Shoshone journal. [volume] (Shoshone, Idaho) 1884-1931, 1918-09-06
Government Must Have Twenty
four Billions in a Year.
WILL BE RAISED BY SAVING
Sixteen Cents From Each Dollar Each
One Earns, and the Rest by Sell
Ing Liberty Bonds to Patriotic
Citizens.
BY LABERT ST. CLAIR.

to make 1t. Approached from differ
ent angles, It can be made as battling
as a Chinese puzzle or as simple as
the operation of an old-fashioned
dasher churn.
If one attempts to deIye into the
qualifications OF the expansion of cur
rency, and all that sort Of thing, he
| is very likely to develop stiff neck
from craning up and down columns
Of figures and wind up by declaring
that figures lie horribly.
On the other hand, if he faces the
situation In a broad, concrete way
and compares 1t with the problem OF
financing his home, or some similar
everyday expenditure, he can grasp
and master it as he would the handle
Of the family pump.
Here is the governments immediate
| financial problem i'm nutshell In
the next twelve months S24,0O0,OO0,-
900 probably will be required by the
United States government to meet war
| expenses. The total income Of every
person in this country is Only about
$50 coo, 100000 a year. Therefore, if
the cost of the war for the next year
were to be assessed pro rata, every
persons share would be forty-eight
cents on every dollar that he or she
earns.
Needed to Beat Off Murderers.
Now let us bring the proposition
little nearer home. Suppose that
band Of murderers, in blood-smeared
uniforms of gray, having slaughtered
their way through the helpless waves
of women and children In nearby
cities just as the Hun has done in
France and Belgium, established
themselves in the woods at the edge
of our town with the fixed purpose of
waging slaughter in our midst. Then,
IL it were announced by the authOri-
ties that it would cost fOrty-eight
cents of every dollar that every earn
er in our town made in the next
twelve months to conduct a defense
against the murderer, that would be-
clear, wouldn't it? And if the authori-
ties were to go further and say that
they would assess sixteen cents of
this forty-eight on persons who could
afford to pay it and accept the other
thirty-two from persons who, out of
their zeal to aid in the defense of
their homes and their loved ones,
would take the promise of the local
government to repay IT, that would be
plain, too.
% Of
tween the local case 1 have described
and the present case of United States
government The Hun is in the offing,
the government needs an average of
4S-one hundredths of everyone's earn
ing in the next year to conduct its de-
Tense, and it plans to raise this money
on one-third tax and two-thirds bond
or stamp sale plan. Within the next
year approximately SS,0OOOO0,OO0 will
be raised by taxes and S16,000,000O !
by the sale of government securities. |
Must Be Raised by Economy.
There is the situation, and the ques-
ton now arises: How in the land of |
Goshen are we ever going to raise |
such a sum as S24,O00,OOOO0O? The
answer is: Save as we never have
before.
1t will not be pleasant to Skimp our
selves, for we have not been used to
;kimping but we simply shall have to I
10 it. That old S24,0OO.O00,00O re-
luirement is going to stick to us like
/ burr to a pair of mittens, and we
simply must raise it.
We must practice the same economy
o raise the money with the Hun g.
100 miles away that we would if he
we're in the grove out at the edge of
own He may be 5000 miles away in
'erson, but at every beat his lustful
Ieart spans that gap between your
laughter and mine and his fingers
ave a virulent 5000 mile itch for
our money and your farms.
The question of what each of US
lust economic on can be settled only
4 our individual minds and at our
WI firesides. If the Hun were in the
rove literally, would any of us ask
ur neighbors what we should sacri-
ce in order to help raise our respec-
We shares of the forty-eight cents
D the dollar? I think not.
My notion is that the question every
American should ask himself
What must l have? The query: I
That can l get along without? is not
enough.
Heber Grim's Story Apropos. I
Every time the idea of saving oc- {
Irs to me think of old Heber Grim, $
character out in my western Indiana |
wn who had perennial habit Of {
lining church. Just as regularly as |
'vival meeting time rolled around, I
eber would get himself all het up
-er his sins and, along in the last r
lys of the meeting he would come $
airing and snorting down the aisle
Id join up. a
Somehow, though, Heber never got a
ound TO making any sacrifices In a
half OF his new found religion. He I
ways kept right on chewing tobacco, t
-ear RING like n mule driver drinking | O