The Idaho recorder. [volume] (Salmon City, Idaho) 1886-1927, 1921-10-07
WHY THERE IS NO PROSPERITY.
N. Y. Worldly

There is nothing in Mr.. Harding's
speech before the Unemployment
Conference to indicate that the Pres
ident has the faintest understanding
Of the fundamental fact that prosper
ity is not national but international.
There is nothing to indicate, either
that the President appreciates the
highly important truth which Gov.
Miller expressed so bluntly in his
speech at the Republican State Con-
vention: "Our people are suffering
from stagnation of business, and
one of the most potent causes of our
distress is our burdensome, cumber
some and excessive taxation"
Mr.. Harding is a kind-hearted man
who is sorely distressed because mil
| lions of other men connOt find work,
and feels something ought to be done
about it. He is the more perplexed
because he can find no reason for un-
employment. Everything is for the
best in the best possible country, and
the supreme patriotic duty of every
body is to find job. As the Presi-
dent puts the case:
i Fundamentally sound, financi-
ally strong, industrially unimpair-
II GUt COUh&uCIlC0lty CO0SASVCAtS QlO
politically unafraid, there ought
II to be work for everybody in the
Il United States who chooses to
|, work, and our condition at home
ii and our place in the world de-
! pend on everybody going to work
1 and pursuing 1t with that patriot
! ism and devotion which make for
d fortunate and happy people.
: If the President is saying what h
! thinks, his state of mind Is hopeless.
! Nor il he more felicitous when h
I ipictures the present depression AZ a
inevitable consequence of the wa
something that could not in any n
a Ispect have been avoided and thers
!. fore to be accepted In spirit of Or
! entail fatalism:
e Liquidation, reorganization, re-
e adjustment, establishment, TAX
ing account Of things done and
the sober contemplation OF things
h. to be done, the finding Of sure
o. ground and the open, sure and
,g onward way--all these are part
en- Of the Inevitable, and he who
If. thinks they might have been
ay avoided by this plan or that, or this
he policy or that. or this interna-
rs, national relationship, or that, only
he hugs d delusion wnen reason IL
he needed for safe guide.
of
M These are mere words. The tru
ro- lis, Of course, that while part of Il
az economic depression was inevitah
IL much OF II might have been avois
IL the influences and rest urces Of
United States had been employed I
.ck years ago to stabilize the peace
Oh. Europe and halt its futher econor
re- disintcgration.
md Much could have been gained
of If Mr.. Harding's own party, when
ron was In control of Congress during
last two years Of the second Will
.ed administration, had devoted itself 4
are iousiy to the reconstruction legis
md tion that the economic condition
all the country so imperatively dema
oes ed. Ii was not too late, even WI
to Mr.. Harding was inaugurated,
mt check the industrial panic that ,
In. under way. Had Congress thrown
be Ierything else aside, cut expenditu
i'm to the very bone regardless of ev
rn- lothef consideration and made
to sweeping revision of taxation, bl
.ut- ness might still have struggled To
be fleet.
yeal The cold, brutal truth is that,
to stead Of using its power to maint
ant its prosperity. Mr.. Harding's pa
TO has been using its power To desi
ing prosperity. That was not its in,
lem lion but that has been the result.
.old has been trying to live in W.
de- that no longer exists, and the col
was quences of such political delusions
ime almost certain TO be disastrous.
| TO The way to revive business is
uch the government to give II chanc,
,ept revive. II cannot revive under a
rue alton system that bleeds II white
the under an international policy that
ting structs the restoration of confde
the and credit and makes IL imposs
nine for Europe to buy what America
n of duces. Give business u chance foi
mer life and the unemployment prob
any will take care OF itself.
like =
pert ccenee ard Theory
ents Theorists may difnrree. hut