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Show THE CITIZEN 4 ance of power is in the making if it has not already been achieved. Some thirteen months ago, according to reliable information obtained in Paris, the Italians were seeking to cement an alliance between Germany, Russia and Italy. Premier Mussolini, the most active figure in the European scene, attempted to bring that about but failed. Meanwhile a But how much would it benefit America to collect its debts at the price of ruining our national industrial prosperity closing our factories and taking the jobs away from our work! ers? The question is a complicated one and will bear mud thought. For this reason the warning of Mr. Winston is espe. cially appropriate at this time. As the Chicago Tribune puts it; American investors have been asked to send their money abroad to the countries which at the same time are protesting their inability to pay even the interest on what they now owe our government. When these nations come here to negotiate pay. ment of their debts, they produce figures to prove they arc ; within a few weeks, American bankers publish the most glowing prospectuses regarding the solvency of the same nations whose bonds they are seeking to float. The bankers' loans abroad have been estimated at some $11,000,000,000, practically the sum of the debt European na. tioris owe our treasury; the annual charge on the private debt is much greater because the interest rates are far higher. The bankers cannot have it both ways. If there are insuperable obstacles to Europe's paying the treasury, there are also insuperable obstacles to Europe's repaying private investors in this country." lowered; alliance has been foreshadow-e- d in the Locarno agreement; the outline has been filled in, in part, by the agreement reached between the steel producers of France and' Germany and their satellites in Belgium and Luxembourg to divide the world market and conquer. This threat has been answered, in turn, by negotiatipns looking toward an alliance between Britain and Italy and perhaps Russia as well. The negotiations are still as secret as negotiations conducted by Mussolini can be. The relationships between the great powers are probably still in process of crystallization. r The league of nations was supposed to supplant the system of alliances for the control of Europe, but we see small reason to suppose that the league has succeeded in its purpose. Considerations of security, economic growth, and colonial expansion are leading the powers of Europe to divide into two rival camps just as they did before the war. As soon as the alliances are definitely formed we may expect a repetition of the old story TELEPHONE of lesser encroachments, followed by greater encroachments of rivalry in armaments, of crises which just fail to lead to war, leading eventually to the crisis which does lead to war. We hope Sometimes we wonder if people realize the amount of work for the best, but we cannot bind ourselves to the clear implication and study necessary to keep a telephone system going. You go of today's events. The last war came as a surprise to most Americans because to your telephone and make a call. The operator and the system as a nation we had refused to admit that the European system of do the rest. No matter how much machinery is required to operate a telbalances must result in war. We have had our education at a cost ephone system, or how scientifically it may be handled, what to this country of more than 100,000 lives and some twenty-fiv- e billions of dollars. Some of our people who understood Wash- makes it worth while to the public is the human intelligence that ington's argument against entanglements in Europe did not need keeps it going. Back of the operator there is an organization whose busthe lesson and they have now been reinforced by thousands of others who have learned by experience. There remain many iness it is to see that there is some one always on hand to keep otherwise intelligent persons who for one reason or another can- the service going in spite of accident, flood, epidemic, storm, war not or will not learn. They are constantly urging us into fresh any one of a hundred emergencies. When you think of the telephone company, think of it as a entanglements. We tried to avoid participating in the last war and succeeded for more than two years. If the leaguists, world large group of earnest men and women who are striving to sene courters and hands across the sea advocates have their way, we the public in a human and very valuable sort of a way. Your telephone service is reliable because the people back of shall be bound to get into the next one the day the first shot is it consider their work a public duty not just a job. fired. Chicago Tribune. Franco-Germa- n bank-rupt- pre-wa- THINK FOR YOURSELF FOREIGN LOANS Said Mr. Garrard Winston, under secretary of the Treasury in a recent address: American financiers must be careful of the soundness of d foreign loans. The risk of such investments is estimated at greater than for domestic investments. Loans to foreign municipalities and corporations should be for the purpose of increasing productivity, and loans to municipalities and governments are not sure of being used for such purposes. In Europe there have been too many American bond men trying to persuade them to issue bonds for public works that might better be delayed." Mr. Winston recently returned from Europe and he knows whereof he speaks. The warning is a timely one and should be heeded by American investors. During the last twenty months, Mr. Winston states, America has loaned a billion dollars to Europe in addition to the money advanced to Germany under the Dawes plan. The amount which European countries now owe to the United States government and to private American investors is staggering. And it is not to be forgotten that some of these countries are now declaring themselves unable to pay what they owe. our government and the interest thereon. If these obligations cannot be paid, what assurance is there that our private loans to Europe will finally be liquidated? Some of our international bankers declare that Europe will pay us in goods and that for this reason our tariffs should be one-thir- J i If the people in this country are losing their personal rights they have no one to blame but themselves. Every voter should read and study the Constitution of the United States and not rely upon their politicians to make the laws for them. Little by little the peqple have been losing their voice in government, and Washington" is yearly usurping more power. At the present state rate we are going in less than twenty-fiv- e years, most of cur will legislation will be directed from Washington. States Rights become ancient history and the politician will say tliot sufl rights might have been a good thing for the people a mndred years ago, but now we need a Mussolini" at Washing: m. However, if every voter .would take the time stud ing dictagovernment, politicians would not be so anxious to do ting., as well as the thinking, for the general public. tl-- become a notorious and well established f; t that while the federal and many county governments have reduced It lias taxes and have been living within their budgets, the aver government lives far beyond its means. ge It may be said that except for a deliberate disrega safety as occurs in connection with the carelessly thro1 ette, all fires are due to the disinclination of the owner to spend the money necessary to eliminate hnzar tures, most of which are usually very apparent. pant . - state d of n cigaf r occu- on? fea' |