Jasper County Democrat, Volume 7, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 December 1904 — THE SUBSIDLY EVIL. [ARTICLE]

THE SUBSIDLY EVIL.

White County Democrat: The scramble of such Republican statesmen as James E. Watson, Charley B Landis, Warren G. Sayer, Durbin, Crumpacker and others for Senator Fairbanks’ seat, with A. K. Sills waiting to step into the shoes of the last named, furnishes some diversion for Democrats after their recent defeat. The republican papers of Newton and Benton counties are each asking for an opening of the books; that an investigation be made of the various county offices of their respective counties. Let’s see, have the republican papers of Jasper county demanded anything of this sort? Ob, no; we remember now, it was the taxpayers our papers wanted investigated. The republican voters of W r hite county paid their respects to Tom McCoy’s successor as Tenth district chairman, A. K. frills, who was an elector on the republican ticket for this district, by spoting him badly. He ran 77 behind his ticket in White county and, considering the great labor of “scratching” a state ballot, White county must have it in for Sills good and hard..

Wo read each season of the ‘■modification of football rules’’ by which the dangerous features are eliminated, yet the close of the few vVeek’s season this year was marked by thirteen players being killed —and this was only in the “way up” games, as many deaths resulting from the scrub 'or common games are not included in the mortality list while the number seriously injured is said to have been far in excess of that of any previous "year. Football should be stopped by legislation. And now it is expected that the legislature will enact a little special legislation freeing all public officials who lost public funds in the rotten McCoy bank from personal liability, and put the loss upon the taxpayers of the townships, city and county. This will be nice for the officials, — some of whom are entitled to sympathy, while others are not —and their bondsmen, who in some instances would have to “wlmck up” where the official is not financially able to pay, but how will the taxpayers take it?

There is no doubt but that thousand dollars appropriated by the county council to employ additional council to help prosecute the McCoys will be quite an attraction, and it will probably go into the jeans of an outside Jawyer whose initials are well known to the taxpayers of this county, but as to the McCoys ever seeing the inside of the peni-tentiary-well, that is a matter that time will determine. They have plenty of means to employ the best of attorneys who will take advantage of every technicality, and it need not surprise the swindled depositors if they go scott free, nor the taxpayers of Jasper county if they are called upon to donate another thousand oV two to assist in prosecuting them.

IndiaDapolib New*: Senator Farber, of Frankfort, •aid in The News of yesterday that he favored legislation forbid-

ding the voting of subsidies to railroads. He is clearly right on this proposition. As he says the time for subsidies—if there ever was a time for them —has gone by. There is no railroad that is really needed that can not now be built solely as a business enterprise. But the subsidy practice is evil in itself. It ought not to possible for a majority to vote the money of the people away to private enterprises. There is no more reason for opening the public treasury to railroads than there is for opening it to any other private business. A majority vote can not make such action right. The man whose property is thus taken, though he be in a minority all by himself, is simply robbed. In this matter, therefore, the powers of the people should be restrained. But further than this it is notorious that subsidy elections rarely reflect the real judgment of the community. The railroad seeking the subsidy makes an active campaign, and sometimes uses methods that are corrupt. The people, being interested only in a general way, do not give much attention to the matter. The enthusiasm, the money and the work are all on the side of the railroad. Promoters and speculators go through the countrystirring up a sentiment favorable to the subsidy, and offering “inducements” which are too often effective. The result is that the election is often a farce. Senator Farber also showed that in some cases were subsidies were voted years ago the projected railroads are still in litigation. In one of these cases the liens filed by attorneys in litigation covering a period of twenty years, amount to $40,000, which is more than the total amount of the subsidy voted. Often the people’s money is eaten up in this way, or absorbed by the promoters, and thus does not go to the construction of the roads at all.

la our local governments at least we should insist that public money be used only for public purposes. The rule is sound in itself, and its application Will stop much corruption and many abuses. If the citizens of a community think that a railroad is needed and are willing to help pay for it, there is no reason why they should not do so, but they should use their own money, and not any of the money of anybody else or of the public.