The City for the People: Or, The Municipalization of the City Government and of Local Franchises

Parsons argues that municipal government is 'the problem of the age' because it touches citizens' daily lives far more than state or national government—determining the water they drink, the air they breathe, the streets they walk, public order, education, and conveyance . The problem is that cities are governed for politicians and monopolists rather than for the people. In the preface, Parsons asks whether 'the People's cities' shall be given over to syndicates and corporations, and whether councils shall have power to legislate against the people's will . The book is an attempt to answer these questions and outline the means by which a city may become a city for the People.

Municipalization is the transfer of ownership and control of public services and utilities from private corporations to local government . Parsons argues this would lead to greater efficiency, lower costs, and better service for citizens. The local franchises specifically targeted include street railway lines, gas works, and electric utilities—enterprises that had been granted monopolistic privileges by city governments and were operating for private profit. Parsons's argument is that 'the People's cities' should not build costly streets and then give them to gas and electric trusts and street railway companies for the private profit of a few individuals .

The book was 'distinctly the joint product of the author and the publisher,' according to a contemporary review in the International Journal of Ethics . Parsons's own preface states that the volume was begun at the request of Dr. Taylor, that its general plan was substantially the one Taylor proposed, and that Taylor's criticisms and suggestions were 'of the greatest value' in working out the plan . Taylor had planned the Equity Series to deal with leading public questions, and Parsons's work on municipal problems was incorporated into it. The collaboration was substantive, not merely commercial.

Reviews identified a tension between Parsons's scientific pretensions and his partisan commitments. Samuel E. Sparling, writing in Municipal Affairs, stated that 'the reader should remember that while the author has written avowedly in a scientific spirit, he is obviously a partisan' . Sparling found that Parsons made no serious attempt to show both sides of questions, raising them only for the purpose of refutation, and criticized an 'intemperate literary style' with loose classification typical of propagandist literature . Arthur Mann's assessment was blunter: the volume was 'poorly organized, dull, rambling, and overlong' . The Arena, by contrast, called it 'the best work on twentieth-century municipal government extant' .

The first edition was published in 1900 by C. F. Taylor in Philadelphia as 597 pages, volume 1, number 3 of the Equity Series . A revised edition appeared in 1901, expanded to 704 pages with illustrations . This revision was substantial enough that the title page specifies 'Revision August, 1901.' The book was reissued in facsimile by Kessinger Publishing in 2010 . It is now in the public domain and available in full view through HathiTrust from multiple university libraries including the University of California, Harvard, and the New York Public Library .

Parsons devotes chapters to direct legislation and proportional representation as mechanisms for transferring power from political machines to citizens. The International Journal of Ethics review noted that these chapters had been 'recently elaborated and republished' and made 'a thorough and useful treatment of these important themes' . Direct legislation—the initiative and referendum—would allow citizens to legislate directly when councils refused to act or acted against the popular will. Proportional representation would ensure that minority viewpoints received representation in city councils rather than being excluded by winner-take-all elections. These chapters were extracted and published separately as The Bondage of Cities in 1900 .