In other cases it claims an absolute
monopoly, and shuts off entirely private enterprise, as in the
conveyance of letters and telegrams, and the local industries connected
with the production and distribution of gas and water. The extent and
complexity of that portion of our State and municipal machinery which is
engaged in productive work will be understood from the following
description--
"Besides our international relations, and the army, navy, police, and
the courts of justice, the community now carries on for itself, in some
part or another of these islands, the post-office, telegraphs, carriage
of small commodities, coinage, surveys the regulation of the currency
and note issue, the provision of weights and measures, the making,
sweeping, lighting, and repairing of streets, roads, and bridges, life
insurance, the grant of annuities, shipbuilding, stockbroking, banking,
farming, and money-lending. It provides for many of us from birth to
burial--midwifery, nursery, education, board and lodging, vaccination,
medical attendance, medicine, public worship, amusements, and interment.
It furnishes and maintains its own museums, parks, art galleries,
libraries, concert-halls, roads, bridges, markets, slaughterhouses,
fire-engines, lighthouses, pilots, ferries, surf-boats, steam-tugs,
life-boats, cemeteries, public baths, washhouses, pounds, harbours,
piers, wharves, hospitals, dispensaries, gas-works, water-works,
tramways, telegraph-cables, allotments, cow-meadows, artisans'
dwellings, schools, churches, and reading-rooms.
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