AN OBJECT LESSON IN SOCIAL REFORM. 307 



bill admit tliat the raising of such a fund by voluntary subscrip- 

 tion would be impracticable, and only through legislative action, 

 authorizing the construction of such paths along our common 

 highways by a small annual tax, can this much-needed public im- 

 provement be consummated." 



A curious feature of the discussion, one common to the argu- 

 ments of the most enlightened as well as the most ignorant that 

 took part in it, was the amazing exhibition of selfishness, and 

 of indifference to the rights of others. " The millennium is too far 

 ahead," wrote another defender of the bill, impatient with the 

 delay involved in voluntary enterprise, and convinced of the 

 perfect propriety of coercing the bicyclists that did not care to 

 contribute. " Only a few of the present generation of riders will 

 be able to enjoy the full benefits of that network of good roads 

 promised when that time comes. Our largest interest is in the 

 present. We are selfish enough to want a few of the good things 

 now that are sure to come in abundance hereafter." Then, to 

 show how just the tax was, since it was levied on bicyclists 

 only, and how glad they would be to pay it, since all were taxed 

 alike, he added : " We only ask those interested to contribute 

 their mite. Every wheelman will be willing to pay his tax if he 

 knows that his neighbor, who is a wheelman, will do the same. 

 When a rider tells me he is against the bill because he is pay- 

 ing for something he does not use, I know that it is the one 

 dollar, not the man, that is kicking. Every rider will use the 

 best path, whether it be a side path or a road. This is human 

 nature." Alluding, finally, to the people willing to avail them- 

 selves of what he was pleased to call, with infinite scorn, " the 

 free-lunch way of going through life," he said : " Could we get 

 the free-lunchers to pay a dollar if they were not forced to ? 

 No ; but they will use the paths just the same, and kick if they 

 are not kept in good repair." 



How often have these arguments been made to do duty for all 

 sorts of schemes to promote " the general welfare " ! How force- 

 ful and admirable they appear to the excellent persons that frame 

 them ! In the first place, the tax was such a little one ; no one 

 could be too poor to pay it. In the second place, people would be 

 so delighted to pay compulsorily what they would not pay volun- 

 tarily ! In the third place, "could anything be more commendable 

 than the suppression of " the free-lunch way of going through 

 life," and the forcing of these odious " kickers " to pay for the 

 paths they would be glad to have at other people's expense ? Only 

 one thing could be more commendable, and that is for those good 

 people that want something done for their own benefit to pay for 

 it themselves ; only one thing could be more odious, and that is 

 for these same people to get a law enacted to compel others to help 



