Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 310, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 December 1916 — U. S. FINANCES IN BAD CONDITION [ARTICLE]

U. S. FINANCES IN BAD CONDITION

Rainey Sees $1,700,000,000 Budget In Salary Grab.

Washington, D. C., Dec. 29. —That the United States will have a $1,700,000,000 budget in 1918 is the prediction of Representative Rainey of Illinois, ranking democratic member of the house committee on • ways and means. In an appeal issued today against the salary grab and “pork” measures which have been introduced in congress and some of which have already passed the house, Mr. Rainey pointed out that the finances of the United States are in a precarious condition. Declaring that incomes are already being taxed to the limit and that the revenue from liquor sources, amounting to millions of dollars annually, must soon be expected to fall off, Representative Rainey asserted that something must be done to co-ordinate the expenses of the government with its income. “Our appropriations for 1918, it is now apparent, will be $280,000,000 ir excess of our revenues from all sources,” Mr. Rainey said. “This does not include payment for the Danish islands, payment to Colombia under our treaty with her, nor the increased expenditures for maintaining our army on the Mexican border which are now in sight. ' “We are also face to face with the greatest salary grab in the history of the nation and not a single newspaper in the United States is protesting against it. This salary grab is to be shared by nearly 500,000 government empolyes and may amount to more' than $60,000,000 per year. It is to be carried through all the supply ‘bills. Members of congress, in preparation for it, increased their own clerical allowance' SSOO per year, and increased the salaries of their political employes 10 per cent.” Asserting that there is no excuse for this raid, since the salaries of government employes were originally fixed far in excess of what they ought to have been at the time the spoils system was flourishing, Mr. Rainey then declared that the Nolan $3 a day minimum wagebill would add another $20,000,000 a year to the federal budget if passed. “In order to meet these enormous expenditures for preparedness and increased salaries which may amount to $400,000,000, the cry always is to cut out ‘pqrk’, which means cut out expenditures for rivers and harbors, $25,000,000 a year; for public buildings, which averages $9,000,000 a year, and for the annual distribution of vegetable seeds,, which costs $250,000 a year.”