Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1894-01-12
NOBLESsE OBLIGE.

gated wisdom which sovereign suffrage has
endowed With functions as perilous as they
arc momentous, cannot vault 80 high as TO
sHrmount conglomerate responsibility, nor
nestle 40 low as 70 escape individual task
making. Legislative bodies have been ever
since recorded man and will be 90 long rs man
needs fellow.msn to help or hinder. Because
no man can do all things, labors must be d.
vided. The only safety from oligarchy is
delegated trust. In true Democracies, the
servants legislate and the masters select
their Legislators. The nineteenth century
only sets the crown OF its approval on the
system that Scion honored, by initiating it,
To give 10 the people the best laws that they
can bear was no more the ambition OF the
Athenian Sage than it is the duty Of the
Maryland legislator. Perfection was not ex-
pected Of nor pretended by Scion, but he
was not content with less than the nearest
possible approach to 1t. As no body of men
have since his time ever disclaimed his high
ideal or ever reached it, more cannot be ex
pected Of those who are, by the grace Of SOW
sreign will, the custodians Of our political
fortunes; but surely less will not content
the wistlul watchers who larry at the hearth
stone and await developments.
No one knows absolutely what IS best 10
any crisis, but few believe that they do not
know more than their fellows 10 mnltitu lie
Of council there is wisdom, but il is the wis
dom of difference, Of dissension, often of
oil IF ,fi
seeking the same goal by different routes !,
generally whets the axe that blazes the
straightest way through the wilderness OF
uncertainty. When Scion gave laws to
Athens, the friction OF contending minds
was confined to the council chamber and
the people had to accept what they had no
voice in framing and little knowledge Of the
genesis Of We who live twenty five cen
turtles after, fnd ourselves still struggling
with the problem Of what Is best TO be done,
but the scope OF the discussion has taken
wider trend and its forum is open to oil who
read or think. Athenisn Solons unused and
thought out their own problems Ours is a
community of counsel givers.
The newspaper moulds opinion II it does
not create thought Our lawgivers can hard
ly ever be in doubt of what their people
want. The difficulty that generally strands
them is how to obtain it, They have no
doubt that high wages, cheap food and raj
ment, and low taxes are an ever present and
pressing demand, and they may quake at
thought of the retribution that will overtake
Them at the polls, If they Iall short of recog-
nIzing it. But the ways and means afford
the puzzle still. How can things so OBJ
viously good be obtained2 Can they be OBJ
ianed at allY Can only some be realized?
II any, which, Which is feasible and which
not9 Among matters so vital, which takes
precedence These and 4 hundred other
questions loom uD in the foreground, at the
very Threshold of every legislative session,
are anxiously considered, much debated,
passed upon, and accepted or defeated, at
each returning session only to confront again
the wisdom that essays TO cope with them.
They have never been satisfactorily settled I;
will they ever be? Time is the only allayer
Of human contentious. Submitting TO the
inevitable, peoples generally ind themselves
reconciled to what is past though the re
luctance Of acceptance bristles as long as the
contest lasts, But this is true only of the ir-
revocable. What may be altered, or amend
ed, or suspended, is and ever has been the
football since Solons met and kicked. What
ever lie amendable is improbable, is the &C.
copied view, and many there be who are al
ways ready TO deem any change an improve.
ment Hence the trials Of the legislator;
hence the failures Of legislation, and hence
full often the tears OF those legislsted for.
Realizing the force of what is here sug.
gesied, we hesitate to obtrude newspaper
opiRiohs IN advance Of any developed pol.
icy, but there Ia one question 30 full OF life,
so irrepressible, SO resolute 10 its demand for
solution, that even at the risk of obtrusive.
ness, we must have brief say about 1t. OF
course we refer to the taxation problem
Three thousand years have found sage legis.
lators graphing with il, experimenting on
it, legislating and reversing or modifying
their legislation, one year formulating one
set OF rules only the next to assert its un
wisdom and try another, and yet TO day we
are as far from any solution that will com.
mend itself TO all classes as when Philolaus
CIRCULATED or Cesar laid tribute. Demon.
STATIONS are at hand, with all the Georgian
clearness, that only land should be taxed. -
Other demonstrators maintain that land |,
God-given and not proper subject of trib
ute. Some assert that the fruits of labo,
should never be taxed. Others make clea
that all that is valuable is the fruit OF labo
and that its exemption leaves taxation will
nothing TO tax. In the midst of such med
ley, one point remains uncontroverted
anybody desires taxation to be negotiable
he does not dare avow il. All agree tina,
each should pay his share Of the public bur
den according to what he is worth. Tn
trouble is in constituting the Delphian utter
anee, Selfishness, of course, lays at th
bottom in all its murkiness, but multiorr
are the appliances by which the stream
muddled An unexpressed desire to svad
the truth is the clutch that holds the slirrin
stick. Each man, each community, eac
interest secretly hopes that taxation wi
strike its neighbor harder than itself an
eovertly struggles to have it So Henc
doubtless much if not all the sophistry thi
perpetually clouds the discussion Of th
fateiul question. Upon no other ground ca
be explained the diametrical oppositenes
and the myriad pointed obliquity OF visic
with which it is contemplated.
The plain mind, with an honest purpos