CLEVELAND'S JOHNSON
by EUGENE
C. MURDOCK
Professor of History, Rio Grande
College
In the northwest corner of Cleveland's
spacious Public Square,
amid the clatter and clang of passing
streetcars and buses, sits a
bronze statue. The figure, a heavily
built man with thinning hair
and firm features, rises six feet above
the circular pedestal. He re-
poses comfortably in his easy chair and
gazes reflectively out across
the nation's seventh city. The right
hand clasps a small book, which
rests easily on the right knee. Those
few who take the trouble to
investigate, learn that this
unpretentious volume bears the name of
Henry George's great treatise, Progress
and Poverty.
Thousands of hurrying Clevelanders
daily rush past this statue,
never turning, never wondering. To them
it is as commonplace and
as uninteresting as the corner
lamppost. It has always been there and
no doubt always will, so why bother
about it. Still, in the warm
summer evenings, people of varying
stations foregather on the
pedestal to discourse on sundry
subjects. Quite often an inebriate
may be observed sitting in the lap of
the statue making amorous
propositions to it. In the wintry
snows, the thin layer of white gives
it an almost celestial air. To that
limited extent it is an object of
periodic attraction.
This monument of Tom Loftin Johnson was
erected in 1912, the
year after his death, yet not many
Clevelanders today can honestly
say they know of him, or can speak
intelligently of what he did for
their city. For the first few years
following his passing, it was cus-
tomary to hold memorial services
commemorating his birth. But
gradually, as time went by, these
occasions became more infrequent,
until finally they ceased to occur at
all. As the last remnants of the
once famous "Johnson circle,"
the Witts, the Payers, the Gongwers,
and the Stages, take their final leave
of the world, the spirit of this
momentous era is all but lost.
Cleveland cannot boast a more
controversial figure than Tom L.
Johnson. And like all controversial
figures, he became controversial
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Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
by doing big things. He sought to
change Cleveland from a second-
rate country town, to a first class
urban center. In effecting such a
great transformation, he quite
naturally trod on sensitive toes, and a
bitter opposition evolved. His fights
for municipal ownership of the
public utilities, equalized taxation,
natural gas, and the three cent
fare, all struck hard at entrenched
interests, or, as Johnson termed
them collectively,
"Privilege." After these forty years, certain public
service corporations still see
"red" at the mention of his name.
The "common people," on the
other hand, were usually united in
their support of Johnson. His victories
were their victories and they
idolized him for them. The tent
meetings which he popularized
were regular forums in municipal
government and brought the
people close to the real functionings
of the administration. Cynics
commented that Johnson had the people
hypnotized. It was more
than that, however. He put his heart,
his soul, his fortune, into the
struggle to improve the city and free
it from the clutches of "Priv-
ilege." In the end it cost him his
health and his wealth, and when
he was finally turned out of office
after nine years of service, he was
a broken, ruined man.
* * *
During the half-century of history
preceding Johnson's adminis-
tration, Cleveland had emerged from its
swaddling clothes into the
garb of cocky adolescence. No longer a
sparsely settled farm com-
munity, its population had experienced
a tenfold increase to make it
the nation's seventh city.1 Three
thousand industrial concerns now
produced goods annually valued at
$140,000,000. "Skyscrapers"
dotted downtown areas. Paved streets
had supplanted wooden
plank roads. Electric lights and street
railways appeared. Great
bridges, such as the Superior and
Central Avenue viaducts, united
the city's two bluffs, thereby
eliminating the treacherous and time-
consuming journey through the flats.
The retail shopping center,
originally west of the Public Square,
expanded eastward along his-
toric Euclid Avenue, converting that
former beauty spot into a
crowded business center. Peripheral
territorial annexations, such as
1 In 1860 the city's population was
43,000; by 1900 it had jumped to 380,000. First
and second generation foreign immigrants
constituted almost two-thirds of this figure.
Cleveland's Johnson 325
old East Cleveland, Newburgh, West
Cleveland, and Brooklyn Vil-
lage, gave the city a greatly enlarged
and well-balanced geographical
appearance.
The most notable aspect of this
transition related to the spon-
taneous sprouting of immense industrial
establishments. Strategic-
ally located, Cleveland was certain to
become a great manufacturing
center. Its lake position facilitated
access to the ore regions to the
north and the coal deposits to the
south and east. Although by the
seventies it was the center of
petroleum refining, the discovery of
the Mesabi and Vermilion iron ranges in
the eighties signaled its
real growth. By illustration,
Cleveland's iron and steel industry in
1860 did a business of about $5,000,000.
At the time Johnson be-
came mayor in 1901 this had increased
to $40,000,000. One hundred
and twenty-seven foundries now existed,
compared to eight in the
earlier year. Fifteen thousand
employees earned $9,500,000. Dur-
ing the nineties the Lake Superior
district produced 9,000,000 tons
of iron ore, over half the amount
consumed in the United States.
Of this total, Cleveland and adjacent
lake ports received sixty-one
percent. In addition, Cleveland
companies owned most of the mines,
eighty percent of the lake vessels, and
controlled all Lake Erie
ports, save Erie and Buffalo. Lamson
and Sessions, Warner and
Swasey, National Malleable and Steel
Castings, Ohio Foundry, and
White Sewing Machine were but a few of
the important manufac-
turing concerns founded in this period.
This industrial revolution necessitated
important adjustments in
all areas of social Cleveland. The
police department was organized,
the fire department was greatly
increased, colleges were opened, the
public school system was enlarged and
modernized, and the public
library was founded. Other civic and
professional groups organized
in this period of change included the
Western Reserve Historical
Society, Union Club, Cleveland Bar
Association, Cleveland Orches-
tra, University Club, and Chamber of
Commerce. Among the im-
portant new public facilities were
Charity Hospital, Union Railroad
Station, Fairmount and Kinsman
reservoirs, and Grays and Central
armories.
Cleveland, like other rising cities,
was unprepared for this social
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Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
revolution. Its political development
was retarded. Graft and in-
efficiency, characteristic of other
municipal governments, was not
unknown. Politicians managed the city
not as trustees of the people,
but as servants of the public service
corporations. As a consequence,
streets went unpaved, garbage was not
collected, and unsightly
shacks and homes endangered the health
of thousands. By com-
parison with the business community,
citizens were taxed out of all
proportion to their holdings. Unlearned
and apathetic, the public
remained mute. Well aware of this
problem, Johnson was to dedi-
cate his administration in Cleveland to
its solution.2
Although little has been published on
Johnson's career, his ac-
complishments are reasonably well known
to students of the Pro-
gressive era.3 Born into a
fairly well-to-do Kentucky family in 1854,
he saw his father lose all his wealth
and property in the Civil War.
Forced to make his own way at the age
of fifteen, he shortly became
a successful street railway owner in
Indianapolis and the inventor of
numerous gadgets for street railway
cars. By his twenty-fifth birth-
day he possessed a modest fortune and
was looking for wider hori-
zons. Foreseeing a promising commercial
future in the Great Lakes
region, he transferred his traction
operations to Cleveland in 1879.
In a short time he had purchased two
street railway companies, intro-
duced, among other advanced reforms,
universal transfers and
through lines, and had become the
"boy wonder" of the business
community. His vision, energy, and
daring moved him quickly into
the front rank of street railway
owners. To obtain steel rails for his
lines, Johnson became a steel
manufacturer, and by the mid-nineties,
when he sold his holdings, he was
listed among the nation's seven
leading steel producers.
2 Charles A. Post, Doans Corners and
the City Four Miles West (Cleveland, 1930);
William G. Rose, Cleveland: The
Making of a City (Cleveland, 1950); Samuel P.
Orth, A History of Cleveland, Ohio (3
vols., Chicago and Cleveland, 1910), I;
Wilfred H. and Miriam R. Alburn, This
Cleveland of Ours (4 vols., Chicago and
Cleveland, 1933), II; James H. Kennedy, A
History of the City of Cleveland . . . 1796-
1896 (Cleveland, 1896).
3 See Robert H. Bremner, "Tom L. Johnson," Ohio State
Archaeological and His-
torical Quarterly, LIX (1950), 1-13. Bremner's doctoral dissertation at
Ohio State
University in 1943, "The Civic
Revival in Ohio," a full treatment of the Progressive
movement in Ohio, contains considerable
data on Johnson. The author's own doctoral
dissertation at Columbia University in
1951, "A Life of Tom L. Johnson," is the only
volume devoted exclusively to Johnson.
Cleveland's Johnson 327
Johnson first met Henry George, the
great single tax economist-
philosopher, in 1885. Their friendship,
lasting until George's death
in 1897, was one of crucial importance
to Johnson. Until this time
he had been fully absorbed in business,
and had found no occasion
to study society nor to analyze the
social implications of the indus-
trial revolution. To him business and
money-making were all im-
portant. Electrifying lines, improving
fareboxes, consolidating street
railway systems--these and other
problems left little time for re-
flection. Basically, however, Johnson
was a humanitarian and
George's teachings found receptive soil
in him. An enlightened em-
ployer, he had never subscribed to
sweatshop practices, although in
truth it must be said that his liberal
employing policies were guided
chiefly by business motives. Then too
he had never read widely, and
was not versed in "comparative
government." Thus such works as
Social Problems and Progress and Poverty met no intellectual
im-
pediments in awakening Johnson's
"social conscience." Having
thought little about our changing
society, he was overwhelmed by
George's ideas.
Johnson experienced serious misgivings
in equating his profitable
business career with the single tax. On
several occasions he seriously
considered selling all of his business
properties, but George dis-
suaded him, suggesting that he apply
his business profits to "the
cause." Although following this
advice for the time being, he
eventually divested himself of the
street railways and steel com-
panies and turned to a career in
politics. Running as a Democrat,
Johnson won election to the house of
representatives in 1890 and
1892, where he continually espoused
single tax doctrine. He fre-
quently advocated many things which
were directly opposed to his
private interests, as when he argued
for free steel-rail imports at a
time when he himself was producing such
a commodity. This
afforded skeptical congressmen the
opportunity to cry "insincerity,"
an opportunity they did not neglect.
The charge was unfounded,
however, and represents a failure to
understand the real Johnson.
He personally was aware of his
anomalous position, situated in a
twilight zone between capitalism and
the single tax, and by aban-
doning his business career he sought to
end his embarrassment. But
the pre-Georgian Johnson and the
post-Georgian Johnson were two
328
Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
different men, and any attempt to treat
their respective political
philosophies as those of one man, is to
commit an injustice on
Johnson.
Yet in spite of his keen, imaginative
mind, Johnson possessed a
monistic outlook, that is to say, all
political and social affairs were
interpreted in the light of his single
tax orientation. He opposed the
income tax, was unsympathetic to
organized labor, and was unin-
terested in imperialism. In these and
other matters he went against
orthodox liberal doctrine as then
advocated by leading Progressives.
He was with the Progressives, truly
enough, in overall objectives,
but differed with them decidedly in method.
It is therefore difficult
to neatly classify Johnson's
philosophy; in general it consisted of a
hodge-podge of "radical"
ideas, bound together by a deep-seated
humanitarianism and single tax
liberalism.
Johnson was mayor of Cleveland from
April 4, 1901, to January 1,
1910. During those nine years he was
engaged in almost unending
strife with various elements of the
community. His efforts at reform
touched everyone, and it was not long
before people were lining up
either with him or against him. The
street railway war dominated
other matters, particularly in the
later years, and the exertion re-
quired in this exhausting struggle led
directly to Johnson's death.
The mayor desired a three cent street
railway system, municipally
owned and operated. Because municipal
ownership was then un-
constitutional, he organized
privately-owned low fare companies to
break the monopoly of the old five cent
companies. The bitter fight
raged from 1903 to 1907, with the low
fare interests making tor-
tuously slow progress through an
obstacle course of injunctions. The
culmination came in the fall of 1907,
when each side carried its case
to the public in the Burton-Johnson
mayoralty campaign. Johnson's
fourth successive victory signaled the
triumph of the low fare cause,
and following protracted negotiations,
a settlement was reached in
April 1908. Municipal ownership was not
the expected success,
however, and a disastrous strike,
serious financial problems, and an
adverse referendum vote in October 1908
marked its early demise.
Yet within the following year and a
half, a modified version of
Johnson's three cent plan was hammered
into shape. Although the
Cleveland's Johnson 329
mayor opposed this compromise, known as
the Tayler Plan, it ade-
quately served the needs of the Forest
City for a generation.
Another of Johnson's great campaigns
was fought over taxation.
His studies in Washington and his own
personal experience had
pointed up sharply the glaring
injustices of the prevailing system.
Bogart observed that "small
taxpayers generally were paying full
rates while the public service
corporations, steam railroads, and
large landowning interests were paying
between 10 and 20%,
only a fraction of the amount required
by law. More than half the
personal property and nearly all the
valuable privileges were escap-
ing taxation."4 For nine months
Johnson battled the steam rail-
roads, seeking to convince the various
boards of county auditors how
inadequately the companies were usually
appraised. Documentary
proof, assembled by Professor Edward W.
Bemis, demonstrated
these errors, and public admissions by
company officials substantiat-
ing the charges should have convinced
the most doubtful skeptic
that reforms were required. Yet hiding
behind tradition and obscure
legislation, county and state officials
failed to authorize any increases.
During the hot summer of 1901 strenuous
efforts were made to
raise the valuations of Cleveland's
five public service corporations,
which, like the railroads, were also
paying incredibly low amounts.
Following heated hearings and stormy
debates, the local equalization
board raised the corporations'
collective property valuations from
$4,000,000 to $20,000,000. This
appeared to be an important vic-
tory for Johnson, but the following
winter a state board of review,
unfriendly to his administration,
overthrew the whole return on a
technicality. The final phase of the
tax struggle concerned local
real estate appraisals. Here Johnson
employed the Somers "unit"
system 5 of scientific valuation and
established the "Tax School,"
under Peter Witt's direction, to
promote knowledge of it. Although
the courts abolished the tax school
within a year's time for improper
use of taxpayers' money, it had already
done tremendous spadework
in public education on tax affairs.
These preliminary moves prompt-
4 Ernest L. Bogart, Financial History
of Ohio (University of Illinois Studies in the
Social Sciences, No. 1, Urbana-Champaign, Ill., 1912), 243-245.
5 W. A. Somers, "Valuation of City
Real Estate for Taxation," Municipal Affairs, V
(1901), 401-418.
330
Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
ed a fifteen month investigation of the
state tax laws, resulting in a
new statute that included many of
Johnson's ideas. Passed in March
1909, the new law called for
quadrennial appraisals, by appraisers
chosen without reference to party. The
first study in Cleveland pro-
duced a valuation hundreds of millions
of dollars above any previous
figure. Johnson, though a dying man at
the time, thus saw one of
his cherished ideals realized.
Johnson made other contributions to
Cleveland's welfare which
are not so well known. Over the
vigorous opposition of the artificial
gas companies he brought natural gas to
Cleveland. Despite argu-
ments that the supply of natural gas
would give out shortly and that
it was dangerous for domestic use, he
gave his full support to the
natural gas people. The franchise they
secured in time cut the cost
of gas to the public from eighty cents
to thirty cents per thousand
cubic feet. He established a municipal
light plant, again over stren-
uous opposition, this time from the
privately owned Cleveland
Electric Illuminating Company. The less
expensive operation of the
municipal plant caused the C. E. I. to
lower its prices almost twenty
percent in three years time. The
successful fight for home rule was
another stirring Johnsonian triumph. As
with taxation, the fruits of
victory here accrued not only to
Cleveland, but to all municipalities
in the state. The fact that much of
Johnson's work in Cleveland was
undone by state authorities in
Columbus, caused him, early in his
administration, to move for the
complete independence of local
governments. Few people realized what a
stranglehold the state
government held on the communities, and
it was no easy task to
educate the public into a proper
understanding of the situation.
Years of effort along this line were
rewarded in 1912 when the
fourth Ohio constitutional convention
convened. Although Johnson
had died the preceding year, his friend
Herbert Bigelow led the
home rule forces at the convention and
won a smashing victory.
Dictation from Columbus on purely local
affairs was over.
The mayor's enlightened outlook on
crime and punishment led to
the construction of the beautiful and
forward-looking Warrensville
Colony Farm. Harris R. Cooley, whose
advanced ideas on correction
won him world-wide acclaim, was the
moving force behind Warrens-
Cleveland's Johnson 331
ville. Within several years, the new
workhouse, the poorhouse
(Colony Farm), the tuberculosis
sanitarium, and the city cemetery
were completed and ready for use.
Frederic C. Howe visited War-
rensville in 1907 and was amazed at
what he saw. Unguarded prison-
ers were grading land and building
roads and sewers. Others dug
in a stone quarry. Further on more
prisoners were gathering crops
and grain. No prison garb, no ball and
chain, and no barbed-wire
enclosure. It seemed incredible to
learn that attempted escapes were
few, and that those most angered at
such violations of the honor
system were the prisoners themselves.
Howe was so excited that he
hurried home and wrote a magazine
article about it.6 A revolution-
ary innovation at Colony Farm was the
arrangement whereby aged
married couples were permitted to live
out their years together rather
than being herded into barren
segregated dormitories. Some visitors
were moved to tears upon reading the
inscription above the old
people's cottage: "It is better to
lose money than to lose love."
The Group Plan development on the Mall
is another graphic
reminder of the Johnson era. Efforts to
undertake the project began
before Johnson became mayor, but the
real impetus was provided by
his administration. Although the new
railroad terminal was finally
located on the Public Square rather
than at the head of the Mall as
the Group Planners desired, and
although the west side of the Mall
was never developed, the Group Plan
wiped out an aching eyesore
and substituted a roomy, landscaped,
civic center. Among Johnson's
minor achievements were the
establishment of a forestry department;
the construction of three public
bathhouses; the paving of 210 miles
of streets, an increase of 125%; the
development of a new
municipal department to collect ashes,
wastepaper, and refuse; the
abolition of sixteen grade crossings
with eight more in progress,
whereas only one had been previously
eliminated; and the intro-
duction of money-saving water meters.
It is just that Johnson today occupies
an important place in the
history of the Progressive movement. In
him were combined a rare
wisdom, knowledge, and understanding of
the many problems which
6 "A City in the Life-Saving
Business," Outlook, LXXXVIII (1908), 123-127.
332
Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Quarterly
confronted municipal leaders. Distilled
from a successful career in
business and politics, and a sustained
study of the single tax, these
attributes made of him a unique figure.
Of the many outstanding
municipal Progressives, only Johnson
successfully united a resource-
ful political method with an acute
"social conscience." Hazen
Pingree, though impelled by enlightened
ideas, knew little of poli-
tics. Similarly, "Golden
Rule" Jones sought to rectify social wrong
through his philosophical-anarchistic
administration. Brand Whit-
lock, "the artist in
politics," also was ill equipped to deal harshly
with corporate wealth.
Along with such men as Pingree, Jones,
Whitlock, and others,
Johnson constructed a new concept of
government. Heretofore
government existed to provide police
protection for citizens and
private property. It cared for the
so-called "housekeeping" duties.
It was not expected to go into business
itself, and seldom did. All
the major services were contracted by
private companies and paid by
the city. Street railways, gas, and
lighting, the principal public
services, were managed by private
concerns with a minimum of
municipal supervision. The traditional
mayor handled the routine
chores and let the public service
corporations attend to the large
jobs. By these standards Cleveland had
many good mayors. Honest,
conscientious, civic-minded--these men
did what the public expected
of them, but no more.
Yet in the history of the city, Johnson
has been Cleveland's only
great mayor. To him the "housekeeping" tasks were
incidental. As
Raymond Moley said, they were mere
details, like "pressed pants
and shiny shoes."7 The major job
was something greater. It meant
broadening the function of the city,
making it completely responsible
for the well-being and comfort of the
citizens. Johnson's fight
against the public service corporations
was not motivated by a ruth-
less lust for power, as some critics
argued; on the contrary, it was
specifically designed to bring cheaper
and better services to the
people. Municipalization, he felt,
would accomplish this. It did
succeed in reducing rates, and although
the standard of the services
was probably lowered, Johnson honestly
believed that the standard
7 Raymond Moley, 27 Masters of
Politics (New York, 1949) 7.
Cleveland's Johnson 333
would be raised. This revolutionary
idea of expanded governmental
services, brought down on Johnson's
head storms of heartless abuse.
Yet many of our important national
leaders experienced similar
treatment for seeking to enlarge the
function of government.
Lincoln, Wilson, and the Roosevelts,
all were roundly criticized for
simply recognizing that in our rapidly
developing country some
regulation of business in the interest
of the people at large was
necessary. They saw far more than did
their fellows--who prophe-
sied anarchy and chaos--the real needs
of their times. Johnson was
in good company.
As the centenary of his birth
approaches, Cleveland is reminded
of Tom L. Johnson, though only
infrequently, by his Public Square
monument. Few contemporaries can tell
why he deserved such a
monument. Many would be astounded to
learn how much of mod-
ern Cleveland is directly traceable to
Johnson. The tangibles, such
as natural gas, water meters, municipal
lighting, the rapidly disap-
pearing street railways, the Group Plan
and Warrensville, have al-
ready been noted. Commonplace as they
now appear, they were
considered revolutionary at one time,
and heated battles were waged
to secure them. Johnson, undeterred by
criticism and corporate op-
position, led this fight. Mechanically
he brought the city abreast of
its growing industrial character.
The intangible contributions of Johnson
are more difficult to de-
lineate. Primarily, he awakened the
civic consciousness of the peo-
ple. He educated them in city
government--made them interested
in it. As his accomplishments attracted
national attention, the people
felt a deep pride in Cleveland. They
considered themselves partici-
pants in a great experiment in
democracy. It constituted a necessary
and valuable experience. Cleveland
needed Tom Johnson, for as
Edmund Vance Cooke descriptively wrote:
He found us groping, leaderless and
blind,
He left a city with a civic mind.