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Show Published Every Saturday BY GOODWIN'S WEEKLY PUBLISHING CO., INC. A. W. RAYBOULD, Business Manager 8UB8CRIPTION PRICE: in the United 8tates, Canada and Mexico, $2.50 per year, idln posted filx months. Subscriptions to all foreign countries, within the Postal foio per year. Single eoplea 10 cents. e Payments should be made by Check, Money Order or Registered Letter, to The Citizen. Address all communications to The Citizen. Entered as second-clas- s matter, June 21, 1919, at the Postoffice at 8alt Lake City, Utah,. under the Act of March S, 1879. Ness Bldg. Salt Lake City, Utah. Phone Wasatch 5409 pay-sbl- 811-12-- 13 RELIEF FOR THE TAXPAYERS old Massachusetts when the colonies were young, there were protested against onerous taxation. It was heroic men of Boston rose in their wrath jer 16, 1773, that the the mandates of George of England and dumped three shiptea into the waters of the bay. Many heavily crown-taxe- d ns have set down this act and this day and date, as the real for the over-taxe- d colonies, ng of the war that won freedom lecame the nucleus of the mighty federation of sovereign states today, who s know and love. the successful issue of the revolution, the fathers to plan their machinery of government. They spent thirteen t it, and when they got through in 1789, they had built a lachine. Our system of popular government was then the the world. It was a glorious triumph of the rights of the lal taxpayer over the assumed prerogatives of Divine Right nd potentates. And it is the best there is in the world today, Be-Jr- e it is not saying that we could not have a better system. could have a much better system if we wanted to. i live in a world as different as the wrorld in which the fathers day is different from night. We have progressed mightily in s and we have in common use, thousands of things that would liracles to our forebears, stalwart, liberty-lovin- g lowing machin-wear- s machinery of government is just like any other out, it changes, it needs repairing, and finally it and ought to be scrapped. As our machinery of gov-- t has thrived and grown to massive proportions, down through t the be-obsol- ete changed from the simple, basic principals of the fathers of a monster political machine reconstructed, revamped and to suit the exigencies and conveniences of party control. a nation as regards the patural result we are a lel of our public officials. It is computed by authoritative cans that fully 15 per cent of the total population of the in serving the other 85 per cent in some manner in Me, either in the service of the federal government, itself, or s, it has ; top-hea- vy na-engag- ed the cities and township communities. Think population of one hundred and ten millions s an army of approximately sixteen and a half million people ,Msomc oificial, fashion and clerical, technical or work-a-da- y Pay from the taxpayers. lI'.I . lcal expediency has caused the massing of this gigantic PMicai workers; it is the history of the nation, as well as ate and ill divisions that the de- of the minor fhe maintenance of political machines, makes the indiscri-In- S of ; ublic servants paramount. emerged from a government of men in national, state, municipal affairs, to that of government largely by and tttcaucratism, commissions and specially appointed commit-- e ave and have gone in flung economy to the four-winks, the counties, of a round 1 sub-politic- al ds for government on a grandiosely conceived plan that means the emparty-workequota of public ployment of an ever-increasi- arid true-blu- e ng sap-sucke- rs, rs politicians. The Case in Utah. The tax question as it looms in Utah calls for the careful and combined consideration of the man who pays the tax. Here, as elsewhere, the taxpayers are confronted with that same example of party expediency and the maintenance of a huge army of state, county and municipal workers, that obtains all over the nation. The crux of the question is not contained in the comparatively few public officials who go wrong; neither is it represented more prominently in the work or activities of one political party over that of another. The prevailing political system calls for as much observance on the part of one party as they do that of of amenities-politicanother. The necessity for the ins to stay in and for the outs to get in, makes it a royal scramble for public favor and that party which can build up the biggest and most aggressive party machine, while in power, usually cops the persimmons. This means generous and promises, which the successful candidates must glowing keep insofar as it lies within their power so to do. It means an army of political job holders and the appointment of endless commissions and special representatives, all gleaning their substance from the public tax treasury. It means the levying of higher tax levies and the kiting of valuations to secure enough money to keep the political machine well oiled and hitting on all cylinders ; it means the issuance bonds ; it means creation of necesof vast fortunes in sary funds to carry on public business by the issuance of paper in large amounts which is merely a legal form of mortgaging the proceeds of a tax levy before it has been collected ; it means the building up of gigantic overhead all along the line; and, too often, the reckless spending of the peoples money. Concrete Examples. Perhaps no better or more penetrating example of the rather reckless and apparently useless expenditure of the peoples money, may be cited than the $12,000 annual cost for smoke abatement, which has signally failed to abate because it was unscientific and futile from the beginning. Other concrete examples of spending of public moneys or rather of issuing bonds to raise money, the public must pay interest on and eventually pay back in full is the liberal manner in which Salt Lake City has issued several millions in income securities. The state maintains a top heavy political pay roll, and has done so for many years, according to the judgment of scores of our most prominent and conservative business men. It is the claim,, put forth by many big men of the various walks of life, that fully 80 per cent of all public moneys collected through the different taxing sources, direct or indirect, is absorbed in paying overhead governmental charges. al pre-electi- on non-taxpayi- ng tax-redempti- on free-heart- ed tax-exem- pt |