The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-02-15
PAYING OUR WAY.


 Unless the coming large expenditures for canal work at Panama are to be drawn from current funds in the Treas ury, which would be very poor finan- ciering indeed, there is every reason to think that, for at least some time to come. we shall be able to pay our own way as nation without difficulty The fear, which has been somewhat gen. eral for many months past, that con- tinuing deficiency of revenue would force either a resort to borrowing or a revision of the tax laws is now being dissipated by the enormous prosperity of the country. During the past week the Governments receipts have exceed ed Its expenditures by more than a million dollars, bringing the current years deficit down to less than four millions; during the last month the excess of receipts was more than thirty-eight hundred thousand dollars. This is very remarkable record, for January usually shows a deficit; last year, for example, the loss on that months transactions was nearly six and quarter millions.
 Nor is this gain of more than ten millions in one month as compared with the corresponding month of the next preceding year an isolated fact; it Is but the most conspicuous illus tration for the moment of a general tendency. Thus between the thirty first of August and the thirty-first of December, 1905, the deficit was reduced from eighteen and a half to seven and half millions; and while a year ago this time the deficit for the preceding seven months was twenty eight and half millions, that for the seven monttas ending Wednesday of this week was but little over three and a third millions. Unless, therefore, the dominant influences of the recent past are radically changed in the very near future the probability is that the end of the fiscal year next June will find us with an approximately bal anced income and outgo account, in place of deficits of nearly twenty-four millions for the year 1SO4-'O5 and of over forty-one and tinree-quarter mil lions for he year 1903-'04.
 And there Is no prospect that these favorable influences are to cease to operate in the near future The pres ent improvement in the condition of the Treasury has been brought about by rapid increase in revenue and by a successful effort to keep down ex- penditures. Thus in January alone customs receipts increased four and a half millions. and internal receipts two and half millions. The increased consumptive capacity and purchasing power of the nation, which made this possible are, as everybody can see, showing no signs of declining now. On the other side of the account. with Congress in it's present rigidly eco- nomical mood, the restraint kept on expenditures, whereby they have been held down to the level of preceding years while income has been grow ing, may safely be counted on as con- tinuing factor. There are, of course, the extraordinary canal costs to be met. But these should, and doubtless will, be returned to the Treasury from the proceeds of the canal bond sales. If that arrangement is made, nothing but sharp decline in the industrial and commercial prosperity of the na- tion or a reversion to wild extrava- gance in Congress can prevent us from paying our way as a people for so much of the future as it is possible for hu- man foresight to Providence Journal