The people's voice., 1942-02-27

EQUALIZATION TO assess taxes, IL Ike
one valuation then the gear Il
changed and for the Railroad Com
! mission to fix a fair income on In
vestments, the same adding machine
handled by the same operatives give.
So million dollar higher valuation
The Standard adds that federal ait
has robbed us of "our rugged indc
pendent, and is making of us de
pendent state community"
We have had no rugged independ
ence nor been free state since
have been in 1t (almost 48 years)
The Standard compares our assessed
valuation of 800 million dollars with
the amount of what it grotesquely
asserts is the surplus, 642 million dol
lars, Of what we have received over
what we have paid back.
For 80 years every large. paying
property in Montana has been owned
by absentee landlords. The policy,
for instance, of the Standard itself
can be changed, or the paper shut
down, by telegram from 25 Broad
way New York City. The Northern
Pacific, with one-fourth of its mileage
in Montana, has paid 400 millions in
dividends and bond interest to for
eigners to this state. The Great
Northern has done likewise. The
Butte Hill has sent into the rest of
the country 5000 millions of dollars
in useful metal, while the men who
dug it out get only a subsistence and
reproduction wage. w. A. Clark's
estate, after many millions given to
his children before he died, was above
so million dollars. Daly's was large.
These came mostly FROM, and
| WENT OUT OF, our state.
The life insurance premiums col
lected in this state annually run
around nine million dollars. Their
losses paid here run around three mil
lion. The profit all goes to absentee
landlords. Forget the 100 percent an
nual profit of the fire, liability and ac-
cident insurance racket; the life in
the state an excess over what they
have paid in losses here equal to the
value of all the assessed property In
the state now. For three years
1887, 1888, 1899 g. the life insurance
premiums paid in Montana exceeded
losses paid by million dollars each
year.
Because of mining insurance, power
company lobbies and newspapers, alb
sentee landlord leeching, by 1882
Montana was "bled white" Our
courts with a few noted exceptions,
our legislature, our Jurors, for 40
years were too weak to protect us
from starvation due to the aggression
of the absentee landlords. Lately,
even the use of water in the Missouri
rivr has been decreed to be in the
Montana Power company and not in
farmers who want 1t for irrigation
and who claimed to own it. To get
water for these farmers now, either
the ruling must be reversed (not ia
vored by the Standard) or the federal
government must build a 25 million
dollar storage dam at Canyon Ferry |
Some years ago the Standard raised |
great cry about diversion near the |
Yellowstone Park to irrigate some
land for farmers in Idaho land prob |
ably return into the watershed). The |
slogan was invented and spread by |
the Standard Montana water for
Montanan People. The Power COM
pany is a New Jersey corporation.
The Standards slogan must now be |
"Montanan Water for New Jersey |
People,"
of course, President Roosevelt's |
plan of getting back into Montana
some of the wealth produced here
and owned elsewhere was not favored
by the people it squeezed. The scheme
was to tax that wealth in New York,
Miami, Boston, Chicago, or wherever
it was, and send it back here for the
benefit of workers, farmers, miners,
who produced it. OF course, some of
1t could have been spent more use
fully than it was But the plan on
the whole was beneficial to the ma
tlon as well as to u.s. Many projects
are capital investment like Fort Peck
dam, which accounts for government
expenditure of 100 million, complained
Of by the Standard.
The plan was the only one that
would have kept us alive In 1921,
spell was broken. Before that we
thought all bankers were paragons
of commercial virtue and exemplars
II wisdom in finance. Over 200 banks
N Montana failed in 1921-1922 Their {
books were opened. 1t was learned
hat they as class were as stupid
II events as the rest of men, and
hat many bankers were crooked and s
heir books corruptly kept Their sins 9
ound them out. 7
Some bankers got in Jail, some sur t
lived their own evil follies aud soft
urles and softer judges. These fl /
lanced no new enterprise. Ia 1926
anne the permanent blight = chain g
It's first curse was over (
'aluation. 1t sold it's stock to num- t
erless suckers-prime bankers even, h
t S47.5O or more the share. This Q
as all faded to s11.OO the share, and h
will not rise much above that be- +
ore the horn of Gabriel sounds for
he quick and the dead One cause n
their crumble was that the chain f
anks ceased doing the proper bank Il
lg functions of lending community Z,
apital to LITTLE and big enterprise r
hey became merely depositaries of n
lontana savings for their own slen- "
er, but fairly safe. profit in listed Z