CHAPTER XI 
ELECTRIC RAILWAY SECURITIES 
The Link Between the Investor and the 
Voter 
BOOKLET on Electric Railway securities 
published recently by one of the largest 
banking houses in this country, reads in 
part as follows:—- 
“As the security of government and municipal 
bonds lies in the ability of the people to pay taxes 
and the extent to which they are burdened there 
with, so the security of the public service corpora 
tion bonds lies not so much in the plants or real 
property possessed as in the degree to which the use 
of their facilities is imperative; things without 
which the people cannot get along; for the extent 
to which their use is absolutely necessary, is their 
support, a tax upon the people; a tax even more 
impossible to escape than those imposed by legisla 
tion, because the laws by which they are levied are 
natural instead of legislative. 
“It is unnecessary to explain in detail the way in 
which public service corporations tax the people, 
their commerce and their industries. The flames 
from burning home and factory quenched by the 
streams from neighboring hydrants prove the worth 
of water bonds. Likewise, the throngs of clerks 
and workmen carried every morning from their 
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