The Washington herald., 1914-11-13
The Old Question About Kansas.

/ The election has been held and the Bull Moose
ceased to score victory in Kansas, but Will
lam Allen White cheerfully bobs up with the assur.
ance that the people of Kansas the most inteli-
gent, the most patriotic, the most prosperous, the
heathiest and hapPest people earth, and that all
this is due TO prohibition. You can't beat these Kan
people except with themselves They are the great
est boomers and also the greatest walters in the
world and for that statement we have the testimony
of William Allen White 1t was not so long ago
that Mn White said: That the mental habit of the
people of Kansas was but garment of sackcIoth,
and that majority of the and women of the
State sitting among the potsherbs, and throw
ing ashes into the air that is vibrant with lamenta-
tons because there are trufies for dinner" And
Kansas had prohibition rampant then.
But the state of mind in Kansas has changed.
notwithstanding the defeat of Victor Murdock and
the return of that reaconary Kansan, Charley Cur
tbs, to the Senate The Kansans evidently have
trufies for dinner they think they have.
Mr.. Whites article is entertaining, interesting
and encouraging, for the East as well as the West
and the Commissioner of Internal Revenue might file
it for future reference, for Mr. White quotes bank
ers, presidents of chambers of commerce. real estate
exchanges, and farmers to show that the Kansas
people have more money in bank, more business
booms, and more prosperity than the people of any
preston that plethoric bank accounts were the in
spiration for the income tax, and that this nspira
ton first made its appearance not far from the border
of Bleeding Kansas; but the report of the Commits
siOner of Internal Revenue dated July 90 1914 credits
Kansas with paying $4oo6oII, or less than 3 cents
per capita income tax.
Secretary McAdoo is dissatisfied with the returns
from the income tax, and is about to inaugurate a
spy system to find out who careessy failed to make
full and complete returns of their incomes last year.
We want to help the Secretary of the Treasury in
this effort to enforce the law the just and the un
just alike and suggest that he file William Allen
Whites testimony concerning the ability of Kansas
to pay than cents head toward the support
of this great and glorious government. No one
doubts the thorough knowledge of Mr.. White, and
no would accuse the people of Kansas of being
dishonest in their dealings with the government but
there is such wide discrepancy between the cond-
tons pictured by the graphic editor of the Emporia
Gazette and the beggarly returns the income tax,
that it is just possible the Kansans have been so
busy figuring out their prosperity and happiness
means of attracting settlers from the East that
they did not have time to fill out those complicated
blanks sent out by the Treasury Department The
ability of Kansas to pay part of the income tax
has local as well a general interest for the
residents of the District of Columbia, numbering
$4,000, paid S2So275.Io on incomes, nearly six
times as much as the I78ooo people in Kansas; and
the people of Washington not claiming to be the
most prosperous, the most intelligent or the most
patriotic people in the world In the language of
William Allen White, What is the matter with
Kansas?"