AMERICA'S PLIGHT
Johnson, Sen. Edwin C.
America's Plight By SEN. EDWIN C. JOHNSON NOTWITHSTANDING the polls in Britain indicating the United States is contributing only a measly three per cent toward the war effort of the United...
...By Jan...
...The contracts they have entered into with private industry are nothing short of shocking and the idleness in the Army today is revolting...
...To date Congress has approved something over 333 billion dollars for the war program...
...By the sweat of his brow the American laborei must pay off that debt and by lowering his living standard the American laborer must pay that interest...
...And yet, this Summer I voted for the hundred-billion-dollar military appropriations, because I would not take a chance on the life, well-being, or comfort of a single American boy...
...They have the sons of the American people facing death and disease all over the world...
...This nation has come upon evil times, but the only way out now is a quick and complete victory...
...It is my honest opinion that military appropriations could be cut 50 per cent without detriment to the war effort...
...I am sure that many of my colleagues faced the same dilemma...
...For the fiscal year ending June 30 next the United States appropriated 97 billion dollars against Great Britain's 18 billion...
...Twelve of the large Western States have a total assessed valuation of but seven billion dollars...
...Last Summer I spoke to many audiences of Navy mothers and Army mothers...
...A Dreary Picture Of course when we dance to the music of the Gods of War we must pay the fiddler and pay him plenty...
...The Only Way Out I have sense enough to know that the Army and the Navy cannot spend one hundred billion dollars in 12 months efficiently and effectively...
...EDWIN C. JOHNSON NOTWITHSTANDING the polls in Britain indicating the United States is contributing only a measly three per cent toward the war effort of the United Nations, carefully checked statistics have let the cat out of the bag (British Institute of Public Opinion, July 16, 1943, shows Russia 50 per cent, Britain 42 per cent, China 5 per cent and the United States 3 per cent...
...1, 1945, our national debt will approximate 300 billion dollars or more than twice the assessed valuation of all the property in the United States...
...That is one way to comprehend the huge size of our post-war interest burden...
...I had hundreds of private conferences with them...
...This debt will bear an annual interest charge of more than seven billion dollars...
...If we deny them anything, if we curtail their extravagance in the slightest degree we are faced with the assertion by them that we are speculating with American lives...
...The outstanding debt of Great Britain in her four years of war only increased 36 billion while in our first two years of war our debt has increased over 100 billion...
...they are wasting its funds and throwing this nation into hopeless bankruptcy at a pace that does shame to the profligate of all ages...
...Why does Congress permit such waste...
...When American workers contemplate this dreary picture it does not make them too happy to learn that Australia's national debt has actually decreased since the war began four years ago...
...It is to be expected that when war rages sound business practices to some extent must go out the window...
...For the year 1933, with 10 million families on relief, the total cost of the federal government was only slightly more than seven billion dollars...
...Economy and war are not Siamese twins...
...I would prefer the guillotine to failure to support fully their flesh and blood...
...But that is no reason for going absolutely "hog wild" and "raring" to finance everything for everyone everywhere as though there were no bottom to our barrel...
...You cannot back track once you get half way down Niagara Falls...
...1, 1945, the United States will likely owe more money than all of our allies and all of our enemies added together...
...Nor does it reassure them to note what is taking place in the Army camps in this country and in many of the war plants having Army and Navy contracts and supervised by Army and Navy inspectors...
...The Greatest Wastrels As a matter of fact the greatest wastrels in this most wasteful period of our history are the military overlords of the Army and the Navy...
...The answer is simple...
...and they are wasting the manpower of this nation with utter disregard for civilian welfare...
...They are wasting the natural resources of this nation in a scandalous manner...
...The Army and the Navy have the Congress and the people over a barrel...
...By Jan...
Vol. 7 • November 1943 • No. 44
