44 FIRST COUXTY PAEK SYSTEM 



interests as in Essex County, wonlcl, if undertaken to the 

 best advantage, require men especial^ qualified, from 

 tastes, training and experience; and that, as the plan of 

 having men selected because of fitness had been so well re- 

 ceived, the continuation of a similar provision in the new 

 charter might be equally favored by the public. It had been 

 shown that, in many instances where the elective plan of 

 selecting commissioners had been in vogue, the practical 

 results had not been acceptable to the municipalities or to 

 the other local officials, and that ^^practical politics" was not 

 a desirable factor in park making, whatever might be 

 claimed for its contributory influences in other public 

 activities. 



It was solely and only for these reasons that the commis- 

 sion decided for the appointive system, and not with any 

 desire to extend the scope of a method of creating a public 

 board, which, at least theoretically, may be criticized as con- 

 trary to the principles and prerogatives of our whole system 

 of government. Not only were results found to have been 

 unsatisfactory in numerous instances of elective park com- 

 missioners, but conversely in other instances — notably such 

 examples as that of the South Park system of Chicago, 

 where the entire control of all park matters from the incep- 

 tion has been vested in a commission appointed by the 

 courts — the practical workings were found to have been 

 satisfactory. 



HOW SHOULD PARK COMMISSIONERS BE SELECTED. 



To those who believe that any other than the elective plan 

 of creating public boards for the expenditure of public 

 funds is objectionable and un-American, it is due to say 

 that such a plan would have been adopted in drawing up 

 the Essex County Park act of 1895, had not the investiga- 

 tions then made compelled the conviction concurred in by 

 Messrs. Emery and Coult, the able counsel of the first com- 

 mission, that the appointive system was preferable here. 

 Having determined that point, the question arose as to 

 where the authority for making the appointments should 



