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Editorial and City Life Section Hearst’s Sunday American, Atlanta, Sunday, August 17, 1913
taxation—he paid a little something occasionally
out of good nature in a joking sort of way.
And while the elephant’s foot still is felt, with
its heavy weight, every man, woman and child in
this country has cause for congratulation.
For at least we know the truth, we see it, can
utter it, AND THE TRUTH WILL SET US
FREE.
It is the poor man in our country who has felt
the weight. He has carried the heavy load to
keep his children in school. He has paid the big
taxes that the trust laid upon the food that he ate,
from the meat of the ox to the milk in his baby’s
bottle.
« # «
Our American elephant of taxation, although
Invisible and not always understood, has been just
as REAL as any elephant that ever lumbered out
of his richly carved stable in the rajah’s court to
crush a miserable creature’s skull.
Our farmers, feeding the people, actually pro
ducing the wealth, have been forced to borrow
money and forced to pay more than eight per
cent for it on the average.
And the little business man has been crushed
by the competition and the brutal conspiracies of
the big capitalistic combination. He has felt the
elephant’s foot.
Young women in tens of thousands have been
employed on a basis of under-payment and under
feeding that meant ruined health or worse.
Children have been ground up into dividends
in mills, factories and mines—they have all felt
the elephant’s foot and Its full weight.
* * *
But improvement has been steady In this coun-
which Is a beginning at least And that means
progress.
We have discovered that public opinion and
public investigation can cope witty private con
spiracies and combinations, and that means
progress.
* * ♦
We have broken away as a nation from the
stupid system of subserviency and submission.
PROTESTS ARE HEARD IN EVERY HOUSE,
IN EVERY CITY, TOWN AND VILLAGE—AND
THAT MEANS PROGRESS.
Remember that the human race as a whole has
been able to read for less than a century.
And printing is a new art, and telling the truth
with print still newer.
The business of conquering and cultivating this
continent has kept the nation busy.
To a few dishonest men and to dishonest law
yers has been left the business of law making,
law interpreting and gouging through the laws.
« « *
We should be encouraged when we realize how
much has been done in this land.
Only one hundred and thirty-seven years ago a
nation smaller than the population of New York
City is to-day decided to set up in the governing
business independent of England.
In that short time we have built all our rail
roads, developed our nation, created the great
States, and DEVELOPED PUBLIC EDUCATION
FREE FROM INTERFERENCE OF GOVERN-
MENT OR RELIGION.
We have done wonders, indeed, in a few gen
erations.
Copyright. 101S. by th* Stax. Compaay. Groat Britain Righto Reoorrod.
HIS picture is intended to fix your
mind on our “civilized” system
of taxation, and also to make
you know that the world is get
ting better steadily and rapidly.
When the rajahs, gaekw r ars
and other curiously named rulers controlled
India the elephant was the princes’ toy and
pleasure.
Sometimes elephants were put to fighting each
other for the amusement of a prince.
Constantly the elephant’s great bulk and power
were used to crush out the lives of those that re
belled against the princes.
Many a miserable creature felt the weight of
the elephant’s heavy foot upon his chest—and
never felt anything else In this world.
Such executions were shocking to look upon.
The helpless criminal, often a man who had
failed in slavish obedience to his betters, was
stretched upon the ground. The elephant was
/
brought out, guided by his mahout.
Coldly and indifferently, without hatred, simply
obeying orders, the powerful beast raised his
heavy foot, brought it down with all his weight
upon the victim’s chest or head. There was a
crunching of bones, one more life was snuffed
out, and the dignity and power of princes again
demonstrated.
* « «
The miserable subject sentenced to die under
the elephant’s foot rarely protested. He did not
scream or struggle, but lay still, waiting for the
weight to settle upon him. He probably thought
that it was inevitable and natural
Rajahs always HAD used elephants to kill the
disobedient, and they probably always WOULD
do so.
But the days of crushing rebellion with the foot
of an elephant have gone in India. The rajahs
and be other rulers are under the power of Eng
land, which is at least a semi-clvilized nation.
Widows are no longer burned alive to honor
their husbands.
Elephants do not crush the heads of rebellious
peasants.
Even the ancient custom of marrying little
girls eight years old and younger to men of forty
is dying out.
India, that has so long lain stagnant under the
curse of caste, under the curse of a religion that
taught obedience to superiors and preached
stupid obedience; India, land of famines, poison
ous snakes, stupid religion and needless brutality
—EVEN INDIA SEES IMPROVEMENT.
The elephant that used to crush men now works
for a living, lending his strength to the peasant in
the hardest labor.
The girls of India are taught to read and think,
to rely upon themselves and to mistrust the
brutal priests of Buddha. They no longer ask to
be buried alive when their husbands die. They
know better—they go and get another husband.
* * *
When you realize how conditions have im
proved in India, the land of stagnation, you feel
sure that in this country, where improvement is
also needed, every problem will be solved and
every abuse will be wiped out with time.
We have never had heavy elephants stepping
on the chests of Bull Moosers or other rebels.
We haven’t the blazing sut
tee, we never threw girl
babies to the crocodiles, and
we don’t die of famine by the
millions.
But there Is plenty of room
for Improvement, and It will
come.
« « «
We have in America, for
instance, a system of taxation
which is in Itself an excellent
imitation of that elephant’s
foot In the picture.
Our taxing system Is a sys
tem of crushing the small
man with the power and
weight of monstrous injustice
and discrimination.
Every man struggling to take care of his home
and provide for his children feels the weight of
our elephant system of taxation.
That system presses down on the little man’s
chest in this country, Just as the elephant’s foot
used to press on the chest of the peasant in India.
The rajah never felt the elephant’s foot, and
our American rajahs of money have not until
now felt the foot of the elephant of taxation.
Our tax is laid on the little man’s house, on the
little man’s property, on the silk dress that his
wife wears—when she cnn get it—on the worker’s
glass of beer or his pipeful of tobacco.
* * *
THE ELEPHANT’S FOOT HAS BEEN ON
THE LITTLE MAN FOR A LONG TIME.
The big man has not felt it. His property
escaped. His hundreds of millions went free of
try. And the man able to recognize conditions
and changes sees clearly an ending of the system
by which the weight of power and the weight of
taxes and the weight of sorrow have always been
upon the chest of the weak.
We have started our system of taxing incomes,
And while the elephant’s foot still is felt, with
its heavy weight, every man, woman and child in
this country has cause for congratulation.
For at least we know the truth, we see it, can
utter it, AND THE TRUTH W'tUL SjET US
FPKK.
<« a
Until Recently the Rulers of India Used
the Power of the Elephant to Crush Out the
Life of Rebellious Subjects. Now the Ele
phants That Were Executioners Are Laborers
and Helpers.
With Us the System of Taxation Crushes
the Poor at the Command of the Rich Rulers.
Some Day the Tax System Will Work for the
People Instead of Crushing Them.
The Elephant’s Foot and Heavy Taxes