, 1921-06-14
ADMINISTERING POLITICAL DOPE

If President Harding is to make good on his prom
Use of less government in business, he must curb the
present epidemic TO take the government into part
nership in industrial and other enterprises requiring
an extension of bureaucracy and the creation of aid
societies The earnestness of the thing is shown in a
kill in congress whereby the government shall pur-
chase agricultural products in this country and hawk
them N the market places OF Europe, and $loo,Ooo,-
coo is asked TO start this work Again the govern
ment is asked to finance every country in Europe IN
order that they may trade with us. Here is a par
ticular industry which by government legislation is
presented with a copper-riveted monopoly on a GER
tain commodity, and there is another industry which
it is designed to curb by n government license to op-
crate. The government is pulled this way and hauled
into q crevice to make up a deficit, or
strapped to a saddle to handicap a so-called trust, >
or splced to a guarantee Of a profitable return on
private capital.
The foreign observer Of democracy in the max
ing" must long ere this have reached the conclusion
that this is a government Ct the government, by the
government, and for the government, and the only
way democracy may participate in the shindig is to
become attached to a government payroll And in the
background are the Plumb planners and their allies
sounding the chorus of government ownership of rail
roads, mines, and practically every other form of in
dustry, melted to their antiphonies by the example of
those who ought o-know better.
Certainly if present tendencies ere not repressed
that socialism against which we all rail, but the tenets
of which so many Of US are avid to adopt will even
insane idea, and Lenine has had enough, if reports are
TO be credited. A Capitalization of power is fast de-
vcloping in this country which, if not restrained, must
terminate in a ~despotism the like of which was never
known. Even now state lines have become little more
than the boundaries of magnified voting precincts,
and it would seem as if no move cori1 be undertaken
unless the president was approached to act as arbi-
ter and to give his sanction or dissent
To the eternal credit of Mr.. Harding it may be
averred that he looks at such manifestation of infirm-
ity with extreme disfavor and has more than once ex-
pressed his wish that private controversies might be
settled by those Immediately concerned. But after
nearly a decade of dictatorship during which bust
ness was neuroticized by every political anodyne, it
might be somewhat natural that the White House
should be looked to as a dispensary where, if a cure
could not be found, a hypodermic may be admins
tered which will afford sCrae temporary relief.
Are we to ~repudiate the teachings of those who
founded the nation? Shall we remain deaf to the
warnings which find their echo in lunatic Russia? The
patriot and the skeptic has each his own answer, and
at present the former is counted with the majority.
For -country's sake and for conscience sake, there
fore, let US put an end to this program for govern
mental participation in every private human activ-
ity. Let the government attend strictly to govern
ing, without distinction of class, and let private in
dustry pursue its course, strictly within the law. held
strictly accountable to the law, and, backed by the
law, let it settle its problems without recourse to some
sort of Legislative opiate.