Conservation Commission 11 



taxes on anything but its actual municipal uses of light and 

 power. These provisions of the Bayne bill protected the State 

 on its part; the municipality, on its part, being protected by a 

 requirement that, before any municipality might enter into such 

 a contract, it must be approved by popular referendum vote. 



The Bayne bill received the approval of the Senate of 1912, 

 but failed in the Assembly. It was suggested that so vast a pro- 

 ject as state-wide hydro-electric development ought first to be tried 

 out in a territory more circumscribed in area, and one where all 

 the facts and results incident thereto might be readily and closely 

 followed by everybody. 



The Capital District Bill 



Thereupon the Commission, in 1913, recommended to the 

 Legislature the enactment of the so-called Capital District hydro- 

 electric bill. This was the Bayne bill in miniature; the basic 

 principle was precisely the same, and the same state-wide develop- 

 ment, by the State itself, was provided for ; but the initial hydro- 

 electric development was to be within a restricted area, namely, 

 the so-called Capital District, including Albany, Troy, Schenec- 

 tady and vicinity. This district presented a two-fold advantage, 

 namely, close proximity to the seat of the State government, 

 where results might be studied at first hand, and like close prox- 

 imity to Crescent and Vischer Ferry, whence surplus waters of 

 the Barge canal were to be derived and utilized for cheaper light, 

 heat and power. 



The Capital District bill, commonly known by the name of 

 Senator Murtaugh, its introducer, had from the start a wide- 

 spread popular support, but a determined — not to say a veno- 

 mous — opposition on the part of interests engaged in the manu- 

 facture and sale of electricity for light and power. Every device 

 known to men long skilled in smothering legislation was brought 

 to bear to prevent the passage of the Murtaugh bill in the Legis- 

 lature of 1913. After it had passed the Senate on March 27, 

 by a vote of 35 ayes to 8 noes, the same interests laid siege to 

 the Assembly Rules Committee in a final effort to smother it there, 

 but without avail. The Assembly passed the Murtaugh bill on 

 May 1 by a vote of 97 ayes to 21 noes. Both in the Senate and 



