities, then, may be
regarded as a means of protecting the local minority against the local
majority. Every attempt to reform this system must encounter the
opposition of the property-owning class, which is one of the chief
reasons why all efforts to establish municipal self-government have thus
far largely failed.

We thus see that while property qualifications for the suffrage have
disappeared, the influence of property still survives. In many ways and
for many purposes property is directly or indirectly recognized in the
organization and administration of municipal government. The movement
toward democracy has had less influence upon property qualifications for
the suffrage and for office-holding in its relation to municipal than in
its relation to state and national affairs. When the Federal
Constitution was adopted the property qualificat