in
POST, DALLAS, PA., FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 7, 1936.
5;
7
THE DALLAS
Editorials
» Letters To The Editor , Comment + Discussion
DEDITORIAL
: A THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK
Faith, there have been many great men that have flattered
the people, who ne’er loved them; and there be many that they
have loved, they know not wherefore; so that, if they love they
know not why, they hate upon no better a ground.
Coriolanus Act II. Sc. 2.
* War Or Arbitration -
The confusion which characterizes this community’s most recent difference
with the company which supplies it with water seems to call for a little careful,
~~ cautious analysis.
We might preface such discussion with the assurance that this newspaper
is concerned primarily with the interests of the consumers. Years ago, The Post
‘was demanding that the company improve its services to assure an adequate
supply of water to local homes. That sentiment was crystallized in the hearings
‘before the Public Service Commission which resulted in the company being
compelled to carry out a $7,000 improvement program. During the hearings,
The Post was so aggressive in behalf of the consumers that it was reprimanded
‘by the Commission
There should be, then, no question concerning The Post’s loyalty to the
consumers, then or now. ~ i
If the relations between the company and the consumers are to be satis-
facto v three problems must be solved: 1. All local homes must have a satis-
factory supply of water. 2. Consumers must not be asked to pay an exhorbit-
ant rate. 3. The water company must be assured a fair return on its investment.
Number three is one frequently overlooked. If it is true that the utility is
carrying a sizable deficit every year it is justified in any effort to make its pro-
‘perty return a fair profit. No one can deny that. Nor can anyone expect the
Dallas Water Co. to improve a losing property. A continuation of such a policy
~ never would assure this section of a good water company. The alternate would
be municipal ownership, and we have already pointed out the disadvantages of
such a system here. We have nothing against the theory of public ownership,
but from the evidence of the part politics plays in practically every phase of
ife here we can visualize what would happen to any publicly-owned plant. If
he plant cannot be to pay now, it 1s unlikely that it could with political
factions struggling for control of it. The point, we think, is this: Now the com-
pany is bearing the burden of a losing property; if the community owned it,
deficits would have to be paid by the taxpayers. ’
So, in working for the solution of Numbers One and Two, we cannot
overlook Number Three. If it is possible, arbitration toward an equitable rate,
‘which would insure satisfactory service, should be the goal of the present ef-
fort.
We say that particularly in view of the progress already made by the
Dallas Business Men’s Association in discussing the differences of opinion
frankly with the water company. More than eighty per cent of the new in-
‘crease would be paid by the handful of business men in the town. That is ob-
viously unfair, not only to the business men, but to the community, which
must prosper in ratio to the progress of its business establishments.
: The company already has shown what seems to be a sincere intention to
recognize and: adjust the complaints of the business men. During the 150-day
postponement of the meter rates some equitable fee may be established by ar-
bitration. .
In the meantime the Dallas Taxpayers’ Association has proceeded to car-
ry its complaint to the Public Service Commission, a process which will neces-
itate a long series of hearings and a certain amount of money, which the con-
mers will be called upon to supply.
What position the Taxpayers’ Association will find itself in if the business
’s method proves to be successful is not difficult to predict. The protest of
axpayers’ Association will then rest upon the increase to domestic consu-
s, a rise of twenty-five cents a quarter.
~ Without presuming to predict any decision of the Public Service Commis-
ion, we can guess what the result of such a protest would be, especially since
a State engineer suggested a year ago that the improvements he proposed would
justify a flat increase of $1.00 a year.
+ The mistake, we think, has been in the Taxpayers’ insistence upon jump-
to an involved legal battle before it has exhausted the posibilities for
ation. :
Robert Hall Craig of Harrisburg, manager of the company, has indicated
h s willingness to sit with any group of consumers to discuss the controversy.
e business men have followed that plan and have at least a minor concession
o their credit. The Taxpayers’ Association has preferred the longer and more
expensive route.
y One point remains. There are some homes in Dallas where the water sup-
~ ply occasionally is completely shut off. Such cases must be remedied or ex-
plained satisfactorily before consumers agree to any increase.
Py
If, however, a small increase assures this community of a successful solu-
tion to the problem which has handicapped it for more than ten years, then it
will be cheaper than an involved controversy before the Public Service Com-
*
\ , Here Comes The Mail
» The United States mail service in this benighted region has little to boast
about except its petty-fogging ritual. It appears to be the only branch of gov-
‘ernment in which economy is practiced; in fact the only one that has had a
taste of economy in a number of years, and it seems to have grown sick at
its stomach, locally.
= *
There is no real attempt to maintain mail schedules. Mails arrive anytime
from nine fifteen in the morning until noon. The morning mail seldom arrives
later than noon if it is going to arrive at all. The afternoon mail might just as
well not arrive, except to bring in the latest edition of the Sears Roebuck cata-
logue or other second and third class matter.
With mails arriving at any time of day the whole region is inconvenienced.
Rural mail carriers are late with their deliveries and forced to loiter two or
three hours more than necessary in postoffices that are so poorly heated that
they are unfit for human habitation before noon. These imposing structures
answering for postoffices have inadequate accomodations for employees and
no accomodations for patrons. Not one of them can compare in warmth, clean-
~ liness, light, neatness and sanitary accomodations with the gasoline stations that
Ne dot the region.
Perhaps the answer to all this lies in the penny-wise and pound foolish
economy of the postal department. The price now being paid for the delivery
of the mails has been beaten down by competitive bidding to the point where
no man can make any money, let alone render efficient service. Good weather
or bad weather makes little difference. All other forms of transportation seem
to get through from Wilkes-Barre except the mails. The postal department,
_ through years of experience, has sufficient figures at hand to know the
amount it should pay for mail delivery in this region. When bids go below those
goures it knows that service has to suffer and should sée to it that a price is
d where adequate service can be maintained.
As to the condition of 'postoffice buildings; only lack of interest and in-
e postal service give a little attention to these matters, adequate service
equate buildings, insead of jumping to the typewriter as soon as ‘this
il is printed to defend the mail service. .
TheDallasPost
ESTABLISHED 1889 TELEPHONE DALLAS 300
A LIBERAL, INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
PuBLISHED EVERY FRIDAY MoRrNING
AT THE DALLAS POST PLANT
LEHMAN AVENUE, DALLAS, PA.
By THE DaLLAs Post, INC.
HOWARD RISLEY ......ococsnssiuresnense ani sesnsmssssssesmmenien iERET al Manager
HowELL REES .........0..c00es Casnnrve ly iba eeas ie rste saegssinin Sotennn
TRUMAN STEWART
Managing Editor
Mechanical Superintendent
The Dallas Post is on sale at the| local news stands. Subscription
price by mail $2.00 payable in advance. Single copies five cents each.
Entered as second-class matter at the Dallas Post Office.
THE DALLAS POST is a youthful weekly rural-suburban news-
paper, owned, edited and operated by young men interested in the de-
velopment of the great rural-suburban region of Luzerne County and in
the attainment of the highest ideals of journalism. THE POST is truly
“more than a newspaper, it is a community institution.”
Congress shall make no law ¥ * abridging the freedom of speech, or
of Press.—From the first amendnient to the Constitution of the United
States,
Subscription, $2.00 Per Year (Payable in Advance),
Subscribers who send us changes of address are requested to include
both new and old addresses when they submit their notice of change.
THE DALLAS POST PROGRAM
THE DALLAS POST will lend its support and offers the use of its
columns to all projects which will Help this community and the great
rural suburban territory which it serves to attain the following major
improvements: :
1. Construction of more sidewalks for the protection of pedestrians in
Kingston township and Dallas.
2. A free library located in the Dallas region.
3. Better and adequate street lighting in Truecksville, Shavertown,
Fernbrook and Dallas.
' 4. Sanitary sewage disposal system for Dallas.
5. Closer co-operation between Dallas borough and surrounding
townships.
6. Consolidated high schools and better co -operation between those
that now exist.
7. Adequate water supply for fire protection.
8. The formation of a Back Mountain Club made up of business men
.and home owners interested in the development of a community con-
sciousness in Dallas, Trucksville, Shavertown and Fernbrook.
9. A modern concrete highway leading from Dallas and connecting
with the Sullivan Trail at Tunkhannock.
WITH OTHER EDITORS
ince can be the answer to the state in which they have fallen. We'd like
“Business hasn’t been as good in five years as it is today after Roosevelt
has run up his seven-billion dollar debt increase. The real waster was Hoover.
He wasted the nation’s manpower, its homes, its shops, its businesses, its in-
come, to ‘save money’. And thenydidn’t save it.”—THE BENTON ARGUS.
: > * # * ;
“Some day the country, roused and completely angry, is going to spew
dirty politics out of its mouth, and’/compel those legislating to regard public
office with the like responsibility of a private business. To stop the graft, the
wasting and stealing would bring balances to reason.”—WILKES-BARRE
TIMES LEADER.
“With New Deal sentiment waning, and since Pennsylvania normally is so
overwhelmingly a Republican State, the chances of a sweep which would make
the House Republican and return a Republican majority to the Senate would
appear to be good.” —WILKES-BARRE RECORD.
* * *®
“It 1s doubtful if many merchants realize thoroughly what it means to
them directly, to their town, and to all her institutions to withhold support,
moral and financial, from newspapers who are anxious to co-operate with them
in spreading news of their wares and efforts.”—SHICKSHINNY ECHO.
* ¥ *
“I believe the future of American agriculture has unlimited possibilities
But I also believe that its success depends upon raising larger crops rather than
smaller.”—Roger Babson in the SULLIVAN REVIEW. ;
: * % »
“There are probably millions of old-time Democrats who will follow Al
Smith if he takes a “walk” and his speech has done more to crystallize senti-
ment against demagoguery and will-o-the-wisp policies than anything in the
present national campaign.” —MONTROSE INDEPENDENT.
® * *
“Al Smith's speech, built up in anticipation by the Liberty League as
something above the average, was disappointing. It was not constructive, but
emphasized in every utterance that the former Happy Warrior is still unhap-
py."—THE WYOMING DEMOCRAT.
Please, Mister
pr
AFTER YoU HAVE
STOPPED THE PROFITS
ON WAR, WILL You
TRY To SToP THE
| WAR ON PROFITS
’
POLITICS
From the volume of political opinion sent to it by Republican and
Democratic bodies The Post this week selects the following article from
the Republican National Committee analyzing the Senate's defiance of
President Roosevelt.
The Senate has shown itself sensitive to repeated rebukes from the United
States Supreme Court, even if Secretary Wallace, the A.A.A. braintrusters, and
the President himself are not. In refusing to accept the new Administration farm
bill the Senate Agriculture Committee, reflecting prevalent Senate sentiment,
served notice that it will not accept new farm legislation merely because it has
the Presidential blessing, and the approval of Secretary Wallace, Professor Rex
Tugwell and Chester Davis. The Senate evidently intends to undertake to shape
future farm legislation in conformity with the limitations imposed by he Con-
stitution, as interpreted by the Supreme Court . i
The best brains of the Senate confess humiliation over the fact that the
Supreme Court, time after time, has been holding unconstitutional important
New Deal legislation which Congress meekly enacted against the better judg-
ment of its more capable members. Every act declared unconstitutional by the
Supreme Court during the past year was a part of President Roosevelt's “must”
program. Every law held unconstitutional was prepared in the first instance by
the brain-trust, and passed along to Congress by the President with the request
“Sign here.” A subservient Congress, during three sessions, did the Presiden-
tial bidding, thereby earning for itself the brand, “A Rubber Stamp Congress.”
The Senate seemingly has grown tired of being known as a rubber stamp,
“and at last has rebelled against taking orders from the White House. Both
branches of Congress are as anxious as the President to find some workable
substitute for A. A. A.; some law that will prove a real aid to agriculture. But
so far as the Senate is concerned, it at last has asserted its right to shape its
legislation, something of an innovation since the advent of the New Deal.
The new Adminitration farm bill was hastily thrown together by the legal
lights of the defunct A. A. A., following a brief conference between Secretary
Wallace and a handpicked group of “farm leaders.” Its objectives admittedly
were the same as A. A. A.; its machinery was different. Like A. A. A.; it was
builded upon the theory of scarcity; it looked to further governmental regula-
tion of crop production and crop reduction, but under new methods. It contem-
plated the preservation of the enormous army of officials and employees who
had been carried on the old A. A. A. payroll.
Under the new Administration bill there would be a job for every employee
who had served A. A. A., either in Washington or in the field. The way was
paved for even increasing the field forces, for under the new bill Secretary
Wallace was given authority to make payments to farmers as he saw fit, mean-~
ing that in hig discretion, benefits could be large or small as he and his subor-
dinates might determine. This unrestricted privilege of passing out government
funds would call for at least as large a force as determined benefits and dis-
pensed processing taxes in the past. To be sure that all beneficiaries were abon-
doning productive acres to pasture or wood-lots; to soil development, to sum-
mer-fallowing ‘or to fertilization, in order to earn a monetary reward, the Secre-
tary would need in the field fully as many, if not more, county and other
agents as were hired to compel observance of the terms of A. A. A. As a job-
preserver the new bill was fully as effective as the old.
The Congress, being overwhelmingly Democratic, was not averse to this
phase of the Administration farm bill. The trouble arose over those provisions
which even Senator Dowrs of
balked at again deliberately following the admonition of the President, given
when the Guffey coal bill was pending, to waive personal doubts as to the con-
stitutionality of the bill and pass it anyway.
The Senate, it appears, has grown weary of accepting blindly the judg-
ment of Secretary Wallace and Professor Tugwell, even though their influence
with the President remains unimpaired. It is starting out to do its own thinking.
® ke
It's A “Farley Surplus”
(From The American Liberty League)
Washington correspondents have coined a new phrase out of the effort of
Postmaster General Farley to make his latest annual budget show a surplus
whereas a strict analysis shows a deficit. The same criticism of Mr. Farley’s
bookkeeping was made in 1934, when he claimed a surplus of $12,161,415. It
was pointed out at that time that his department actually had a deficit of
$52,003,295.62 in that year. With these two incidents in mind, newspaper jest-
ers have adopted the method of calling any sort of a red ink condition a “Far- -
ley surplus”.
* * + 4
G. 0. P. Opposes Townsend
Dr. Walter E. Spahr, a member of the National Advisor Council of the
American Liberty League, says: “The Townsend Plan subscribes to the notion
that organized society is under some obligation to pension people who are quite
able to ‘continue useful work and to take care of themselves. The whole plan
is a blow aimed, wittingly or not, at prudent and useful living, at saving, at
investment, at insurance.”
BUSINESS
BRIEFS
_ Severe weather has stimulated many
lines of business, particularly in the
J; fuel field, where business volume was
J) larger than the preceding and 1935
weeks.
—0—
| Industrial employment slacked ofr
slightly in Detroit. Pittsburgh con-
tinued to receive new orders for struc-
tural steel; most Philadelphia found-
ries were busier than since 1930; a
Y million dollar real estate deal was ne-
gotiated in Atlanta for a bottling plant.
ANAS
| \\
——
Corporation reports reflect substan-
tial earnings, with General Motors’ net
profit reported at $167,226,000, the
largest since 1929, with the final quar-
ter of 1935 the best in history.
eres
Bethlem Steel reports a net income
of $4,291,253 for 1935 against $550,~
571 for the preceding year.
Uncertainty continued to hover over
wholesale markets as a repercussion
from the AAA decision.
Nebraska held to be unconstitutional. The Senate
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