The San Francisco call., 1907-06-16


improved? The people interested. in
instead of falling upon the job and do
ing it offhand, appeal to township. The
township shirks the task and begs
money from the county.
STATES IN RIVALRY
So, when there is an opportunity
anywhere for a county to get money
from the state it works harder to get
it than the money is worth. Finally,
the states vie with one another to in
duce the national government to give
make any aIlusion to the Guilford bat
tlefield. but the force of his remarks
was apparent. He had evidently re-
garded the Guilford battlefield enter
prise as an excellent text for the lit
tie sermon he was preaching.
The question presented itself to his
mind, said Cannon, whether the states
were not morally bound to acquiesce in
the enlargement of the governments
Iiberately placed themselves under
obligations to the government for
money. He said that in many. cases
the money obtained from the treasury
through state influence was not neces-
sary. which was bad enough; but in
other cases the states induced the gov
ernment to do work which they should
90 themselves, winch was worse, DIS
this nurtured spirit of mendicancy
which was incompatible with sturdy
self-reliance-
"The borrower is the servant of the
lender" said Cannon. The man who
asks favor owes a debt when it is
granted. Sooner or later, and in some
coin or other, that debt must be paid.
No state in this union can go and help
itself from the treasury to the disad-
Of he of 1r,oi0
out mourning thereby an obligation.
How will 1t square itself? Will it re-
pay the money belonging to its neigh
bors? Then it should not have gone to
the trouble of borrowing it originally.
Will it barter some of its rights and
powers to the government in exchange
for an appropriation? Insensibly and
insidiously 1t may do SO.
BURDENsoME TO NATION
'T do not like to see this tendency.
It is humiliating to see great COM
munitfes and great states coming with
the borrowers whine to congress, ask
ing for appropriations that are ques-
tionab1e as to their propriety, and GER
tainly burdensome to the nation as a
whole. What has become of the jeal-
Gus, resolute spirit of selfhelp and
home rule? When q state asks for
money for purposes which are partly
or purely local, can it logically refuse
to permit the United States to exer-
else control of the expenditure, and
therefore over the maintenance of the
enterprise. whatever 1T may be? AS a
matter of fact, this abdication of local
and state rights and responsibilities is
going on, caused by the universal de-
sire to go higher up for help"
The gist of Speaker Cannon's speech
is just becoming known among public
men and they are much interested in
it. The speaker, of course, is in a posi-,
tion to see the seamy side of organized
community mendicancy. The delega-
tions of prominent citizens" and COM
mittees, and chambers of commerce and
other agencies of importantly never
fail to visit the speakers room 1t is
he who is f1attered, and wheedled and
soft soldered. If he yielded to half of
the sectional schemes proposed DUR
ing one session of Congress the trea-
sury would be as bare as Mother Hub
bard's cupboard. His words of warn
ing are regarded as supplementing
with concrete illustration and rough
force. the speech of Secretary Root in
which the warning was uttered that if
the states did not exercise their rights
and powers the nation would be com
PEELED to assume and exercise them
STATES MAY BE DOOMED
1t is rather significant that public
men are SO concerned over this old old
question OF states rights. this ques-
ton which agitated the men who are
now known only by their marble ef-
figies in Statuary hail. Many publi-
cfsts believe that the states are doomed
to obliteration in fact If not In name.
They argue that the conditions which
forced small communities to band to-
gether in the early days and which
Nnr
therefore suspicious of its neighbor are
now done away with. The people of
Maine and California now carry on a
more intimate correspondence and un-
derstand one another better than did
the people of Boston and PHILADELPHIA
during the period when states were
being made. There is no deep isnor-
ance of one state by the people of an
other and therefore no jealousy.
intelligence is mutually and instan-
taneously disseminated, communication
is fncessant local manners are modi
ned to conform to common code and
knowledge of the outside world oper
ates to solidify national sentiment. |
states as sovereignties are already a |
myth and 1t is held that evolution will
obliterate them altogether.
One of the current examples of this
tendency to adopt the national point of |
view rather than the old state view |
point Is the ATTITUDE or the people on |
the Japanese question Here and
there during the brief but noisy debate
on Japanese exclusion the old cry was
heard In the east that Exclusion was
Pacific coast ISSUE" and that a.the
sand lotters are the only people who
demand Japanese exclusion" But this
was like the wall of an infant in the
night compared with the Irresistible
sentiment of the people in favor of