The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1934-12-06

proudly proclaimed a few weeks ago.
The department, in fact, seems to be
in great pain-and no wonder.
Xxx
It's explanations do not explain.
They are more nearly confessions than
alibias. In effect, they admit the
indictments made of the Farley "sur-
plus" that it is a fake surplus, that
instead of a surplus Mr.. Farley
actually expended $54,0O3,831 more
/ than his receipts, which sum is the
amount the Treasury had to turn over
to make up his deficiency and which is
the official deficit.
49,
1t is admitted that Mr.. Farley de-
Quoted from his expenditures a suffi-
cient number of millions to wipe out
the deficit and give him a surplus.
For example, he did not, the Depart
ment comedies, count in $28,6S2, 604
for ocean mail subsidies, nor $780,
991 for air-mail subsidies, nor $685.
094,882 for Government Department
postage, nor $4,000 for mail of Con-
gress, nor $545,OOO for weekly news
papers, nor 1921 ,652 for handling mail
for the blind, nor various other sums
for various other things.
~
Altogether, there is a total of
some $66,OOO,OOO in the way of ex-
penses which Mr.. Farley did not
count. He ignores these items under
a law sponsored by his predecessor,
Mr.. Brown. 1t is a bookkeeping law,
the purpose of which is to permit a
ostmaster-General to show that if
he did not have to take these losses
into account the deficit would not be
so deep. The law authorizes him to
estimate the total of these expenses
and then certify them separately to
the Treasury. The Treasury gives the
actual deficit but, in an explanatory
note is authorized to point out that
but for these expenses it would be
less. But Mr.. Farley was not salts
fled with that. By being ridiculously
generous in his estimate, he wiped the
deficit out altogether and created a
Surplus" The thing that shows the
whole hocus pokus up is that the
eliminated expenses are not charged
by the Treasury to any other depart
ment but to the Postoffice Depart
ment. There is no other place to
charge them.
Now it is possible to make a de-
fense-not a very good defense, but
still defense-of Mr.. Farley's fail
ure to make it clear just how his
Surplus" was obtained. And it is
possible to argue-though not very
convincingly-that there is nothing
wrong in Juggling the figures and
stretching the estimates so as to get
a surplus on paper, provided he does
nothing illegal. And that no one has
charged. 1t is not possible, however,
to defend the statement made by Mr..
Farley in presenting his report to the
President. 1t would have been better
for Mr.. Farley not to have made that
statement. Certainly he now wishes
he had not. He could explain differ
ence in figures. People generally are
easy to confuse and, except in such
clear cases as this, rarely know who
is right in a statistical controversy.
But there just is no way at all to
explain these Farley words-"For the
first time in fifteen years the tax
payers have been relieved of making
good a postal deficit" That leaves
Mr.. Farley with no "out" at all. That
admits Of no explanation. That just
| isn't so. The kindest thing one can
say about that statement is that Mr..
Farley did not understand the figures
prepared for him and just thought
| they meant the taxpayers nave been
relieved" He could have stated that
if it were not for the cost of air mail,
ocean mail, Government mail, Con-
gress mail, and other items, a surplus
might be possible. But, in face of
the facts, to claim surplus as re-
atty; to applaud himself and con-
graduate Mr.. Roosevelt on its ex-
istence; to impress the public with
the idea that millions had been saved
by his economical management, and
to tell the country that the "tax-
payers have been relieved"-to do
those things-is to go higher up in
the scale of political humbuggery
than any one else for long time.
CNDTNIED