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Show OUR INTEREST IX MINING Floyd W. I' :r -.: -.. in the Saturday Evening Post of January 22, reviews the mining situation in thei United States and clearly shows that mining min-ing is one of the two basic industries indus-tries of man, farming being the other. oth-er. "Just now we are much disturbed by the slump that has taken ulace in our metal mining industries. From a time of unusual prosperity, caused by the war, the metal mining industry has settled down to a period per-iod of dullness and readjustment. "Of the many problems the mining min-ing industry is now facing nore are more important than the questions of tax reform, blue-sky legislation, standardization, a protective traiff and operating costs under new freight frei-ght rates. In the matter of 'state mine taxation the metal producers are on solid graufid in their contention conten-tion that the so-called and valorem basis of taxation for real-estate holdings hold-ings or agricultural lands. When the miner produces the ore it becomes of vy.lue. is sold and thereafter can lienor be of value to that piece of property again. A mine can only show ineome by depletion of its fixed fix-ed value, while a farm not only yields an annual crop providing a yearly income, but at the same time is likely to show an increase in land j value which is not affected by the return re-turn from the annual harvest." ! Tiie plainest lesson of the war j was that the nation which exercises j ominion over the minerals of the r:'rh, including oil. controls the ! earth. Every westerner should now i stand solidly bebird t:"' fining in-dn::try in-dn::try and favor only constructive policies which encourage iti operation opera-tion and edvelopment, and particu-1 particu-1 :r!y in regard to our foreign trade relations. |