The union times. (New Haven, Conn.) 1941-1948, 1944-01-22
Rep. Taber Lets
Cat Out OF Bag
By Miriam KOlkin

approval of the senate finance COM
mittee's bonanza to warn profiteers
-camouhaged as a wartime tax bill
will probably set the scene for a
renewed tax campaign.
Indications are that President
Roosevelt will veto the bill, which
raises just slightly over 81 billion.
Operating on the motto, "a sales
tax or nothing at all'', the finance
committee chose to enact practical
II nothing at all as the method de-
signed to ALLEVIATE the least number
of voters. If presidential veto re-
suits, chairman Walter George Cd.
Ca.) of the senate finance COM
mittee will undoubtedly pretend
that a sales tax is the only way left
to raise revenue.
He will maintain this elaborate pre-
tense in the face of reams of testi-
mony to the contrary by Treasury
Dept. officials. For the past few
months Sec. of Treas. Henry Nor
genthau, Jr, and his chief counsel,
Randolph Paul, have been trudglng up
to the Hill, YEARLY explaining to first
the House ways and means commit
tee and then the Senate finance COM
mittee that the Administrations request
for $101a billion wasn't advanced as a
bargaining point, but that it was in
dead earnest when it named that sum
as the minimum needed to win the
war.
Congressman, however, are noto-
riously immune to administration pleas
and logic. The Treasury's carefully
worked-out tax program was showed
aside with contempt.
Instead the Senate finance COM
nittee whipped up measure which
left even hardened legislative OBJ
servers gasping at its fragrant invi-
tation to war prOfiteering. Income
tax IoophOIes were widened, the re-
negotiation law was amended out
of existence, and low income
groups we're saddled with the main
burden.
Committee members topped off this
concoction with raspberry aimed at
unions and cooperatives in the shape
of a rider requirino them to file an
nual financial statements with the
Treasury. Behind this is drive to
force unions off the income-tax ex-
emption list.
The Senate had already given its
approval to the revenue raising pro-
visions of the bill when Roosevelt
submitted his budget message which
included a renewed appeal for a
$1ON billion tax BILL.
Congress for the most part remain
ed unmoved. In fact, Rep. John Taber
Or. N.Y.) said the Presidents re-
quest was Childish" Asked why, he
beloved because he refused to re-
commend a sales tax" Everyone
knows, that a sales tax is the only
way to get a substantial return, he
said, blithely ignoring the testimony
of Morgenthau, for one, who said that
a sales tax is the least desirable meth
cd of raising revenue.
lie the President vetoes the pres
ent tax bill, the only thing left to
do will be to enact 1910 sales tax,
he said cheerfully. Taber's chief in
terest at the moment, however, is
printing for fight against the Pres
ident's 500 billion budget.
There's a lot of water that ought
to be squoze out of it, he said, indi-
eating that he was going to do the
squeezing. It's a technique at which
Taber is most adept
AS ranking members of the
House appropriations committee,
he led the fight against the $25,-
900 income limitation. Last spring
his rumbling voice was raised with
the main Ratchet job on OWL. and
O.P.A., which were almost wiped
off the states i'm the orgy of congress
sional budget-chOpping.
Taber has announced that the Pres
ident's budget items for established adj
ministrative departments-like the
Treasury and post Office could be cut
by at least 1870 and war agencies by
$50"
When appropriations for a string
of vital war agencies-O.P.A.,
OWL, F.S.A., WING, etc.-cOme
up before Congress within few
months, Taber will undoubtedly be
i'm there swinging his axe.