SECOND  BOSTON  OBJECT  LESSON  77

accordance  with  a  natural  economic  law,  instead  of
a  variable  and  impossible  statute  law.  This  is  all
there  is  in  the  single  tax  of  complexity,  absurdity,
or  impracticability.
The  City  of  Boston  is  lavish  of  its  millions  in  order
that  Washington  Street  space  may  yield  proportionately ­
  more  business,  rhore  profit,  more  convenience,
and  more  satisfaction  to  people.  Enterprising  syndicates ­
  of  men  and  capital  are  ready  and  watching
to  make  the  most  of  the  situation.  It  is  the  unequal
advantage  enjoyed  by  the  owners  of  lots  small  or
large  that  hinders  this  realisation  of  the  city’s  good
intentions.  This  is  the  canker  that  destroys  the
city’s  harvest  from  its  planted  millions.
The  people  tax  themselves  1100,000  to  build  a
beautiful  Milton,  Dorchester,  Newton,  Cambridge,  or
Lynn  boulevard.  Then  straightway  the  same
people  again  pay  interest  on  the  same  outlay  in
the  form  of  ground  rent,  before  they  can  establish
their  homes  and  enter  into  the  enjoyment  of  their
own  benefactions.  In  other  words,  they  deposit
?  100,000  in  the  ground,  and  then  pay  5  per  cent
annually  for  the  privilege  of  appropriating  the
interest  thereon.
Why  should  a  city  which  creates  the  enormous
v a!ue  of  its  land,  be  powerless  to  insure,  or  even  to
facilitate,  the  use  of  it  by  the  provision  of  suitable
buildings  thereon  because  paralysed  and  checkmated
by  unequal  rights  vested  in  the  dead  hand  of  corporations, ­
  trustees,  and  institutions.
German  cities  exercise  themselves  about  the  municipal
  “housing  of  the  poor.”  Why  should  not
American  cities  cast  about  to  remove  the  municipal