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Show Motorists Must Prepare For Protection from Political Graft For years the motorists of Utah have patiently submitted to a tax equal to five and one-half times as r.iuch on the invested dollar as any other class of property tax in the state of Utah, says the Scenic Utah Motorist. This tax includes the personal per-sonal property tax; equal to any other tax; and in addition the state license ' ax, and the gasoline tax, the total as stated, is about five and one-half 'imes as great as any other tax in state, on the assessed valuation of the j iroperty taxed. j The motorist has submitted it is i ouestion as to whether it is consti- road program, but if for any reason it is more than we need for funds, the logical thing to do would be to reduce this tax on the motorist, because the gasoline tax is a road tax pure and simple. At every meeting of the legislature legisla-ture the motorist is compelled, for self-protection, to battle for his rights against those who would, ?f i they could, secure the passage of a , law to divert the gasoline tax to other purposes. Indications are plentiful plen-tiful that the motorist must again ; be ready to defend his interests at the I next meeting of the legislature. Tn his spmi-rnmifil rpnnrt. inst. marlp tutional or not for the sole purpose j of raising funds for building, improv-j ing and maintaining roads. The j amount of these taxes raised each 1 year has increased abnormally, because be-cause the use of the automobile has so increased. It is also true that the increase in the number of automobiles has automatically, abnormally, increased in-creased the necessity of more funds for building, improving and maintain-ng maintain-ng roads. It is doubtful if the tax money has increased in proportion to the need of funds for road purposes. purpos-es. Therefore, it is vitally important that the motorists protect their own! road funds; created by a special tax on them; from the hands of grasp- ing politicians who would, if they could, divert road funds for other I purposes. j The gasoline tax which now exacts three and one-half cents from every motorist who buys a gallon of gas, is i the largest of the funds collected, and i is therefore coveted by the politicians ! looking for more funds to spend. It is a fact the gasoline tax, in addition to other taxes paid by the motorists, is hardly sufficient to maintain our public, Secretary of State Milton H. Welling has recommended that a portion por-tion of the gasoline tax be turned into in-to the general fund for general state purposes. His argument is that we have more funds than we need. The state highway commission, whose duty du-ty is to build and maintain our roads, claims our funds are not sufficient. From the point of view of an expert, ex-pert, we believe the state highway commission is in a better position to j judge the need of funds for state road purposes than is the Secretary of the i State. At a recent meeting of the state municipal league, composed of , the mayors of the state, a resolution '. was passed recommending legislation : to divert a part of the gasoline taxes to the cities for special purposes, j It is, therefore, manifest that we may expect an effort will be made at I the coming legislature to divert a part of our gasoline taxes, or increase the I present gasoline tax, to obtain funds j for other purposes than for state I roads. This proposed attack makes it i necessary for all motorists to be on guard to prevent any rape on our i road funds. |