The times-news. [volume] (Hendersonville, N.C.) 1927-current, 1933-05-23
NEWSPAPERS OPINIONS
THE REPEAL BooTSTRAP

Repeatedly in the last few years the sages OF
business have warned against recipes for recovery
which would have industry lift itself by its boot
straps Sometimes the phrase has been used Where
it does not really apply. But Americans would 40
we'll to consider whether it does not tit the recon-
mendation advanced by President Roosevelt and
his budget director in which the revenue from
relegalzed liquor trade is sought as means ulti-
mately of defrayng the cost of an otherwise COM
mendable public works program.
An inducement to the states to hasten their
ratifying of the prohibition repeal amendment IS
plainly implied III the presidents message and III
the tax proposals of Mr.. Lewis w. Douglas, dlrec-
for of the budget. Even more than this is implied
If the government anticipates $25O,OO00OO a year
in revenue from hard liquors, aside from the pres
ent beer tax, it must anticipate pretty extensive
drinking of those liquors. Even at the wartime
rate of taxation this estimate would call for the
of nearly four-ffths much whisky,
gin and similar intoxicants as during 1918
And how would this affect industry? The testi-
mony not only of laboratory experiments but also
of common experience is that drinking is drag
on the efficiency of workers from manual laborers
to intellectuals. 1t is drag, moreover, on their
ability to spend for the products of moro whole
some industries. Here is where the bootstrap ef-
feet comes in.
The government spends large sums on public
construction to put money into circulation. So
long as that money is spent for worthwhile things
it tends to multiply itself. The man benefited by
new park or a piece of furniture IN his nome
becomes shade more useful and helps to pro
duce values that will go to repay the governments
expenditure.
lif,1,n fOr iDtOYi nj
does not produce values but destroys them, slowly
down if not besotting the worker. The industry
which receives some of the benefits of quickened
business activity could readily pay moderate and
definite unemployment tax" But under repeal
it would be asked to pay instead a very indeter-
inmate tax in the form of lowered efficiency and
dependability in its staff, increased alcoholic COM
petition for the consumers dollar and increased
public OUTLAWS for social salvage
The recovery program has more in its favor
without the reference to repeal than with it. This
artificial aid-or supposed aid-would act in the
long run as a brake on the prosperity it is hoped
to encourage.
1t happens that on the same day as the budget
directors message there comes radio address by
Dr. Nicholas Murray Butler president of Columbia
University declaring that the 18th Amendment
already has been "morally repealed" and urging
that it now must be repealed legally. If DIR. But
Ter refers to the kind of repeal that has taken
place by an official dscontinuance of enforce
ment activities while the obligation remains in the
Constitution or to the kind of repeal which pro-
fesses horror at one kind of lawbreakng and yet
encourages another that is at the root of the first
then it may be asked whether this repeal is so very
moral"
The improperly of these various arguments, Of
fetal and unofficial, financial and philosophical,
lies not so much in the fact they are urged IN
favor of repeal as that they are urged in favor
of one particular kind of repeal-the utterly I'M
guarded form of federal abdcation in the liquor
problem which is proposed in the pending Blaine
If the vets were offering real Improvement IN
place of the prohibition amendment, it would
hardly seem necessary for them to use the pres
sure of refined brides or threats to win their case.
Until substitute is offered which at least Will
give adequate protection to dry states and will
keep private profit out of the traffic in noxicants,
the repeal proposal will continue to be unaccept-
able to millions of Americans.-Christian Science
Monitor.