The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1919-04-18
THE ROAD TO PROSPERITY.

The United States is an aggregation
of undeveloped empires, sparsely oc-
cupied. The Yellowstone Park is
three times the size of Luxembourg
There are both space and climate in
California for a new Italy and a great
er Greece. Our gulf states exceed in
area, and are incomparabIy richer in
resources than the German empire
Holland, Japan, Formosa and Great
! Britain together The Scandinavian
peninsula, with it's limited natural re-
sources. supports ten million sturdy
and prosperous people, under climatic
conditions similar to those of Alaska
while our great territory, nearly twice
as large, and rich in agricultural soil.
in fisheries and furs and untouched
coal, with mines which have already
yielded metal values exceeding $780,
J O00,0 900. with spruce and water-power
to supply the world with paper main
tains a white population of scarcely
more than $4,000.
For wholly commendable reasons.
writes Arthur D. Little in the Atlantic
Monthly, we have placed a mortgage
of twenty-one billion dollars on the
nineteen hundred million acres of our
continental farm. Taxes of a ubiuuity
and magnitude unheard of previously
take heavy tribute of all ACCOMPLISH
ment. Many profitable industries are
slowing down and government con-
tracts aggregating billions are being
licuified. Wages have risen rocket
wise, both as to height and. as to DO
tentiality of explosion. There is an
unprecedented demand upon our food
supply, and the price of the things
we buy has made living a problem of
the higher mathematics. Bolshevism,
contagious as the influenza, is abroad
in the world and not unknown at Ellis
Island. Millions of our young men
are in the army, and have yet to reck-
on with the elevator-girl and the wo-
men who are building refrigerator
cars.
Housing facilities are everywhere
inadequate; the expense of building is
almost prohibitive. Public utilities
are disorganized, industry is in the
throes of readjustment, operating
costs of every kind are at flood-level.
while permeating everything is a
strong governmental pressure toward
Socialism. The whole CONFEDERATION
OF our environment has been remould-
ed as by glacial action.
Fortunately. the writer continues,
there has come to most of us an awak-
ened vision. broader sympathies, a
finer patriotism, a quickened sense of
responsibility. We desire, as never
before, to serve, and we recognize
within ourselves a new capacity for
large affairs. The spirit of co-opera-
tion is abroad.
Strongest, perhaps, among US, of all
the new influences born of the war, is
the determination to derive from it
some compromising good, a, determi-
nation which scorns indemnities.
seeks no territory, asks no favors;
which turns within rather than with
out; but which will not be satisfied
until many burdensome folIies and
injustices of the past have been cor
rected, or until new achievement per-
mits comfort and decent living to all
who deserve them, provides true
equality of opportunity, and furnishes |
an environment in which growth is
rather than inhibited. With
new burdens on our shoulders, this |
mortgage on our acres, these, taxes
pressing down on all endeavor. how
are these aspirations possible of real |
lzation? We must create new wealth |
in vast amounts and render actual the |
potential values now neglected. There
is way to do this, and one way only. |
1t is thru the development of our es-
tate, the Estate of the American peo-
pie.