The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1937-06-17

lterested in reduction in State expendi-
lures. 1t is one for Mr.. Ripley's BE
lieve it or Not" column, but none the
less true 1t was a group of Minnesota
farmers-not the far-famed CD Peoples
Lobby type-who invaded the corridors
of the Capitol Wednesday, bringing fol
personal presentation resolution to
the legislature demanding a reduction
in appropriations. So rare is any such
thing that many legislators found them
lSelves speeches.. Said they: I'VE OF
the rural communities demand that the
Legislature of this state refuse to ap-
lprove any legislation carrying with 1t
new appropriations and that they de-
vote their time and their efforts toward
finding means of reducing appropria-
lions instead of finding new ways of
taxation and new sources of revenue. I"
The gentlemen who made the trip to
the capitol to stress their demands were
real gentlemen. There was no harang-
uing; no loud mouthed shoutings. There
were no threats against the lives of
legislators or their families. These men,
so unlike those who made up the
Peoples Lobby were not professional
agitators and labor organizers. They
were honest-to-goodness farmers, who
own their own farms and homes, and
who hope to keep them by keeping the
tax wolf from their door.
The resolution was the result of a
To roa NJ forroayc cloud
on May Goth. It did not deal with the
disagreement between the Governor and
the Senate, which disagreement arises
in tn Governors demands that thirty
four million in new revenues be raised
as against the Senate'S determination
to hold such new Ievies to some twenty
million. 1t merely set forth the very
apparent fact that 1--WE cannot have our
cake and eat it too"
And from the Range country there
came another group. Rather than a
group of tax savers, they could be
classified as a group of tax Spenders.
They came to oppose the Senate bill
sponsored by Senators Oscar Swenson,
VIM. Dietz and Anchor Nelson. The bill
would reduce the expenditures in iron
range municipalities, townships and
school districts and place the savings
so made in the state treasury to help
take up some of the enormous demands
being made. And yet the bill would
give these same subdivisions of govern
ment far more than the average in the
state. As drawn the bill would allow
each of the range cities and villages
$500 per year per capita for school
purposes and $4,000 per year per capita
for ordinary municipal business.
Ever since iron ore became one of the
states chief resources there have been
those on the range who have gouged
and gouged the mining companies
Elections on the range have been so
bitterly fought that those not of that
section have become suspicious. Not a
few are the tales of wholesale graft and
fraud, that not only apply to the
municipal government but to the school
government, as well.
With continued demands for more
and more money for civic needs, it is
not strange, therefore, that south state
Senators, beholding the great demands
for appropriations the while their taxes
on their farm and commercial proper
ties were jumping sky high, felt it high
time to give the entire state a portion
of this great sum paid by the mining
companies through the medium Of tax
alton.
Last year the mining companies paid
in round figures, 500 100000 in taxes.
Of that vast sum Minnesota received
but little more than $6,000,O0O. Where
did the remainder go? Testimony be-
fore the Senate Tax committee was that
it went to the villages and schools and
townships.
In the same hearing some very in
teresting facts were revealed. Per cap
tia expenditures in Hibbing, for ex-
ample, were found to be $92O0-think
of it, $1,000 for every man, woman and
child in the village. Mankato, with a
slightly larger population and tidy,
weH-kept, well-policed city, had per
capita tax of but S1245. Eveleth's ex-
penditures were shown to be $71.31 per
capita as compared with only $685. in