The Republican journal., 1910-09-08

one INDIVIDUAL item OF which, or no sphs+,
tial part Of which, their critics can or ,,,;,,
specify as bad. they do not condemn the n.rtn
responsible for them
II a Democratic candidate for Office char.c-
terizes the increase of 1909 over 1882 az two
and one-half million dollars Of Republican ax-
travagance and neglects to qualify his state.
ment by the admission that one and one.b.,f
million dollars Of that increase consists of sa-
ditional moneys returned to the cities and
towns for educational purposes, what are Won
going to say to that candidate? If he regards
that as waste, as extravaganza, is he worthy
of your suffrage? If he doesn't know II
couldn't find it out, is he competent to renre.
sent you? If he knows it and approves it but
tries to prejudice you by telling only half the
truth, is he worthy of your confidence? There
are three horns to such dilemma as that and
if they can find comfort in any of them tbav
are welcome to it.
Why do they not tell you that the State ;s
now returning to the towns and cities for roads
and bridges, $685., 9,39935 more than in 1882 and
Sl33,OOo more in railroad and telegraph taxes
and $79524 in State aid for soldiers and soldiers,
widows, and $55OO0 for State paupers? If thew
would reduce any of these items, which would
it be? The State has been going farther toward
relieving the towns and cities in caring for the
insane, and this item accounts for an increase
of $685. 300, or more than one-sixtb of the total
charge of extravaganza. Do they not kno-:
this! Or do they prefer that the towns and
cities should charge themselves directly with
the entire burden instead of requiring the cor
porations, the railroads and wild lands to con-
tribute to it? Or do they simply hope to de-
ceive the public by general charge of ex-
travagance.
But they say that the appropriations for
charitable and benevolent institutions have
been increased. And SO they have And
none have been more active in securing such
appropriations than the democratic members
OF the legislature. But do not undertake to
rest their justification that ground alone
These have consisted in the main of appro-
priations for hospitals scattered throughout the
State. They have been made without regard
to creed or politics. The recipients are not
money making institutions. They are organiz-
ed and largely supported by public spirited
citizens Of their respective localities for the
public benefit. The rich do not need them.
They can command the facilities of private
institutions within or without the State, or if
need be they can turn their homes into private
hospitals equipped with every convenience that
money can buy. When they avail themselves
of the hospitals, they pay for their treatment
But they afford the poorest citizen every faci-
ity which the means of the wealthiest can
command. They are as essential to modern
society and as much part of modern civiliza-
ton any. of the great public institutions
that have come to be Indispensable. They are
not self supporting and never can be until
their doors are closed to the poor unfortunate
who> has not the price of treatment in his
pocket. If our opponents would return to
that stage they should say So If they would
afford to the poorest in his distress the bene-
fits ofmodern medicine and surgery and nurs-
ing, somebody must pay the expense of it.
They might make the applicanta town charge
We would not. They might personally endow
the hospitals. They do not. They might con-
tribute small fraction of the States income,
8 per cent or per cent of it, thirty five one
thousandths of one per cent of the States as
sessed valuation, to that purpose. We are do
ing that, and it surely does not seem extrav-
agant.
have seen no more inhumane cold blooded
proposition enunciated during this campaign
than the suggestion recently contained in
prominent Democratic newspaper that "every
taxpayer should ask himself and his neigh
bors. What benefit do l get from this
hospital end of Republicanism?' Is it possi-
BILE that the desire to win political preferment
in this State has reached such point that one
of its great political parties should require
every charity to be measured by the direct
benefit each contributor is to derive from it?
Is it possible that when the poor boy or girl
man or woman, is stricken with the pangs of
fever, when his breath is shortened by pneu-
monia, when his arm or leg is broken or ap-
pendcitis has him in its grasp, the great State
of Maine will refuse hinA the best treatment
and the speediest cure to be mad until some
Democratic politician is told what he is to get
out of it? If this is Democracy, prefer the
"hospital end of Repubcanism.
If the State collects the revenues it must
disburse them They not retained for the
immediate benefit of the State government
They should not be. They are returned in the
main to the towns and cities TO be used by
their ldsal officials and are ther spent wisely
or otherwise according to the capacity and in
tegrity of those officials, not of the State gov
ernment. The local authorities are entirely
responsible for this.
In the last analysis the sole issue in the cam
paign is, whether the Republican policy of
developing and perfecting system of taxation
which reaches all classes of wealth and COM
pels it to bear its just part in discharging the
public burdens shall be continued, or whether
the State prefers to go back to the Democratic
| theory of decreased State revenue with the
necessary result that every city and town shall
support its schools and roads and other public
burdens solely by direct tax on such property
as can be reached by local taxation. 1t is not
question as to whether the State will spend
less, but whether certain classes of property
shall be relieved from their part of the burden
while that burden is shifted entirely to other
classes, the classes that bore most of it in
1882 practically all Of it in real old Democratic
/ times.
The question you naturally ask is, how this
! ~ taYafion offootsf vopr o;+,, ...--