The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1918-05-27

The presidents address in full. COW
ering the tax question before congress
today, follows:
Gentlemen of the Congress:
1T is with Unaffected reluctance
that come to ask you TO prolong your
session long enough to provide more
adequate resources for the treasury
for the conduct of the war 1 have
reason to appreciate as fully as you
do how arduous the session has been
Your Iabors have been severe and pro-
tracted You have passed a long
series of measures which require the
debate of many doubtful questions OF
judgment and many exceedingly diff
ficult 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
10 be impaired by lassitude and fae
tigue. The elections are at hand and
we ought as soon as possible to go
and render an intimate account of our
trusteeship to the people who dele
gated US to act for them IN the
weighty and anxious matters that
crowd upon US in these days of crit
ical 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 I'VE
know it is there. Excuses are I'M
availing. We have either done our
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.
Must Provide Sinews of War.
Anc the facts are these.
Additional revenues must manifest
Iy be provided for; it would be a
most unsound policy to raise too large
of = :
evident that the four billions now
provided for by taxation will not of
themselves sustain the greatly en-
larged budget to which we must i'm
mediateIy look forward We cannot
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 earning of the present calendar
year whose accountings and expendi-
lures will then be closed.
We can not get increased taxes I'M
less the country knows what they are
to be and practices the necessary econ
omy to make them available Defin-
iteness, early definiteness, as to what
its 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 regulations in
haste if it is not to know its exact task
until the very eve of its performance
The present tax laws are needed.
more over, by inequities which ought
to be remedied. Indisputable facts.
every one. and we cannot alter or
blink them. To state them is argu-
ment enough.
Situation as 1t Is.
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 mutations and extravagances,
which presently make the whole eco
nonic structure questionable and in
secure and the very basis of credit IS
cut away Only fair, equitably dis
tributed taxation of the widest Incl
dence and drawing chiefly from the
4 sources which would be likely to de-
raoralize credit by their very abund-
ance, can prevent imitation and keep
our industrial system cree of specu-
lation and waste We shall naturally
I turn, therefore, I suppose, to war
profits and incomes upon which the
increased taxes will be levied will be
the profits and incomes of the calen-
dar year 1918. 1t would be manifest
ly unfair to wait until the early
months of 1919 to say what they are
to be- 1t might be difficult, I should
imagine, to run the mill with water
IIdI Hdu already gone over the wheel
! Moreover, taxes of that sort will not
be paid until the June of next year
and the treasury must anticipate them.
/ 1t must use the money they are to
produce before it is due. 1t must sell
short time certificates of Indebtedness
In the autumn a much larger sale of
long time bonds must be effected than
has yet been attempted.
Country Must Know.
What are the bankers to think OF