Republican farmer., 1918-05-31

Your labors have been severe and pro- tracted. You have passed a long series of measures which required the debate of many doubtful questions of judgment and many exceedingly diff cult questions of principle as well as of practice.
 The summer is upon us in which labor and counsel are twice arduous and are constantly apt to be impaired by lassttude and fatigue. The cleo tions are at hand and we ought as soon as possible to go and render an intimate account of our trusteeship to the people who delegated us to act for them in the weighty and anxious matters that crowd upon us in these days of critical choice and action. But we dare not go to the elections until we have done our duty to the full.
 These are days when duty stands stark and naked and even with closed eyes we know it is there. Excuses are unavailing. We have either done our duty or we have not The fact will be as gross and plain as the duty itself. In such a case lassitude and fatigue seem negligible enough. The facts are tonic and suffice to freshen the labor.
 Explains Wisdom of Action.
 And the facts are these: Additional revenues must manifestly be provided for. It would be a most unsound policy to raise too large proportion of them by loan, and it is evident that the four billions now provided for by taxation will not of themselves sus- tain the greatly enlarged budget to which we must immediately look for ward. We canot in fairness wait until the end of the fiscal year is at hand to apprise our people of the taxes they must pay on their earnings of the present calendar year, whose account ings and expenditures will then be closed.
 We can't get increased taxes unless the country knows what they are to be and practices the necessary econ omy to make them available. Defi- niteness, early definiteness, as to what it's tasks are to be is absolutely neces- sary for the successful administration of the Treasury It cannot frame fair and workable regulations in haste; and it must frame it's regula- tions in haste if it is not to know it's exact task until the very eve of it's
 
 are marred, moreover, by inequities which ought to be remedied. Indis- putable facts, every one; and we can not alter or blink them. To state them is argument enough.
 And yet perhaps you will permit me to dwell for a moment upon the situation they disclose. Enormous loans freely spent in the stimulation of industry of almost every sort pro- duce inhations and extravagances which presently make the whole eco- homie structure questionable and in secure, and the very basis of credit is cut away. Only fair, equitably distri- buted taxation of the widest incidence and drawing chiefly from the sources which would be likely to demoralize credit by their very abundance can prevent imitation and keep our indus trial system free of speculation and waste.
 Unfair to Wait.
 We shall naturally turn, therefore, l suppose, to war profits and incomes and luxuries for the additional taxes But the war profits and incomes upon which the increased taxes will be lev jed will be the profits and incomes ot the calendar year 1918. It would be manifestly unfair to wait until the early months of 1919 to say what they are to be. It might be difficult, should imagine. to run the mill with water that had already gone over the wheel.
 Moreover, taxes of that sort will not be paid until the June of next yea1 and the Treausry must anticipate them. It must use the money they are to produce before it is due. | must sell short time certificates of in. debtedness. In the autumn a mucf larger sale of long time bonds mus be effected than has yet been at tempted. What are the bankers tc think of the certificates if they do no certainly know where the money it to come from which is to take then up?
 And how are investors tc approach the purchase of bonds with any sor o6 confidence or knowledge of, thei own affairs if they do not know wha taxes they are to pay and what econ onies and adjustments of their bus mess they must effect? I cannot as sure the country of a successful ad ministration of the treasury in 191 if the question of further taxation i to be left undecided until 1919.
 The consideration that dominate every other now, and makes ever other seem trivial and negligible, the winning of the war. We are no only in the midst of the war, we ar at the very peak and crisis of fl Hundreds of thousands of our mer carrying our hearts with them an our fortunes, are in the field, an ships are crowding faster and faste to the ports of France and Englan with regiment after regiment thou sand after thousand, to join them un til the enemy shall be beaten an brought to reckoning with mankind
 There can be no pause or intermis sion. The great enterprise must, 0 the contrary, be pushed with greate and greater energy. The volume ( our might must steadily and rapidl be augmented until there can be II question of resisting it. If that is be accomplished, gentlemen, none must sustain it to the utmost
 Our financial program must no mol be left in doubt or suffered to la than our ordnance program or oI ship program or our munitions pr' gram or our program for making mi lions of men ready. These others al not programs, indeed, but mere plal upon paper, unless there is to be g unquestSonable supply of money.
 Call of Duty.
 That is the situation, and it is u situation which creates the duty, choice or preference of ours. There only one way to meet that duty VI