Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1919-04-12

- yuy UU1W1D " 0Ut00O " Nv 80
srnuaD1S. Amss3ea nase sasser u
some extent In peace a. well ~ In
war. that Is suffer under burdens that
wifi he imposed upon the nations IN
tho reconstruction Of the world. But
while we do not agree with Mr.. Cum
Minis In avoiding such obligations al
together We do not agree with the
Rotary speaker in his view that II will
be as nothing 10 us. great and rich
and philanthropic as we are--that we
are TO be the greatest nation In the
wcrld' stuff does not attract us as
muci as II does some men. especially
orators. IL is easy to he that with
our mouths.
comment on Is the speakers boast that
ne now have $4,000 more millionaires
In this county than we had before
the wsr--then We had a mere 1000 and
now we have 10000. 30 ran hts boast
We can hardly believe that these fig
ures are correct. a!;ho the speaker let
them run from his lips as easily as
water runs from a ducks back. We
believe those %, 900 more are like the
greatest nation on earth talk. mostly
talk. But II we have that many more
millionaires II does not 20 TO prove
that we can pour money into the
world for it's regeneration and not
miss IL at home. Unfortunately, those
1000 millionaires will not do all the
paying Those fellows are apt to put
their millions in tax exempted bonds
and let the rest Of US pay the taxes.
l,,r1 ~ rnntTnr
whether they are paid thru our
$1,000 new millionaires, will fall ulti-
rnately on the rest Of us who are the
producers and the consumers of this
country. That is where the final bur
dens always fall, the others pass them
along until they reach those ultima
tums.
And those e3,ooo new millionaires,
war made millionaires. in other ways
are not things TO boast OF. but to be
deplored. They represent not the
glory. but the greed of war. Those
millionaires were made during the
war because they were sraspine.
grinding insrates-most OF them-and
because the men who bought and sold
for the government were not good
business men and were imposed upon
by all those with whom they had to
deal. The government did not resi-
tate to commander the services OF
three or four million men for thirty
dollars a month. that was easily done
-. when II came 10 Communicating
property. materials with which to
make war. the government was help
less and instead OF getting that at cost
plus a reasonable profit TO the owners,
Il cost the government exorbitant
prices-men who had sold lumber TO
other men for S35 a thousand got $40
from the government-we have heard
Of such a case exactly. Everyone got
more from the government than he
got before. although the government
ought TO have gotten materials as
cheaply as il got its men. Those a.
900 new millionaires are nothing to
boast of.
And we should not now continue to
talk about how much money We have
ard how willing we are to spend II in
the regeneration of the world-that
sort Of talk will mean that we will go
on doing business and spending money
az We did IN the WARMTH the hand
Of extravaganza. until we made year
and hak Of war cost US more than
four years and a half cost England.
although England had q thousand
ships in the service where we had a
hundred and had twice as many men
in the ranks az we had. We spent our
moneys like drunken sailors-not like
senators who talk az II they may not
be sober. and the kind Of speaking
that is often indulged in even now In
calculated TO continue such extravagI
ance when. as a matter OF fact, the
time has come for us to get down to
bed rock principles in finances. or in
stead of boasting Of 1900 million
aires made during the war We will
lament wide spread bankruptcy. for
even the wealth Of great people az
we are can be dissipated. We are
obsessed with the crazy notions that
all we have to DO is to levy taxes and
all we have to do Is to sell bonds by
the billions-phat are a billion more
or less. But bonds have to be paid
ard after we are all sobered off We
will begin to know that taxes are a
burden-even the grasshoppers in the
scriptures became a burden at last
No, let's get down to business, not
boasting Of our millionaires, but car
ing well for the millions who have
only a few dollars in their pockets,
and let US not talk as IL we have bill
lions to SOW around the wide, wide
world with the hand of continuous ex-
travagance, profligacy and what not