Historical Newspapers of South Carolina

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bT w. D. BREED III So, you say, to heck with the Federal government. On April 15th they sheared me as clean as a sheep on a hillside in Spring so they could keep supplying wheat to India, guns to South Viet Nam, and blonds, brunettes, and red heads to Sukarno of Indonesia. If they would just leave the old Palmetto State alone we would do fine. And we might. But it would take almost as many adjustments as the Alaskans are having to make after their recent earth quake. In the first place, one of every thirty-five of us in South Caro lina works for the Federal gov ernment. At the end of 1963 there were 68,386 federal em ployees in the state earning $316,- 000,000 annually. Of these, 27,- 300 civilians earned $157,000,000 and 41,086 soldiers, sailors, ma rines, and airmen earned $159,- 000,000 at the state’s sixteen bases from the hills to the sea. Do away with that annual pay roll and the tears of South Caro lina businessmen would flood the state’s low lying areas like a six- inch rain. You won’t have any trouble seeing the Federal troops frater nizing with the local population, mostly feminine, if you go to Charleston, Columbia, Beaufort, or Sumter on a Saturday after- ' noon. But the Federal govern ment’s civilian employees don’t stand out like the military. They’re there, however, all 27,- 300 of than. In mid 1963, 62% worked for the Department of Defense, 19% for the Post Office Department, 4% for the Veter ans' Administration. The remaining 15 per cent in cluded forest rangers, veterinar ians, soil conservationists, hank examiners, internal revenuers, judges, marshalls, deputies, fish hatchers, meteorologists, and countless holders of more pro saic jobs. Then there are the roads. We South Carolinians may not know where we are going all the time, but we have good roads to get there on, and Uncle Sam is con tributing $45,032,926 to help pay the bill in 1964. Of almost $700 million spent on state roads in modern times, the U. S. has paid slightly more than half. There is a Federal Bureau of Federal Roads office in Columbia staffed by several engineers and admin istrators. Consider the forests. There are 587,000 acres in the £rancis Marion National Forest and the three separate divisions of the Sumter National Forest. The' Federal Government administers them for timber production, wa ter management, grazing, wild life, and recreation in cooperation with the South Carolina Forestry Commission and Wildlife Re- sfurces Department. In 1963 over 140,000 South Carolinians hunted and fished in them. They bagged pure eastern strain wild turkey, deer, squirrel, quail, and other game. They caught trout in the upper part of the Sumter forest and bass and bream in the lower parts of Sumter and Mar ion. Over 95 million board feet of timber were harvested with $340,000 being distributed as a dividend to the thirteen counties that contain National Forest land. Of course there were no taxes paid on this property. The Federal government’s Farmers Home Administration has 36 offices in the state. When a fanner can’t get credit from other sources, they will, if his repayment ability is sound, lend him money to buy a farm, oper ate it, build a house, or for emer gencies. And the Soil Conservation Ser vice, also Federal, will give him assistance in developing and maintaining his soil, -in some cases sharing the cost. The Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service, Fed eral again, is administered by elected county committeemen. It’s the outfit that administers crop acreage allotments, lends Federal money on crops and stored cotton, provides assistance in emergencies, and buys surplus food for the School Lunch Pro gram, in addition to a multitude of other agricultural activities. The School Lunch Program touches almost every child in South Carolina, providing for a small charge (a quarter or less per meal) a lunch including a protein rich food, fruits and vege tables, bread and butter, and a half pint of fresh milk, roughly a third of the child’s daily food requirements. The youngster might prefer a candy bar and a “big orange” drink, but the meals are good and nourishing. If Un cle Sam didn’t foot his share of the bill, they would cost consid erably more. When a child’s MAY, 1964 parents are unable to pay for the meals, they’re provided free. As the youngsters get up from their meal, they return to a class room that probably has at least one piece of equipment bought with Federal Aid under Title III and V of the National Defense Education Act, which provides for Federal Aid in the instruction of science, mathematics, and modem foreign languages. When the young South Caro linian graduates from high school, Uncle Sam participates in college and university student loan funds. If he goes to Clemson University, it’s a Federal Land Grant school. THE SOUTH CAROLINIAN U^pon starting to work, he gets a Federal Social Security num ber that stays with him to the grave and possibly beyond. There are ten district Social Security offices in South Carolina to keen up with him from his first job through his retirement. If he goes into business for himself and needs help later, he can call on the Federal Small Business Administration, which on occasion lends money for ev erything from cotton candy ma chines to cotton mills. The Veterans’ Administration Hospital and the V. A. regional office in Columbia employ about a thousand persons. ’Die bed capacity of the hospital is 600 and there are usually that many South Carolinians bedded down there. The Post Office, a branch of the Federal Government that touch es most of us every day, is in every community and in the rural areas in the person of car riers. About 5,000 Federal em ployees get out the mail. Our Federal Judges and the rather large Federal Court staffs are on the Federal payroll, as are F.B.I. agents, Federal Bank Ex aminers, Customs Collectors at Charleston, the U. S. Treasury Secret Service, Interstate Com merce Commission representa tives, Department of Labor peo ple, and Selective Service per sonnel. The Federal Department of the Interior maintains the Cape Re main, Carolina Sand Hills, San tee, and Savannah National Wild life Refuges, has fish hatcheries at Orangeburg and Walhalla, and is charged with keeping the Kings Mountain National Mili tary Park, the Cowpens National Battlefield Site, and the Fort Sumter National Monument. These last three are worth visit ing- | ; One of the Federal Department of Commerce Weather Stations at Columbia, Spartanburg, or Greenville can tell you what the weather will be, barring unfore seen oveprunnings of warm, moist air, possibly from Wash ington, D. C. * \ So far, all the departments mentioned pay out money. Well, of course Uncle Sam is no Santa Claus, while he’s paying out all this dough with his right hand, his left hand in the person of the Internal Revenue Service is get ting the biggest portion of it back. And that’s a small part of the Federal Government in South Carolina. We may not be com pletely happy with it, but it’s so much a part of us, and we’re so much a part of it, that it will probably stay like it is. r