The Alaska daily empire., 1915-07-13
LONG LIVE Alp
 TO sErrLERs' PLAN

ITO SEllLEho PLAN
 JUNEAU July l2 ITO the Editor -0ut of the bog nov comes the cat Socialism paternallsm. state heQ, help. politics. iayoritism graft. fraud a mad monagerie of concupiscent creatures fcastins iattenine and bat. tonlng m the soporlfic sunshine of hesevoleuuy watchful but waning ad- minis,ration High inks ai last for Che poor devil of D homesleodor when he may borrow rom the government enough money to buy mother last years hat, Sister Sue pair Of new kids pop gun for Johnnie and for tho old man perhaps 8 iive.cent man- ila cigar at the post office store Go to it ye hide bound exponents of a dead evonomic theory rattle the bones with mystical incantation and prophetic direful import do your worst Twill be 8 spectacle and no. thing more. For the first time since che debacle of national benevolent conservation or constipation, for tho first time since the passage Of inc Grosnoyer homestead act Of 1862 has an administration set Itself to work If we except the reclamation acts, a little the most construction and sug- gestive of real conservation of any that we know or
 If tho tentative plan of the Secre- tary involves a loan of public money to the homesteader, it is radically different in form though not In sub stance from similar measures which arc at the present time and were formerly features of the land laws of the nation. No general law has ev- CT permitted the loan of public mon- eys to the individual settler for the purpose of aiding the settlement of the public domain. Nearest to such method at the present time are the reclamation acts-the first one pass ed in 19O2-and the desert land laws, whereby payments of the declared value Of the land settled upon or claimed, may be made, under the roc lamation acts, annually in ten annual payments, under the desert land law in three years after the initial pay ment of 20 cents per acre.
 The earliest land laws of the coun. try provided for the outright sale of the public lands on terms Of ex. tended credit and the payment of in- terest on deferred payments. Be- cause Of the conditions then obtaining one of which was the disposition of the public to wildly speculate in the public lands. the credit system was abandoned in 1920 The growing pub ing public sentiment which prevented speculation in the public domain and compelled It's administration for the benefit of Che individual settler is strong enough at this time to spire and support a plan of state help to the homesteader, which if it amounts to a direct loan to the settler, will never suffer the abuse that attended the credit system. One of the argu. ments that may be expected to be urg- ed against the plan Of the Secretary is that a large class Of citizens should not be in debt to or tho recipients Of gifts from the govsrnment-an argu mont formerly urged against tho cred it system and the homestead laws as we'll But at this time the prOpor. tion of the benenciaries of the plan can never be so large as to have any preponderating influence upon legisla- tion. even if it could be shown that such an influence would be baneful Moreover tho possible effect of the plan--to debauch the electorate-has never been appreciable in the case of the reclamation act, nor in the case of the gift of free homes to the peo- pie under the homestead laws Long live the plan of the Secretary and may 1t become the law of the land.
 "A Reader