Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1922-02-17
SALES TAX OR NO BONUS,
President IIarding's letter to Chair

% AoAAAiA - 4~AAAA " NldA q I " u
eley on the bonus and bonus tax question places this
whole: subject in more concrete form than it has
,-%sslitherto assumed. The presidents letter makes it
reasonably plain that unless the cost is financed BY
sneans OF a general sales tax there will be no bonus,
Ind unless there is a reversal of attitude on the part
pf a large number of congressman there will be
!. neither at this time.
Concerning the attitude of the president, the
! CABINET, most of the, members of congress, and a
!. Sast majority of the people of the country. on the
. provision which should be made for the former SOL
. IHiers who are suffering from the effects of wounds
5r disease, and for the care of the dependents of
these and of others who died in the service, there
. pas never been any question. The practically uni
.lersal desire has been that prompt and abundant
provision be made for the wants OF these. That
tehere has not been more ready and effective action
in this direction is due in some considerable meas
s,re to the focusing of attention on the larger and
/. more complicated question of a general bonus for
Ill ex-service men.
q Whether or not the president believes in the
wisdom Of the general bonus, he has not opposed it.
He has opposed the policy Of assuming obligations
,aunning into billions without suitable provision be-
ne made for the raising of the money. He has op-
posed the policy of passing a bonus bill and leaving
20 the executive the duty of finding funds from
which to make the necessary payments, with the
alternative of an enormous deficit to be passed on to
another congress-, or perhaps to a later 'administra-
fElon. ne has insisted that the bonus and the tax
with which to meet it go together, and that the tax
must be certain and specific, and not predicated on
some vague contingency which might or might not
apccur.
Both the president and the secretary of the
treasury have sought to keep the country free from,
the illusion that there is any way in which this fund
ban be raised other than by means of a tax to be
paid by the people. All the devices which have
been suggested, and which give the faintest promise
of realizing the desired result, amount to just that
= tax to be paid by the people of the United States.
With that conviction firmly in his mind, the
president suggests the adoption of a general sales
lax, a device which, highly unpopular as it is
throughout the country, and rejected though it has
seen by most Of the house members, stands up un-
der investigation as better than any other means Of
raising money that has been proposed.
Assuming the necessity for the collection of a
given, and a very large sum of money, two condi-
tions must be met if we are to avoid disaster. One
of these conditions is that the largest possible per-
Es:ertage OF the money which the public pays as a
result of the tax shall find its way into the treasury,
and the other is that the levying and collection Of
the tax shall impede as little as possible the bust
ness of the country, from the tiling Of the soil and
the operation of the mines to the most complicated
processes of manufacture and the conduct of the
great commercial and financial activities. In the
opinion, we believe, of the great majority of the
%nen who are fitted by experience and understand
ding to judge, the sales tax meets these essential
Conditions better than any other plan that can be
used.