The Bozeman courier. (Bozeman, Mont.) 1919-1954, 1924-07-30
PEOPLE ARE URGED TO SUPPORT GOVERNOR DIXON

Governor Dixon has announced his candidacy for reelection.
The question is whether the people of the state shall sustain a
public servant who has stood four square for all classes of its
citizenship, in the face of the most vtuperative assaults from
the paid agents of the foreign owned corporate interests because
they were not able to control his official actions.
Shall the men and women of Montana, whose public interests
he has faithfully served, now permit a man of this type to be
destroyed by the malignant anger of special privilege, or will
they re-elect him by the most decisive vote ever given a governor
of this state?
Regardless of preconceived opinions, let US review the cold
facts in order that a first balance may be struck.
Four years ago, Governor Dixon found the state revenues
bankrupt. He has made it a going concern. He found the state
institutions threatened with suspension for lack of funds and he
has made them more efficient than ever. The year before he
became governor, the general fund had run more than one million
dollars in red.
The fiscal year closing July first, shows receipts over ex-
penditures of about $4,000 and with about $55OyOOO of the cur
rent years legislative appropriations returned unexpended to the
treasury.
He found the insane asylum costing the state $652,OOO the
year before he became governor. Last year it's maintenance
cost was $347OOO.
The state prison cost the year he became governor was
$325OOO. Last year it was only $181y PIP.
The figures are the official records. Do they mean any
thing to you?
He has done this in the face of a two hundred sixty million
dollar shrinkage in the assessed valuation of property between
1920 and 1924.
The record has been made despite the steadily rising per-
centage of delinquent taxes" during these terrible years of
deflaton and drought. The delinquent tax total in 1920 was a
little less than Z per cent, in 1924 a little more than II per cent.
This rehabilitation of the states finances has been accom-
plished despite the further handicap of having the great Montana
Power company Withholding by court injunctions $487,962 of their
assessed taxes for 1922 and 1923. The state tax commission last
year raised the assessed valuation of the Montana Power COM
pany from $45,OOO,OOO to $54,OOOOOO, and that is why the COM
pany brought the injunction suits.
Almost unaided and alone ne forced the adoption of the
constitutional tax commission for the equitable assessment of
these foreign owned corporate interests who heretofore had in.
vested a percentage of their Montana profits in controlling news
papers, legislatures, courts and government itself. Of course. thew
hate Governor Dixon. Ask any of their paid retainers. Read
their newspapers and note the denunciations of the man their
money could not control.
The general manager of the Montana Power company while
in Helena last week, l am reliably informed, made the following
statement:
1--WE are going to beat Dixon in the Republican primaries
by $4,000 votes. We have the organization and we have tbo
money to do it, and when we open up you watch us put it over "
For years a reign of terror has prevailed in Montana because
men in public life were afraid of the power of these great monied
interests to crush and destroy any man in public life who dared
to disobey orders.
The manager of the Montana Power company, is evidently
still of the belief that money can accomplish all things.