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(Etjr (Eambrn (C^rutiirlr 1109 N. Hroad Street Camden. S. C. FU BUSH EI) EVERY FRIDAY J NO. M CANNON Da COST A BROWN Editors and Publisher* SUBSCRIPTION TERMS: All Subscriptions Payable In Advance <>?e Year . *2.00 Six Months* D00 Entered as Second Class Matter at the Post Office at Camden, S. C. All articles submitted for publication must be signed by the author. Friday, February 26, 1943 PROOF OF THE PUDDING I After Pearl Harbor a plan had to be worked out for war risk insurance. Here was a chance to put government into the insurance business on a grand scale. To the credit of those in charge, and to the lasting benefit of the country, this was not done. Congress provided that the Reconstruction Finance Corporation could invest up to a billion dollars in the capital stock of the War Damage Corporation then created. Instead of building a gigantic newbureau to handle these war risks, the voluminous details of insuring the property of the American people is handled by directors of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation through 546 insurance companies acting as fiduciary agents. These^ companies had in existence more than 150.000 insurance agents, reporting to more than 1,400 policy issuing offices. Arrangements were made to pay small commissions and reimburse insurance companies for actual out-of-pocket expense in connection with war damage business. The RFC accounting department takes care of the figures and the Federal Reserve banks receive thefunds. Thus was an indispensable service provided without great cost to the tax-payers. This is the way government and industry should cooperate in a free country where the government exists for the people rather than the people existing for the government. This emergency job was carried out with the use of machinery created by private enterprise, thus proving the flexibility of our American system. We don't need to junk our American way of doing things, as some have suggested, to fight the dictators. COST OF DISILLUSIONMENT It has been popular of late to say that if industrv fails to meet the demands of the "common man" when this war ls over, the government will. Suppose plans for full employment falter? Suppose government does step into the picture? It is predicted that . socialization vvou.d be the ord-r of the day. If that happened, the common man. which means all of us. would begin to lose personal liberties. The right to strike, the privilege of going to the bo>s for a rai-e. the opportunity tor personal advancement, the chance to go into business -hese are the things that would begin to disappear one by one. The reason for their disappearance would be sample. No man strik-s against government. It would be impossible to go to the boss with a grievance, tor the boss would be the government. and a socialistic government is merely a collection of bureaucrats. Under socialism, the man who has a new idea cannot go into business for himself because he cannot compete with government. Disillusionment would come when it was finally realized that government is not a producer ; that every social security check, every government job. and every public official must be supported by the common man. the taxpayer. This is so because the common man is the producer. There is no one else to do the job. A11'so-called government guarantees must be made good by the efforts of the common man. from corporation president to ditch digger. In the last analysis, there remains but one way to guarantee progress and personal security. And that way is to sustain free enterprise and constitutional government at all costs. We must preserve the right of men to forge ahead, to make newdiscoveries. build new industries and expand payrolls. We must encourage industry to produce as never before from our vast latent natural resources under the ownership r,f private citizens, with the knowledge that this combination is the J only source < f progress and real national w'-a.tr.. bad; re to recognize these fund a- j rr.*r'.ai truths w::! result in servitude and A *T>. r ar- ;r. a lifetime when :: is .It t-- ..' b-r y--ar ?. untry | thar. :t - uId .v.- t- r>.< v . - lib- for your ' C'-r * *" _ Y ? : I .r'- :: v :!;g t such a t.rr- * . - W- - ::g .t : r .r pr::.e:p,> > r g; - ^ .r . r/. - .,t is our o g- v i*rr - ' . xermar; !> .n. U<>1 umr?.a L'r..ver-.ty. The New <)r.-ans fat sa 1 vage campaign stresses used fats by te?.ing housewives that wa.-te fat from a naif-dozen j fried soft shell crabs makes enough glycerine. processed into explosives, to fire one 37 mm. anti-tank shell. NO EXCUSE FOR WASTE Senator Byrd of Virginia ha* long ami courageously Opposed governmental waste. The problem has become many time* greater as the war baa progressed. Government spending has grown beyond the comprehension of man. It has grown.00 great, many of us are inclined to dutmifls the whole subject with a shrug, .-rod yet as Senator Byrd and others who put interest in their country above all else, know, government spending that leads to uncontrolled waste can ruin the strongest nation just as completely as can military defeat. A nation may survive spending. It cannot survive unchecked waste. Billions of dollars are being wasted. No one can deny that. They are being wasted in excessive w ages, in cost-plus contracts for war work, in political mismanagement and in a thousand other ways. ? The excuse is often made that this is a big country, that waste is inevitable. But that is not a valid excuse. There is no excuse for continuous waste. The demoralizing influence of governmental waste undermines the fighting spirit of worker and employer. It will inevitably slow the voluntary sale of government bonds because men and women instinctively mistrust a waster even when that waster is their own government. These are fundamental reasons why Congress must halt the waste of public money. It is not so much the amount of money that is wasted during any given period that will hurt, it is knowingly permitting the waste. In these days of hundred-billiondollar budgets, a single billion may not seem like much. But a wasted billion which is part of a trend toward more wasted billions, is a danger signal that cannot be ignored if we value our self respect, our freedom and our finacial integrity. Senator Byrd has revealed the waste. The voters and Congress must apply the remedy. FARMERS DO NOT WANT IT There should be no hesitancy on the part of the Congress in throwing out the window or "burying in committee' the administration's request for a $100,000,000 subsidy fund to encourage farmers to step up production on certain crops. After what has gone before this is an insult to farmers and rubbing salt (into a sore wound. The farmers do not want it? that is, the progressive farmers do not;? and they are the ones w*ho fill the grainories of the nation in peace tim and in war. All the American farmer wants is a square deal and an even break with the other felTow. If there have been any real patriots on the home front during the past two years they are the men on the farms. Deprived of much of their labor by the selective draft and robbed of the balance by the soaring salaries paid to labor in the war production plants, those who were left on the farms?men, women and children?worked early and late to provide the food without which no nation can long exist, in peace or in war. Even with top ceilings on their crops and a scarcity of labor greater than at any other time on the farms, the tillers of the soil, aided by nature, dit 1 an outstanding job last year* This is generally recognized by most everyone outside the administration leaders in Washington. Stripped of the verbiage of childish | pratle eminating fr<>m Washington, the proposed hundred million subsidy is nothing more or less than a continuation ot the plan of the administration to retain a control over agriculture, by offering a handout to the farmers. The government, out of the money "which you and I are paying in taxes, has little concern over the prices it is paying for war raatrials, the wastage of idle labor in the multitudinous bureaus and in many other ways, but when it conies to the farmer it says to all intent and purpose. "You are not Worthy of your hire, but to keep you going we will slip you a few dollars, or a few hundred, if you will do precisely ] what we tell you." It just doesn't add up, subtract, multiply or divide, or conform to any other mathematical process that^.has a bowing acquaintance with common sense. If the present Congress acquires in the request advanced by Secretary of Agriculture Wickard our hope that the rubber stamp days were over will have to be abandoned. HORSE LAUGH OUT OF ORDER Euphonious titles for tax measures will not make it any easier for the taxpayer to pay the tax bills he owes. The only permanent relief he can ever expect will come from the elimination of political waste in government and from drastic pruning of the bureaucratic fungus that threatens to smother turnings an<* savings. Tn the meantime, the taxpayer can be helped by a new tax bill that will allow the easiest possible installment tax payments from current income for current taxes. Treasury officials should not give the h<laugh to idea^ ! ? a.?: the taxpayer. The bureaucrats dor.pay the t^xes. They should hump tr.L r.o Ives to keep the taxpayer alive. " } By preventing purchasers of new electric motors from buying motors with more horse power than their work requires, the Government will save about 15 million pounds of copper, 55.000 tons of carbon steel, and 150.000 pounds of stainless steel annually. The Fourth Estate Conducted By J NO. M. CANNON WHAt'8 THE NEWS ABOUT OUR BOYS?GOOD, WE HOPE "I like lo everybody doin' well." said Old Man McDonald. but 1 duo t Uke to see em doin' better n me." And whether we admit It or not. moat of us are constituted very largely like Old Man McDonald We like to see everybody succeed, but not lu the extent that their success jeopardises our own. or the success of our children, our friends arid our close neighbors The reason, of course, is that fundamentally all human being* are selfishly Interested in everything that happens. What we all want to know is "'How will that affect me?" When you reason it out, that is ex actly why we middle-class Americans axe so intensely Interested in what goes on at our City Hall, our State Capitol, at Washington, on the Rus slan front. In India, In the Solomons everywhere In the world. We have lo know what has happened on the Libyan desert because it may affect ua Nowadays, it is almost certain to af feet us. Right now the cost of the ''market basket" is fa.52. and it never got higher than |6.21 in 192*?that almost legendary year of lush prosperity Mother has to know how the war is going, what's happening to food prices, what is next In rationing. what kinds of furniture and household supplies are po longer being made. Father has to know what is happening iq the grain, livestock, and financial markets in order to manage his business. Brother has to know what's happening to young men of 18. 19 or 20. because his entire future?his very life?depends upon the use of young manhood In this war Sister must keep currently Informed about the activities of the WAACS and the WAVES and the Red Cross and business opportunities for young women. And the smaller children s . whole play-life is bound up with the adventures of heroic characters in comic strip and front page newspaper story. Everyone of us?mother, father, sister, brother?must keep informed these days because our lives depend on It. We must get that copy of the newspaper as soon as it hits the front porch for its columns may contain the reverberating announcement that will change our lives completely. The newspaper, in the last analysis, is our only dependable source of information in these tin.es when the fate of the w orld depends on the success of opposing military forces. "I pray every night." said a little Irish lady to me one time, 'for the good health, prosperity, and happiness of everybody in the world. But first I pray for my own sons and daughters, and their children. Then for Mrs. Flanagan and her children, and for Mrs. Mahoney and her children. Aft'-r that I pray for everybody." Human beings are the same the world o-? t-r. We pray for the success of our ow n sons* and daughters first always." Today we must pray for the success of our sons and daughters on all the battlefronts and on all the seas of the world. And we must depend upon the newspapers of America to tell us how our prayers are answered. One inch of water is contained in each foot of freshly-fallen snow, accordnig to estimates. Surf board riding is a sport of the natives In some of the Solomon Islands and in Haw aii, but is little known else- j where In the Pacific. ___________ Promotion Folders i We have the equipment to print beautiful folders in color or black and white. If you need this kind of printed matter, come to us. The work will be well done and our rates are very reasonable. PHONE 29 I For Free Estimates Chronicle Press Perfection Printing | "THAT'S THE 'UNION' TO STRIKE fOR NQWl?"l s*HI Beginning next week The Chronicle ; will run under this head a regular I feature by Jessie H. Laurence, devotj ed to social legislation, women's ao, tivities, economic developments and | other subjects of special interest to | women. j The reading of this feature will be j by no means confined to women. Men i who are interested in community bet[ferment and political freedom will i find much food for thought in these j articles. { Mrs., Iaurence is well known to ! many club women and social thinkers ! in this section. She has been presij dent of the South Carolina Federa tion of Women's Clubs, the Wlnthrop ' Alumnae Association and several : other state wide organizations. She ! organized and was the first president of the Council for the Common Good, 'an organization of women embracing | most of the organizations for women in the State. Her articles in the Sunday Columbia State have attracted a iwide readership for many years. At some future time these articles will be syndicated in several newspapers over the South that have manifested an interest in the feature. American men discarding used razor blades formerly threw away 3. >?>?" tons of high grade steel. ^ i I LOAN SHARKS! BY JOHN M. CANNONl Small loan companies hare tx^fl major social problem for manjjd South Carolina law makers hired far done nothing about this ineil Most states have placed such coned under some regulations and |d made the lending of money la id amounts to salaried people a |fl legitimate business. ' After surveys made by relisMil tional research organizations ltd came apparent that in some Mt|d of South Carolina ignorant uid less victims were being charged much as nine hundred per outd year on money borrowed tread sharks. Such vultures should fl tarred and feathered and rldfci^H of town on a rail. The Russell Sage Foundation, nl up of well-known economists ujl search men, recommends indiid banks under state regulation* d an interest rate not to exceed and one-half per cent per martl the outstanding balance of soctlfl i Such a rate is fair and eqoliiN^H ! loans of this nature. The Camden Chronicle wouldd to see every small loan businenH ing operated on a racket bufcd only put out of business butllld cipals made to leave the State. rd Legitimate banking institutiouffl meeting this problem in moetd munities. We are happy to Npfl one of our local banks is hud this type of paper very satisfMld I (Please turn to page fire}! ft w a V I * J 11 11 11 Arfi I 11 k l \ | | Free plans show how to build sanitary improvements of Concretm A. Concrete dairy improvements play a vital part in the farmer's "Food for Victory" job. A concrete floor keeps cows healthier; is easier to clean and disinfect; doesn't absorb odors; is wear-proof, fire-proof and vermin-proof. I Build at low cost with concrete, and you know it will last for a lifetime. Few "critical materials" needed ? many concrete jobs require none. If you need help, get in touch with your concrete contractor or build.rg material dealer. Check Lst for free booklets. | ? ? ? ? ? T 2x*f O" p* KTV DMfl Concrete mtllr houses and cooltf? tanks make it easy to keep clean and to handle it efficiently prevent the losses that result wM* milk is graded down. I I Or perhaps you need a new few* ing floor, poultry house, grain MB storage cellar, or other thriftycaj crete improvement that will MM you conserve feed and prodo^B more food for war needs. ; PORTLAND CEMENT ASSOCIATIONS I I I Address ....... I City .... i S^S"-? bi ? ' ?Ho,?^, BaaaBSj