d and
impossible; everybody knew that justice waited to be done. Very well,
then, why wasn't it done?

There was another thing that we wanted to do: We wanted to regulate our
public service corporations so that we could get the proper service from
them, and on reasonable terms. That had been done elsewhere, and where it
had been done it had proved just as much for the benefit of the
corporations themselves as for the benefit of the people. Of course it was
somewhat difficult to convince the corporations. It happened that one of
the men who knew the least about the subject was the president of the
Public Service Corporation of New Jersey. I have heard speeches from that
gentleman that exhibited a total lack of acquaintance with the
circumstances of our times. I have never known ignorance so complete in
its detail; and, being a man of force and ignorance, he naturally set all
his energy to resist the things that he did not comprehend.

I am not interested in questioning the motives of men in such positions. I
am only sorry that they don't know more. If they would only join the
procession they would find themselves benefited by the healthful exercise,
which, for one thing, would renew within them the capacity to learn which
I hope they possessed when they were younger. We were not trying to do
anything novel in New Jersey in regulating the Public Service Corporation;
we were simply trying to adopt there a tested measure of public justice.
We adopted it. Has anybody gone bankrupt since? Does anybody now doubt
that it was just as much for the benefit of the Public Service Corporation
as for the people of the State?

Then there was another thing that we modestly desired: We wanted fair
elections; we did not want candidates to buy themselves into office. That
seemed reasonable. So we adopted a law, unique in one particular, namely:
that if you bought an office, you didn't get it. I admit that that is
contrary to all commercial principles, but I think it is pretty good
political doctrine. It is all very well to put a man in jail for buying an
office, but it is very much better, besides putting him in jail, to show
him that if he has paid out a single dollar for that office, he does not
get it, though a huge majority voted for him. We reversed the laws of
trade; when you buy something in politics in New Jersey, you do not get
it. It seemed to us that that was the best way to discourage improper
political argument. If your mone