The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1912-08-29
OUR WASHINGTON LETTER.
(By Clyde H. Tavenner, specis
Washington Correspondent of TIL


president remain in Washington.
The democratic House of Repre-
sentatives, it will be recalled, passed
bill placing sugar on the free list.
1t was estimated this would reduce
the price approximately 2 cents a
pound. Another bill was passed
placing a slight tax on incomes in
excess of $4,000. This would have
| meant, in few words, transfer
of small portion of the burden OF
taxation from the breakfast table to
wealth. The corporation-contro
and both bills will die with the ses-
sion.
The democratic program of sub
shutting tax on wealth for the
tax on sugar was class legislation,
the standpatters and protectionists
cried out in chorus. They were
never heard to complain, however,
of the existing class legislation
which permits the burden of federal
taxation to fall entirely upon tire
shoulders of the masses, taxing the
average man, woman and child on
every stitch of clothing they wear
and everything else they must have
in order to live, while permitting
fortunes to go untaXed.
The masses of the people produce
the wealth, and by legislative ad-
vantage few get possession of it,
and now those few object, and
have prevented, the transfer to
wealth of even the small amount of
taxation derived from the tariff on
sugar. which is but one of more
than 500 things on which the con-
sumers pay tax. They would pre-
fer that the government continue to
tax sugar instead of wealth, because
they eat no more sugar than the
section hand on the railroad or the
worker in the mill and therefore
under the present system of protec-
ton are compelled to pay no greater
tax to the federal government than
does the poorest man.
If fiscal system which requires
a millionaire to pay no more tax
to the national government than the
section hand or mill-w orker is fair
and just. there is no need of reform;
but if such a system is unjust, the
income tax and the free sugar bills
were moves in the right direction.
The average citizen of this country
eats 80 pounds of sugar year. A
saving of cents a pound would
have meant SLIGO per person a year,
or a saving of So to a family of five.
Because of the obstructionists in
the senate, however, this saving is
not to be. The people must go on
paying an artificial price for sugar
so that the poor old sugar trust
shall not want for dividends on it's
watered stock, while the millionaires
need not bother about paying a
single penny of taxation on their
wealth for the support of the govern
ment. Perhaps some day it will be
a democratic senate and president
is elected to cooperate with house
of representatives that is really try.
ing to represent the will of the
people of this country.
In the city of Lawrence, Mass,
where the highly protected wooden
mills hold forth; where boys and
girls work for 50, So and 81 week,
and fathers and mothers work long
hours for IS, Sc and 81 week for
full time, Al out of every 100
deaths are those of children under 5
years of age. And of these At chill
dren, IS are under 1 year of age.
The doctors declare the big major
ity of these children perish because
their mothers labor such long hours,
under unsanitary conditions, in the
wooden mills.
But mark the percentage OF child
deaths in Lawrence particularly:
Forty seven out of every 100 persons
that die in Lawrence are children
under years of age. Now compare
this with Seattle, Wash. There,
out of every 100 persons that die,
but 10 are children under years
of age.
The average for the whole country
is p children under years of age
instead of Al as in Lawrece, and for
the whole country 10 out of every
100 deaths are of children under 1
year of age, instead of 35 as in
Lawrence.
In Fall River, Mass, where the
wooden trust also operates, so out
of every 100 persons that die, are
children under years of age. At
New Bedford, Mass, another WOODEN
mill town, 40 out of every 100 per-
sons that die, are under 5 years,
and the great majority of the 40 are
babes.
These people who work in the
wooden mills are protected" That
is, the multi-millionaire WOODEN
trust magnates who come to Wash
ington for executive protection, say
that the sole reason they desire
tariff rates which give them monop-
oily on American markets and per-
init them to charge double the value
for wooden clothing, is that they
are protecting" their employees.
In addition to making this plea,
the trust magnates, of course, make
liberal contributions of money to the
campaign funds of the party of pro-
lection. The result is such bills as
Schedule X, of the Payne-Aldrich
law.
Here is a plain question for the
American people to ask themselves:
Why should they longer permit a
comparative handful of millionaires
to force them to pay exorbitant
prices for every article of wooden
clothing they wear, on the pretext
lo1, ho< Srr