The Bismarck tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, N.D.) 1916-current, 1931-01-12
The Case Against Government Charity
(MinueapOlis Tribune)

AAAcuAAS/
The opposition which has developed to the demand
that federal funds be appropriated and loaned out for
the purchase Of human food in the drouth areas Is
hardly as brutal and calloused, we are disposed to be-
lieve, as certain s~elf-styled humanitarians would have
it appear.
TO say that this opposition has it's roots in a COM
plete insensibilty to human misery and suffering comes
periously close, as a matter of fact, to simple char
latanry.
of opinion as to the need for administering relief and
still exist a great mass of honest and conflicting opinion
as to the best means of attaining that end.
Those persons who do not actually care whether the
drouth sufferers of the nation are decently fed and
clothed or not must constitute an infinitesnnally small
proportion of our population. The great majority OF
us want to see relief administered to the destitute and
hungry with all possible despatch and efficiency, whether
these unfortunates are the victims of drouth, or unem-
ployment or other adverse circumstances. Nevertheless,
the wisdom of appropriating federal funds, or public
funds of any sort, for loans that amount, in the last
analysis, to simple charity may legitimately be QueS-
toned. If this practice is a sound one for drouth suf-
ferers it is, of course, a sound one for sufferers of every
sort and description. The principle, if established. can
not logically be restricted, in its application, to certain
chosen groups. We must either accept or reject in its
entirety the notion, which is now being earnestly set
forth, that charity is the special province of the govern
ment.
This notion Is admittedly an attractive one. The idea
Of alternating all human suffering through the public
treasures has an elemental simplicity about it which is
almost irresistible. But the fact of the matter is, of
course, that government charity, like private charity,
must ultimately be paid for by some one. Congress. to
our knowledge, possesses no magic formula for creating
charity. funds out of thin air, and we are even inclined to
suspect that no state legislature or city council possesses
1t. The question OF how charity shall be administered,
therefore, touches the taxpayer rather intimately. ano
if he has given the matter any thought, he will be dis
posed to doubt the justice, logic or efficiency Of any
system of government philanthropy.
It must be plain to anyone that no controversy exists
as to whether our drouth victims should be fed and
clothed. Certainly no sef-respecting nation would dis
regard such obvious needs as now exist in the stricken
regions. But the point is that private relief organiza-
tons are already in the field. and that they have been
created and financed for just such emergencies. The
American Red Cross has already given its assurance that
1t is prepared to meet the distress needs Of the drouth
sufferers. and it Is a matter Of record that the Ameri-
can Red Cross can work more effectively and with greater
despatch and intelligence than any bureaucratic gov
eminent philanthropy ever organized. The loan OF funds
for the purchase of seed, fertilizer and livestock docs not
fa2 within the province Of private charity; here is relief
Of q sort which the federal government can undertake
with some show OF legitimacy. But loans for human
food are another matter. They would constitute, as
Representative Tison has already pointed out, q dis
~tributicr Of funds for strictly charity purposes and not
for the rehabilitation OF a temporarily stricken industry.
For the federal government to compete with private
charity and local initiative here, is not so much wicked
and vicious as It Is silly and futile. There is, in the last
analysis, no clear need for such competition. When
that need exists, and not until then, it will be time to
talk q iaging pipe lines from the federal treasury.