The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1891-04-07
The Fabulous Expenditures Of the
Fifty-First Congress Une-
qualed in History.
More Than Will Be Earned BY
Nearly One Million Wage
Workers.
The Glass Born, Brought Up, and U ed
Only to He Taxed to En-
rich Others.

~ ASittA NNtNAA obs
From every tree lop. bark and part of the timber
And, though we leave it with a root, thus
hacked,
The air will drink the ap"--Henry VIII.
The fact that the Fifty-irst congress APP
propriated over 81, 900, 900, 600 for expendi-
lures for the fiscal year of 1912 ought to
set an intelligent people thinking. But the
truth is that the intelligent people of Amer
lea find it a bore to think. Yet, to ignore
this enormity will be a disgrace to the Co.
100000 FREQ citizens who inhabit this great
republic. writes J. s. Moore in the New
York Times.
In the first place, there is no country in
the world, nor was there ever one, that, in
time of peace, expended $1,000, 10000 in
one year. The amount is so fabulous, so
unheard of, that the busy people OF the
United States do not and can not realize
its Importance.
Let me try and illustrate this enormous
appropriation. Let me, for instance, point
out that the whole wages earned in 1880,
according to the official census for that year,
was $947, 1853, 795. Assuming that the wages
earned by all employed in the industry of
the country in 1s9l-92 is $1,000, 900, 600, it
would follow that the appropriations for
1oJ1-J- ny u Il1ly-AlSt COuSIcSS dSSiO-
gated some $S,0 900 more than the whole
wages earned by the following number of
people employed. In 1880 there were en-
ployed in the whole industries of the coun-
try:
Males above sixteen yeaes old ............ 2,0la,095
Females above fifteen years old ......... 5Sl,669
Total human beings Employed. 2.7S2,62a
Thus it will be seen that there was no
scruple to expend in one year over SS,0W,-
600 more money to run the government
than can be earned in wages by over :, 1872
600 working people.
What a hot and virtuous indignation
there would be displayed by this great
Christian pe ople %inhabiting the United
States if, for instance, the emperor of
China and his mandarins should squeeze
the 400,0o0.0O0 Chinese a thousand million
dollars in one year for taxes! Well, let it
be admitted that the 65, 000. 900 Americans
who are squeezed out of $1,000, 900, 0OU'
taxes in one year feel very happy and per-
haps rather proud OF the fact that this, the
greatest country on the globe. although but
an infant, can boast of having higher noun
tains, longer rivers, louder thunder. fork
eder lightning, moro money, and pays more
taxes than the combined wornout effete
European monarchies can ever dream of.
Besides, have we not discovered the new
est and greatest benefit in political econ
omy, which is, that as long as the money
remains in the country it matters little
what the taxes are? Suppose a few million
farmers in the west and south are taxed,
oppressed and robbed, 60 not the mill
bosses of the east and north benefit
to that extent, and is not the whole
country as rich as if the farmers
sides, the tariff system is a twin brother of
the now extinct slavery system, both being
legitimate children of Beelzebub and the
serpent. When the late lamented slavery
system flourished nothing was more con-
temptible in the nation than the so-called
''roor white trash.'' Under the now -four
ishing protective system there is, indeed, a
lot of poor white trash" who we're born,
brought up, live, and have to work in order
to be taxed, and taxed SO heavily and in so
complicated a way that it is difficult for
this poor white trash to realize the enormity
of oppression under which they groan.
Nearly forty centuries ago., when the serfs
of Egypt were groaning from their heavy
work, a lovely princess fished a deliyerer
out of the bulrushes for them. Surely the
heavily oppressed people of the free United
States need some deliverer in their pI esent
dilemma, as there is no getting over the
fact that to tax 65,OOO,0 600 of men, women
and children some S1,00S. COG, 900 annually,
or about SIG per capita. means a tax of $50
on a poor family consisting of man, wife
and three children-that is to say, one
sixth of the average income of American
families.
Our coming new party, the Farmers al
lance, although not fshed out of the bull
rushes. may become the redeemer of a
sorely taxridden people if it would apply
its great influence and aid to rectify exist
ing abuses, instead of running after the
Utopian ideas and making people rich by
limit silver coinage or unlimited credit
on imaginary securities. Suppose. now,
that unlimited coinage would really enrich
the people of the United States say 81, O0O,-
100000: why, instead of putting 81, 000, 0O0,-
900 tax on the appropriations for one year,
the taxes would be doubled and the people,
on account of their easily-acquired wealth,
would only be worse off.
My friends of the Farmers alliance. PAR
don me-, but your task, if you really mean
well. is to break existing oppression and
outrageous taxation before you begin to
create an Eden of happiness for the people
of this country. In the meantime it would
be well if the good, plain people of the west
would take as a reform text the shameful
opp essive, unheard of appropriation O
$l,OOo, OO0, coo expenditure TO- the veal
1872, a year OF peace at home and abroad
1t such a text does not arouse the indigna
ton, disgust and resentment of every COCO
citizen from Maine TO Oregon, then reform
is simply a farce, and the sooner it is rele
gated to the limbo of antiquity the bette.
and more profitable for all concerned.
They Want "A RuIinr an If