264: FIEST COUXTY PAEK SYSTEM 



quest had been allowed to rest in the pigeon-hole archives 

 of both the Board of Freeholders and of the Orange City 

 Council, without either report or favorable action all that 

 time. 



When, however, the Public Service Corporation managers 

 recognized that, with the rising tide of public sentiment, 

 should they continue to contend for both avenues, they 

 "might fall backward and lose both,^^ the yielding of one — 

 the least valuable for either parkway or trolley way — was 

 reluctantly agreed upon. Presto ! The precedent of the 

 freeholders, which, since 1896, had been promulgated as a 

 principle, almost too sacred or too important to be waved 

 or broken, viz., that the board should not, and could not, 

 act on the avenue transfer question until after the local 

 governing boards directly interested had taken action, was 

 at once cast to the winds. The Orange authorities had not 

 only failed to act favorably on Park avenue, but had then, 

 three times, expressly declined to make the transfer of both 

 avenues. Notwithstanding this action and the "precedent'' 

 mentioned, the Board of Freeholders promptly and form- 

 ally transferred Park avenue June 11, 1903, and the formal 

 acceptance "with thanks of the Park Commission^' soon 

 followed. 



These acts and facts proved more clearly than words, that 

 really nothing had stood in the way of the prompt transfer 

 and parkway use of both avenues for years, excepting the 

 baneful, liidden hand of the corporate giant, which was 

 continuously pulling the strings behind the scenes, and ma- 

 nipulating the toy officials to do its bidding in thus thwart- 

 ing the will of the people, and depriving them of both their 

 parkways and franchise possessions. 



