The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1924-01-02
YOU ASKED FOR 1T

When you elect free-and. easy
spenders to office. you must provide
plenty Of money for them to spend.
The only way in which this can be
done is by taxation. There are tax
exempt bonds, but no tax exempt Cit
liens. Soak the-rich taxation some
times does soak the rich, though not
nearly so hard as our legislators
hoped and planned, but it infallibly
swcats the poor.
Last week we had something to say
about Federal taxes, but state and
city taxes are quite as deserving Of
attention. When there are three
rings under the big top in which stu
pendous and dcath-defying feats are
being presented at the same time, the
eyes Of the spectators are naturally
focused on that ring in which the
feats seem most stupcndous and
death-dcfyint. But though the
somcrsaults in mdair Of the Federal
Troupe keep one gaping, the stunts
Of the State Sisters on the slack wire
and the juggling with knives by the
City Fathers are no less hazardous.
1t has long been accepted as i
commonplace that Il nation of home
owners is strong nation and that
a stake in the land makes for good
citizenship. But our taXlaycrS are
steadily driving home n new lesson.
1t is that the man who owns the
house in which he lives is fool.
1t is true that taxation is invariably
passed along to the renter, but he
at least has a hope and n chance
for by jumping from house to house
from city to suburb, and from one
suburb to another he may at least
lower his taxes. There is, Of course,
another surer and less troublesome
way to accomplish this purpose, but
the average voter is usually too stu
pid or too lazy to look into it. In
stead we read of angry househ olders
storming city halls to protest against
increased real-estate assessments and
taxes, of mass meetings Of indignant
citizens who are enraged at the price
of commodities. They can protest
until they are purple and resolve I'M
til they use up all the whercases in
the dictionary, and they will get no.
where. They asked for it.
These groups are largely composed
of men and women who went to the
polls and voted for higher prices;
or who stayed away from the polls
and so assented to them; or of boost
ers who are merrily boosting the cit
les of their affections along the road
towards cOnfiscatiOn. The booster,
with his noisy cheering for the i'm
mediate development and overdevel-
Opment of everything. is Americas
most expensive and wasteful citizen.
Now at 4 time when the country is
staggering under burden of I'M
avoidable Federal taxation, due to
the. war, when every cOmmon-sense
consideration calls for sound finance
rctrenchment and careful examin-
alton Of all new expenditures, we find
Congress half-willing to pass up a
chance to cut taxes and almost open
ly eager to pass measures that will
increase them. We find the states
planning overambitious projects that
call for new taxes and great bond
issues that finally must be met by
still further taxation. We find the
cities virtuously asserting one year
that there will he no raise in tax
IS, bat that assessments must be
jumped; and the next year declaring
piOusly that there will be no radical
changes in assessments, but that the
tax rate must be increased. So up
go assessments. up go taxes, up go
rents, up go prices, and up into the
air goes the worthy citizen.
Taxation is the keystone of the
high-cost-living arch. There is no
chipping here and picking there at
prices until that keystone is loosen
ed and brought down from it's proud
eminence. Only intelligent voting
can do that, though watchfulness and
firmness can accomplish something,
even now. For another election is
coming, and where the fear of God
will not move politician the fear of
voters will-when enough of them
stand together for more than few
days at a time. Heretofore every
class. except the taxpayer. has lined
up at one time or another for some
selfish class purpose. When the tax
payers-and that means everybody
stand together for the single pur-
pose Of reducing taxes, we shall get
them reduced.
These temporary spasms of rage
against the confiscatory taxation of
real estate are usually an affair of
the owner, not of the renter of prop
erty. But we heard the other day
of an intelligent woman who bore
down an assessor to protest against
an increase in the valuation of a
house that she was renting, because
during the past ten years the rent
Of that house had been increased
from fifteen to eighty dollars a
month following periodic increases
in assessments and taxes.
The woman renter had found the
source of her, trouble. If she will
analyze her other living costs she
will find that taxation is the largest
single factor in their advance.
Take any city-your city. Take
any voter-yOurself. Take any cleo
tiOn-the last one. What happened?
Either you did not register and
vote-and in that case you have no
cause for complaint about anything
that is happening to you-or if you
did vote the chances are ninety in
hundred that you voted for exact
ly what you arc getting. Only a
few of those who went to the polls
had any real information about the
fitness of their party candidates or
by whom, how and when they were
selected; or they voted on the theory
that easy spending, even with graft