STATE WATER COMMISSION FOR NEW JERSEY.

STATE WATER COMMISSION FOR NEW JERSEY.

A Jersey City correspondent writes that "there seems to be little doubt that the State water commission recommended by Governor Stokes, and, after investigation, carried in its report to the legislature by the potable water commission will become an accomplished fact. Senator Hillcry has introduced the bill in the senate. The bill is not all that might be desired, and might be construed as allowing the State to confirm rights or claims of rights that are at least doubtful, especially those claimed in the water of the Passaic as asserted by the East Jersey Water company and questioned by the potable water commission. The words of that body’s report arc to the effect that the East Jersey Water company was incorporated under the corporation act of 1875, and that the provisions of that act and its supplements, ‘so far as they relate to the incorporation of companies for the purpose of storing, diverting and selling water are in effect restricted solely to the Delaware river. By incorporating under this act, the East Jersey Water company could acquire no charter rights to store, divert and sell water from the Passaic river.’ At the same time, ‘the court has emphatically stated ‘‘that the common law recognises no right in the riparian owner, as such, to divert water from the streams, in order to make merchandise of it.” ’ l'he report adds that the statute law has not ‘changed the rule of the common law. so as to make the water of our lakes and streams the subject matter of commerce in the ordinary sense.’ If a State water commission is created, the law establishing it should be so framed as to make that statutorychange in the common law. The act to be passed should concede or recognise no claim of private rights, except what is clearly established in the law, and should assume the absolute ownership by the State as a basis of State action. This would secure the people in the future of its water supply, and guarantee the impossibility of the potable waters of the State being controled and sold by any private organisation of monopolists.’’

During 1906 there were 3,271 fires in the British metropolis, as against 3,511 in 1905.