The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-10-24

NNOutluucU tEou IaBe One.J
number of other Democratic congress
men to keep Ayres company when he
gets back to the national capital.
Charges Against Republicans.
Mr.. McAdoo. speaking here.
charged Republican administration
with strangling prosperity of middle
west thru high railroad rates. He
called middle west an empire de-
pendent upon land transport and
billions of increased earnings mulcted
from shippers and farmers by Esch-
Cummins bill, were unable to handle
the traffic of normal times. He said
business must face the embargo and
rationing of cars whenever conditions
the greatest blight on business was
weakness of our railroad system; that
during federal control one and a quar-
ter billions of dollars had been spent
by the government on improvements
and still the transportation machine
was wholly inadequate to meet the
demands of internal commerce; that
the railroads are doing nothing to
improve conditions and will be as
hopelessly broken down If prosperity
ever returns as in 1917 when the gov
eminent was forced to take them over
to save the war.
McAdooo attacked the iniQuity of
Esch-Cummins bill which is based on
an arbitrary aggregate valuation of all
railroads and fixes rates high enough
to earn 5 " per cent net on that gross
valuation. Necessarily there is in
cluded railroads which should never
have been built and never will earn
anything on the investment. Other
railroads improvidently or unwisely
built will never earn dividends Yet
the Esch-Cummins bill is forcing the
public to pay II per cent net on these
poor investments. McAdoo said the
only reasonable basis for rate-mak-
ing was the value of the transporta-
ton service performed and what the
traffic would bear. Disregard of these
fundamentals, he said. had imposed
on the country a laundering and ex-
tortionate system of freight tariffs
that was suffocating the farmer and
paralyzing commerce; that rates
based on any other consideration put
a premium on inefficient operation
and made the government a party to a
fraud.
Let the investments in railroads
on a rotten basis be lost. like in any
other enterprise he said. ITO re-
quire the people to make them good
is robbery
Takes Up Taxes.
McAdoo attacked the Republicans
for their failure to reduce taxation ex-
lionaires whose surfaces were reduced.
He challenged Republican economy by
pointing to a treasury deficit of $780,
00O,0 admitted by the president in
his veto of bonus bill. He called the
Fordney- McCumber tariff the most
extortionate ever enacted. alleging
that it took from the public four bill
lion dollars per annum, of which only
four hundred million dollars went to
the treasury. the remainder being
gift to the trusts that generously con-
tribute to Republican campaign funds.
He charged the Republican tariff
policy with adding to the farmers
troubles by restricting his ability to
sell his surplus in European markets.
McAdoo advocated legislation to en-
courage farm cooperation: more lib
eral short-tern credits for farmers;
reduction of freight rates on agricui-
tural products; the establishment OF
an elevator and warehouse system for
farm products and the use of ware
house receipts as a basis for credit
He said 40 per cent of the purchasing
power of the country was represented
by farmers and stockmen. and that
real prosperity could not come until
the government adopted a genuinely
constructive and enlightened po3cy
toward agriculture and labor.
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