The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-03-25
HOW LONG WILL CONGRESS TRIFLE
WITH THE PEOPLE?

From the NJ z. Times.
Nearly five months of the Congressional
session have passed away, and still the one
great political necessity of the hour is put
aside as if it were of no interest to any
human being on the continent. The burden
of taxation is not reduced, and it seems to
be thought that the people will be satisfied
with the vague promises of relief which
Lave been made from time to time. We
have proved past all cavil that the present
rate of taxation is immoderately high, and
could be reduced with perfect safety to
the country. The advocates of absurd
theories about the national debt have either
been compelled to keep silence, or forced to
admit that the demand for O reduction of
taxation is too loud and general to be re-
sisted any longer. Our contemporaries in
all parts of the country, with heartiness
and unanimity seldom displayed on any occa-
sion, have joined with us in requiring of
Congress immediate attention to this most
important subject. Congress admits the
justice of the appeal, but folds its arms in
apathy, and wastes week after week in dis
cussions on personal affairs, or on the pettiest
questions which the ingenuity of trifers could
possibly suggest.
We can scarcely suppose that any member
of the Administration or of Congress can be
so infatuated as to dream that the question
itself. An idea of that kind could only be
entertained by some one who was utterly un-
able to detect the drift of public sentiment, or
to appreciate the practical hardships which
the present taxes infict on every man of
moderate means each day of his life. This is
not one of those subjects which can be quietly
shelved or forgotten. 1t is pressed upon our
attention constantly, and in a thousand diff
ferent forms. The poor are piEched by the
taxes almost beyond the limits of endurance.
Hard. working men and women find them
selves deprived of many small necessaries of
life by the levies which are made upon
them, in one way and another, by the tax
gatherer. Almost everything they buy is
dearer than it need be. Their children are
made to suffer in order to crafty the delusion
of doctrinaires that unless we pay off the
national debt non, we shall never pay it off
at ALL The people are willing-they always
have been willing-to assist the Government
in its extremity But is it not monstrous to
tax a whole nation heavily for the sake of
carrying out laundering system of
| finance? Have we not made enormous
sacrifices for posterity for years past? Is it
| too much to ask that the crushing load of
| taxation should now be very materially
| lessened? The President is understood to
have been convinced by the evidence brought
before him that the people earnestly, i'm
peratlvely desire rellel from WnaI almost
amounts to financial oppression. Congress,
it is true, rarely finds time to attend to the
real wants of the public. 1t will waste any
day in discussing polygamy, or the "case"
of this general or the other but as to apply
ing itself to practical and useful work, it
does not do it once a week. 1t seems to
think that the voice of the people is not
thing worth paying any attention to in
| these d0ys.
The procrastination to which this great
subject is being sacrificed will imperil the
very existence of the Republican party, if the
leaders are not very careful. We believe we
shall go before the country under very unpro-
| missing circumstances if we cannot succeed in
getting the taxes reduced before the next
elections. The people will not always sub
NIT to be ''put off" like children. They will
have relief from taxation, if not from one
party, from another. Four months have been
frittered away already Is not this enough
to satisfy the greatest admirers of Fabian
rolicy We can only once more warn Con-
q ess that further delays may exasperate the
people in way which no one need be
anxious to witness. Shall we have to re.
COZ d the lapse of another week without a
single step being taken towards a settlement
of this question:
THE RING SMASHED.