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Maryland State Archives Jeffersonian, Towson, Maryland mdsa_sc3410_1_81-0800 Enlarge and print image (6M) |
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Maryland State Archives Jeffersonian, Towson, Maryland mdsa_sc3410_1_81-0800 Enlarge and print image (6M) |
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Saturday, February 2, 1924—Page 4 THE JEFFERSONIAN, TOWSON, MARYLAND
THE JEFFERSONIAN
Baltimore County's Only Sunday
Newspaper
TOWSON, MARYLAND
Maryland Journal, Established 1865 Baltimore County Democrat, Est. 1885
The New Era, Established.......1013
Consolidated with THE JEFFERSONIAN
Published Every Week By The Jeffersonian Printing & Publishing Co., Inc.
Entered as Second-Class Matter at the Post Office, Baltimore, Md.
Subscription $1.50 Per Year. Payable In Advance.
Single Copies, 5 Cents, For Sale At The Following Newsdealers In Baltiomore, County. Court Drug Co. - - Towson
Hergenrather's Drug Store - Towson C. H. Michael's - - Reisterstown Henry Crumlich - - Dundalk
Mrs. Davis', P. O. Building, Pihesviile A. C. Davis - - CatonsvUle
Rudolph Deihlman's Store, CatonsvUle H. T. Cooper's Store - Owings Mills Frank Zlto's Store - Pikesville
SAT. FEBRUARY 2, 1924
IF WE MUST HAVE AN ADDITIONAL LOAN FOB SCHOOLS, LET THE PEOPLE SANCTION IT.
It is very apparent that the Board of Education feels it needs additional funds with which to erect new school buildings to take care of the rapid growth and increased attendance in the thickly populated sections of the county, and in view of this fact it has petitioned the Legislature for the passage of a bill to create a bond issue, authorizing the County Commissioners to borrow a large sum to cope with the situation.
While a great many may want such a bond issue passed, we must not overlook the minority, or the people in the sparsely populated districts, who are not in favor of the measure, simply because they cannot stand the burden of additional taxation. These are farmers and wage earners who are just barely ekeing out an existence.
The Jeffersonian believes that the Baltimore County delegation at Annapolis will be assuming a grave responsibility by introducing and working for the passage of an additional Bond Issue for schools without allowing the people to have a voice in the matter, and will not only be doing an injustice to themselves but to their constituents as well if they put the proposition through without a referendum.
If additional funds are necessary to house our children properly, let the people sanction it at the polls in November.
OUR THICKLY POPULATED COMMUNITIES ARE GROWING JUST LIKE "TOPSY."
Towson, like CatonsvUle, PJkes-ville, Essex and all other thickly settled communities in Baltimore county are growing just like "Topsy"— with no guiding hand as to the direction in the way they should go.
One person may take a liking to a site, build an elaborate residence and in six months another come along and erect a shack next door, which not only proves a detriment to the individual property owner, but an eye-sore to the community.
Building lines are totally ignored in all sections and so far as legitimate restrictions go, Baltimore county is not blessed by them.
The present method of allowing promiscuous construction might have been all right twenty-five or thirty years ago, but today, when home-seekers are flocking into the county to be free from the stifling air and discomforts of the city—they are all wrong.
The Jeffersonian feels that if the various Improvement Assoications throughout the county would get busy immediately and take the matter up with the County Delegation to the General Assembly, some ways and means could be found to remedy existing conditions at this session of the Legislature. As the matter now
stands, there are no definite plans of procedure and everyone building does exactly to suit himself, ingor-ing entirely the rights of neighbors.
MUST BALTIMORE COUNTY GO INTO THE WATER BUSINESS?
It looks very much as if sooner or later Baltimore County will be compelled to go into the water business, and with this fact staring the authorities in the face, the present time, when the 1924 Legislature is in session, is the period for action.
Developments over the city boundary line and in the county are springing up "over night" and the mains of the Baltimore City Water Department are not sufficiently large enough to even handle the situation in case of fire, for The Jeffersonian has been informed that at a recent blaze at the county seat there was not sufficient pressure when two pieces of fire apparatus hooked up to a plug to throw a meager stream of water.
From present indications, the City has the county "hooked"—it will not extend its mains due to the plea that it has no money available for the purpose and that it does not intend to go into the water business, so there is nothing else to do as far as the county is concerned but look the proposition squarely in the face and decide on its future course.
Way back when the City acquired the right to the Loch Raven supply, the county reserved the right to 10,000,000 gallons of water per day but at the present time, with many developments coming into being here, there and everywhere, this amount is not a "drop in the bucket."
Baltimore county cannot compel Baltimore City to lay water mains, but under the law the county can do so itself and charge consumers at a meter rate to be fixed by the Public Service Commission, plus 5 per cent, for filtering and pumping. This however, can only be done by a petition of the people of communities desiring an adequate water supply.
If, for instance, the residents of Essex want water, they are at liberty to petition the County Commissioners and the City must furnish water to the boundary line from whence the county must convey it to the community.
Indeed, as The Jeffersonian views it, the water situation in this county is becoming so acute that it believes it would be wise to divorce the subject entirely from the office of the Roads and Sanitary Engineer, and to create a separate department to be known as the Water and Sanitary Department. As it now stands the Road's Engineer is also the Sanitary Engineer and as the construction and maintenance of highways consumes all his time, he has an engineer under him who looks after the sewer end. To separate the two would cost the county no more and in all probability increase the efficiency of both materially.
MAKING FISH OF ONE AND . FOWL OF ANOTHER.
The other day we noticed in one of the Baltimore City papers that a baker was arrested and heavily fined for delivering "the staff of life" on Sunday, and it brough to mind the fact that while driving through the city on the Sabbath there are always numerous delicatessen stores, candy shops and the like open and doing business regularly on the Lord's Day, unmolested by the "strong arms of the law."
To us, it seems very inconsistent to arrest a baker for making deliveries on Sunday and allowing every delicatessen to remain open; surely there is no necessity for them operating on the Seventh Day, for the goods that they sell could just as readily be purchased on the Sixth.
The Jeffersonian is not in favor of the "Blue Laws," but it does feel that equal and exact justice should be accorded all, with special privileges to none, and while we have not been informed of a case in Baltimore County such as the one cited from Baltimore City, we hope if there ever is a drive to force Sunday observance, our police will not "make fish of one and fowl of another,"
BETTER FARMING THE ONLY SAFE RELIANCE.
After we have done everything that it is possible to do toward improving agriculture as a whole it still will be true that only those who farm intelligently and carefully, who work diligently and save reasonably well can hope to prosper. Those who fall below these standards will make at best but a bare living.
It is a mistaken notion that when prices are low because of overproduction that the remedy is to take less pains and let the yields of our acres and of our animals run down. Such practice leads to but one end —bankruptcy. Whatever the price, it is the man who makes the highest returns on his acres who is most prosperous. The truth is the lower the price of the product the greater
the need for high efficiency in producing it. When prices are high even medicore yields are profitable, but such yields are always unprofitable when the prices are low. Therefore the more discouraging the price of farm products, the greater the necessity for good farming. ,
Except for brief periods when we were farming new land that had been virtually a gift from the Government those who have taken only average pains have never prospered. There is no more new land now. Henceforth we shall have to farm old land and pay a good round price into the bargain for it. No agriculture can be prosperous in the face of declining yields and rising production costs. The surest way to cut production costs is by increasing the yields of our acres and our animals. The farmer who disregards this law cannot be saved by any outside help.
Twenty years hence the farmer who has systematically produced high yields through periods of low prices and high prices will be out of debt and be the leading man of his community. At that time the fellow who is more interested in holding down yields to prevent overproduction than in getting large and economical returns from his land will be fortunate if he is as well off as he is today.
IT'S ABOUT TIME SOME
THERS" WERE PLUCKED
"FEA-
The bill proposed by the Automobile Club of Maryland and presented to the Legislature for abolishing of unpaid plain clothes and mysterious "deputies" should be passed.
It seems that the Automobile Commissioner has favored all his friends with one of these jobs, which not only allows them to make arrests promiscously but to go the limit as to speed upon the highways of the State, the result being that these "dashing job holders" have long been a thorn in the flesh of autoists.
Everyone who drives a car or has dealings with the Automobile Commissioner's office realizes the autocratic spirit which rules it, and it is high time that some "feathers" be plucked and those responsible for the conduct of this important department be made to "sit up and take notice."
to every man's choice, for there are many who have no other opportunity to indulge in them, but it seems to us that six days in the week of matinees and evening performances are ample to amuse, entertain and instruct all kinds of people.
YEA, AND THE AUTO OWNER FOOTS THE BILLS.
SUNDAY MOVIES.
Baltimore City interests are once again "jabbing" the Legislature to pass a law making it possible for moving picture theatres to keep open on Sundays, but as far as the counties are concerned The Jeffersonian believes there is little or no desire for the measure.
Morally there can be no question as to the unwisdom of Sunday movies, but eliminating that we feel it is a poor proposition from an economic standpoint.
The people who would really be affected by such, are the operators who are now expected at their posts six days in the week, with a very large proportion of their duty at night, and it means about as hard a physical strain as the average human being can stand without adding the seventh day.
European countries have endeavored to try to deny the physical demand for rest, one day in seven to their sorrow.
On the strength of their experience Maryland can well afford to pass up the possibility of further enriching movie magnets at the physical expense of their employees.
Aside from the employees' end of the matter,: there is another, and in expressing our views, The Jeffersonian wants it understood that it is in no sense allying itself with the reformers, who carry their own fanatic zeal to the extent of endeavoring to pass laws forbidding everything that is not in accord with their own selfish views and to which they themselves have no appetite and for whom their particular object has no temptation.
We are not opposed to Sunday movies on the ground that they desecrate the Sabbath, because we believe thoroughly that it is up to every man's individual attitude, but do on the theory that it is purely a move on the part of the big interests, represented by the large moving picture companies, to commercialize a day that has always been observed as a day of rest.
Speaking for Baltimore county, the great majority of its inhabitants hold the Sabbath Day sacred and it would be a source of great distress if the bill for Sunday movies is ever enacted into law.
Public sentiment is not behind the proposed "movie law"—it is a mere attempt to get additional profit out of an already overdone business.
If passed, it would be unfair to all other commercial enterprises, hence the Legislature has no more right to grant this privilege to the "stars of Hollywood" than it has to permit the markets to be open, likewise butcher shops, grocers and the sort.
There are certain healthy outdoor sports that should be permitted
Often those who do not own autos complain about the enormous sums of money spent on highway construe tion and contending that car owners are the only ones who benefit. In a measure that is true, but they are apt to overlook who pays for the roads. It is really the car owners who must maintain them. The federal government, for instance, reports that it has paid out $264,728, 216 on account of Federal Aid highways, forest road construction and expense of administration. But this is not a tax on the non-car owner because the government has collected $589,012,021 in taxes on autos, tires and accessories. This leaves more than $300,000,000 of automobile money to be turned into the treasury to help meet other expenses of the government. In many States licenses fees, gasoline taxes and other charges—to say nothing of the property tax—usually take care of the road-building programs and some times leaves a surplus.
If the non-car owner feels that better roads aid the auto-owners and do not help him he should remember that the better the roads the easier it is for producers to get their wares to market. And the easier it is to market then the lower the prices to every one^—car owner or non-car owner. In fact, there is no one in any community whom good roads do not benefit, and the better the roads the greater the benefit. If we are not getting the finest highways then it is largely our fault and those who own cars should have their representatives look into it. They are paying their auto license money to State and Nation with the understanding that it is to be used on roads—they should get what they are paying for. Then all of us will be benefited.
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