The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1936-05-21
PROGRESSIVE REPUBLICAN
BY r. w. Hitchcock

In two paragraphs of a short le
ter published in a Twin City pape
a few days ago appeared five CON
pletely misleading political state
ments. The writer of the letter ha
apparently absorbed his warpe
views from the Minnesota Mislead
err, official organ of the farmer-la
Dor party and from other farm-la
Dor sources, had accepted them a
their face value and was Innocent.
repeating them. This little inciden
reveals the inwardness of the de
liberate deception constantly prac
ticed by the farmer-labor organ. I
disseminates false figures and mis-
statements of fact with malic,
aforethought, cunningly aware tina
many of its readers will accept tn,
misstatements for the truth anc
will be mislead to the benefit of tn,
farmer-labor party.
An examination of these two
short paragraphs is illuminating
Here they are: THE fact is the
legislature has the sole right to ap
propriate money for state purpos
es. The republicans have been II
power in the last three legislatures
and not one dime of money was eX.
pended by the state that did not
first receive the sanction of these
republican controlled legislatures
1t looked like a pretty one-sided
economy when the last legislature
ordered a ten per cent cut in sal
aries of state employees and then
raised the salaries of the three re-
publican office-holders, Mike Holm,
Julius Schmahl and Stafford
King" In these short sentences are
four false statements, one of them
made twice, which have been re-
peatedly circulated by the official
organ of the farmer-labor party, by
many farmer-labor newspapers and
by farmer-labor speakers. The false
statements are these: % that the
legislature has the sole authority
to spend tax money, (2) that the
republicans controlled the last
three legislatures, 90 that the last
legislature ordered a cut of 10 per
cent in the salaries Of state en-
ployees, and (4) that the last leg
islature raised the salaries of three
republican office holders.
What the people of the state are
interested in here is not the Pc
culiar twists of language used but
the actual facts.
a. There are several depart
ments OF the Minnesota state gov
eminent which spend state money
without legislative control-for in
stance, the highway department,
the rural credit bureau, the game
and fish setup and others. Instead
OF every dime being spent by the
highway department upon appro-
priation by the legislature, that de-
partment last year spent many mil
lions without legislative control. In
fact, so absolute is the highway de-
partment in the spending of its
millions that the farmer-labor at
torney general of the state chal-
lenged even the right of the law to
suggest to the highway commits
sioner how he should spent the
states money and declared that in
spending the public funds the high
way commissioner is like Alexander
Selkirk, monarch of all he sur
veys. The false statement that ev-
cry dollar of state funds is spent
upon direct appropriations of the
legislature has been much made
use of by the farmer-labor party TO
deceive the people. The state adj
ministration spends many millions
free of all legislative control; it is
largely in the expenditure of these
millions that scandals have arisen
in the state administration during
the last five years.
CD The republicans controlled
the last three legislatures" This is
another misstatement, worn thread
bare by constant farmer-labor
misuse in various forms. It is
doubtful if the republicans have
ever had a majority in the legisla-
ture since the enactment of the
law, back in 1913, for the election
of members of the legislature on a
non-party basis. The control of the
legislature in that time has been
in the hands of groups organized
without regard to party lines, and
few who have served in the legisla-
ture under the non-party rule have
known, or have even thought, who
were republicans and who were
democrats. One instance will suf-
flee. In the Legislature of 1885 the
House was composed of 131 men,
bers. OF these, 40 were farmer-la-
borites or acted with the farmer
labor party in the organization and |
control of the House, 80 were DEM
ocrats and so were republicans |
The republicans were 16 votes |
short of a majority. The same con- i
dition prevailed in the state Sem
ate. A similar condition has pre-
vailed in every legislature for
many years.
CD 1t is completely misleading to
assert that the last legislature cut
the salaries of state employees 10
per cent. What the legislature real
ly did was to reduce the cut of 20
per cent, in force in the previous
down to 10 per cent,
which was in effect an increase in
wages to most of the employees af-
fected. Hundreds of state employ
ees were not affected by the re-
auctions which applied only to
higher salaried employees.
(4 The statement that the last
legislature raised the salaries of
three republican office-holders,
Mike Holm, Julius Schmahl and N
Stafford King, is a particularly at
rOciOuS falsehood deliherataly ,;- II