22 THE AGRICULTURAL BLOC 



To explain my views fully would take up 

 too much space in your valuable paper and 

 tire your readers, but I will say in conclu- 

 sion, for years my heart has longed to see 

 the American farmer and his noble wife 

 and family put on a plane with the rest of 

 this great nation. Putting on a high pro- 

 tected tariff without putting on a gradu- 

 ated income tax is like building a steam 

 engine without a safety valve, and when- 

 ever I read of Mr. Carnegie^s and J. D. 

 Rockefeller's magnificent gifts, I want to 

 know why they are allowed to bestow this 

 wealth according to their own whims which 

 rightly belongs to the American people at 

 large. 



Thomas Withycombe. 

 Feb. 20th, 1920. 



The present administration has succeeded 

 in having the income tax instituted, and 

 that is high above every other measure in- 

 augurated by the administration. The late 

 beloved Theodore Roosevelt tried his level 

 best to get the income tax inaugurated but 

 failed. William Jennings Bryan said Mr. 

 Roosevelt was stealing his thunder, but the 

 difference between Mr. Bryan's income tax 

 and Theodore Roosevelt's income tax was 

 very wide. If Mr. Bryan had been elected 

 with his free trade schemes there would 

 have been no incomes to tax. 



Fifty years ago Senator Hatch of New 

 England saw agriculture was declining, and 



