Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-10-22
BONDING Of AUTO TAX
TO FURNISH funds
FOR ROAD BUILDING PROGRAM
w. B. Dennis, Dean Of Oregon's Highway Sys-
tenn, Advocates Adoption of Plan in Montana;
Has Been Success in Neighbor State.

I vehicle demand for good roads was
met by the very correct and Just aus
wer that the taxpayer could not af-
ford to build roads TO furnish JOY rides
for the rich. Today with 3.O00,000
motor vehicles and trucks on American
farms, and with approximately 80 per
cent of the total registration in the
United States being Ford ears. and
over 40 per cent Fords and Chevrolets,
it is no longer q question of whether
the tax payers can afford to build
roads for the motor vehicle but wheth-
er they can afford to do without them.
Who are the tax payers anyway?
With one motor vehicle to every six
people as in Oregon. and one to nine
people as in Montana, and one to
every IL people as in United States,
the tax payers and the car owners are
one and the same people. Do you
know Of any other one thing in all
the range of articles of human use
that is being daily used by as large
a per cent of the American people &C
the motor vehicle or in which as
large a per cent of the people of the
United States are financially interest
ed TO the extent that they are in motor
vehicles.
Our Real Problem
THE real problem for our states
is not whether we shall have good
roads or do without them, but how
can we get them, which is another way
of asking how can they be financed
upon sound business principles. The
motor vehicle with it's demand for good
roads has come upon us with such sud
denness and in such magnitude that
naturally it has found our people, our
counties. u states and our nation
u~nprepared to meet the situation.
Under these conditions it is not
to be wondered at the laws of a ma
jority of our states present such a
mass of confusing principles and bad
financing. Nor is it to be wondered
at that so many of the roads already
constructed have proved partial fail
ures when it is remembered that our
engineers were no better prepared
than other people to meet the demand
of a wholly new type of traffic for
which there was neither theoretical
precedent nor previous experience.
Montana may have sometimes been
accused of being slow because it has
not yet adopted a general state pro-
gram. But if it has been slow it has
also been fortunate and perhaps even
wise because it can now profit by the
experience of other states and avoid
their mistakes, and all states have
made mistakes, even Oregon where /
come from. 1t is easier to avoid a
mistake than to undo one.
public Welfare" Theory
zone of the chief causes of high
taxes everywhere is the interpreta-
ton of the public welfare theory.
which has gradually crept into all of
our tax ~levying bodies. from congress
down. The constitutional right to tax
! private property for the support of
those institutions of government that
are necessary for the public welfare
has come to be interpreted to mean
the right to tax private property for
any purpose that may contribute to
the public welfare. This means. of
course, that all restraint of the right
to tax private property has been taken
off, because there is scarcely a con-
ceiyable industry institution or works
of any kind that, in a broad sense, does
not contribute to the public welfare.
This vicious socialistic doctrine has
been responsible for saddling upon the
taxpayer the support of purely indus
trial schemes of almost every sort
irrigation, drainage, fertilizing. manu-
featuring, research, specialized educa-
ton. etc. Many of these industries
are of purely sectional or local benefit
and only in the most remote way con
tribute 10 the public welfare Of the
state or nation at large.
In the name of public welfare in
Vulnerable crimes of taxation have beer
committed against the people. Not be-
400 -,lIsz rf.I --l
tax levying authorities have been dis
honest but because they. in common
with ourselves and all the people, have
been unconsciously but gradually drift
ing away from the fundamental princi-
pie of democratic government towards
the sea of socialism.
The Fundamental Principle
This tendency has so muddled our
thinking that we seem to have lost al
power of distinguishing between such
enterprises as are purely economic in
character and those institutions of gov
eminent which are necessary for the
defense of society. for the preserva-
ton of peace, for the education of the
young and for the administration OF
justice. We have been using the power
of the government to levy taxes for
the support of economic enterprises
that. because they are economic. must
have in themselves a sound basis OF
self-support, and therefore are not
proper institutions Of government fol-
support by taxation.
Certainly no public enterprise could
contribute more to the public welfare
than the building of good roads. and
there is no one enterprise in which
such n large per cent of the people
are directly interested. Nevertheless
if the proposition | have here Iaic
down is correct. namely, that the mo-
tor vehicle road problem is purely az
economic and transportation problem
it follows. then. that it must have its
own inherent basis of a self support
and I therefore maintain that, sub
ject to further analysis and exceptions
which | shall hereafter discuss. the con.
struction and maintenance of motor We
hicle roads should not become a charge
by general taxation against the real
estate and personal property of the cit.
liens of the state.
Il want, ladies and gentlemen, to BIZ
fully understood on this point because
I am here laying down a Fundamental
principle. the acceptance or rejection
of which will vitally affect the whole
program of financing road construc-
ton and maintenance by our states anG
by the counties.
Lack of Comprehension
ct on np1oead RI fipauoipp tho onn.