The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1923-12-25
Federal Aid"
From the Baltimore Sun.

The steadily growing tendency of private
Observation-Disclosures that business be agrcul-
t1raI or irdustriaI-to demand financial aid
from the federal government is sinister
enough in its implications to have the closest
attention of the public. 1t is unfair to say
that the wheat farmer, or some OF his radical
spokesmen. is the most conspicuous example
of this tendency. The industries when
seek and obtain heavy tariff protection,
those which have asked for the privilege
of issuing taX-empt bonds to stimulate such
things as housing construction, for instance
illustrate it just as significantly as the farm
ers do. The movement threatens to become
epidemic
The cotton-growing interests of the South
are going to ask financial assistance from
congress this winter, if Representative
Lowrey, of Alabama, has interpreted their
thought correctly. They want an extern
sion of federal credit for the purchase OF
fertilizer and of calcium arsenate, winch Is
the only antidote for the boil weeVll known
to science now. Calcium afSehaLe IS eA-
pensive. and it would take nearly the entire
worlds supply to kill off the boil Weevll IN
the South in single season, assuming that
! the project were feasible. The cotton plant
ers want to purchase it in large quantities
to check their insect enemy; they want the
! federal government to advance them the
money for doing so, with a liberal policy as
to repayment over a period of years. 1t
doubtless will be argued that the boil Weevll
menace constitutes a national emergency,
and that therefore a grant of federal tundS
is iustifable. Every appeal from industry
for assistance from the national treasury,
however, is put forward on exactly the same
footing.
What is the farm bloc going to ask of
| Congress? Reports have it that the more
/ radical of it's members will ask either
! government purchase of the wheat surplus
or an outright appropriation to relieve agrl-
cultural distress. The measures which are
now proposed by the administration, includ-
ing the cooperative marketing organizations
among farmers are not opposed by the
bloc; it is denied, however, that they deal
with the emergency features of the situation.
What is wanted is nothing less than a sub
sidy or a subvention, apparently.
Congress has denied subsidy to shipping;
there is little prospect that the Inflated
Lasker plan will be revived again, no mat
ter how badly New England wants it. But
the spirit of federal subsidy is abroad in
the land nevertheless. Business interests
are getting more and more in the habit of
asking favors from the national government;
they want direct subvention or support, or
exemption from the federal statutes, or in
direct aid of the type characterized in the
Fordney-McCumber tariff. The protective
tariff, of course, is almost as old as the
government itself; ship subsidy has been agi-
tated in the country for two decades or
more but the various plans for direct grants
of funds or credit to special interests seem
to be an outgrowth of the world war. 1t
is sincerely to be hoped that some means
will be found for checking this tendency,
which bodies nothing but i'll for the federal
government and for business itself if long
continued. If the government is to become
direct fiancial partner of private business
interests the country will take another long
step in the direction of bureaucratic or So
cialstic control of its economic fabric.