THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by The
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
Nome, Alaska .
Telephone: Main 125 p. O. Box 613
W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER .!.Editors1
i
$1.50 PER MONTH $16.00 A YEAR
Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943. at the postoffice
at Nome. Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Monday, December 15, 1947
Board Doing Good Job
(Anchorage News)
THE REPORT made public here by the Territorial
Board of Veterans’ Affairs should be studied careful Iv
by all Alaskans. It discloses a record of efficient admin •
istration for which it should feel gratified and in which
all of us can take pride. Since, its creation it has pro
cessed and approved some $3,000,000 in loans, and $700,
000 in bonuses to veterans of World War II.
The outstanding feature in its operations, handled by
Mr. Normal Haley, Commissioner, with the approval of
the Board, is that its administrative costs are to date
less than two per cent on the dollar. There are few pri
vate enterprises, handling as many individual accounts
and in like volume of money as the Board has done,
which can show an equally low cost. Its record does
much to offset the too-frequent charge that public agen
mies cannot be operated as economically as private com
panies or corporations.
The prediction made by the Board that the “Veter- j
ans’ Sale Tax” will become inoperative at the end of the
June quarter in 1948 will be welcomed by both mer
chants and their patrons. Any kind of sales tax is a nui
sance levy. However, this particular tax has not serious-j
ly disturbed our local economic system.
On the other hand it has been a considerable factor'
in making that economy more stable. Virtually all of j
the money collected and distributed either as bonuses or
loans, has been and will be spent by Alaskans in Alaska.
In other words, our tax dollars are remaining at home
and being put to useful purposes. The fact that already
25 per cent of the loans made under the Veterans Aid
Act have been repaid is indicative of the high quality
of the veteran borrowers and their capacity as well as
their willingness to liquidate their indebtedness as
possible.
They Asked For It ,
(Daily Alaska Empire)
THE INDIANS of Southeast Alaska and elsewhere,
who have blindly followed the advice of their glib at
torneys from back East and have been taken in by the
promises of a few legal light underlings left over in the
Interior Department from the Ickes regime, may soon
find that their actions in blocking the immediate pulp
and paper timber development in Alaska will cost them
everything they have been awarded in reservations
handed out so liberally by Ickes.
Senator Hugh Butler, chairman of the powerful Senate
Public Lands Committee, has announced he will intro
duce during the present special session of Congress leg
islation which destroys the Secretary of Interior’s au
thority to establish reservations under the Wheeler
Howard Act and to do away with those reservations al
ready created under it—1,540,000 acres for 1,428 na
tives.
Senator Butler is making no bones about the fact that
he is going all out to defeat at once the aboriginal rights
theory which he sees as the biggest block to develop
ment of Alaska.
The legislation he has prepared points out that abor
iginal titles to land in Alaska were wiped out by the
Treaty of Cession when Alaska was purchased by the
United States, saying exactly the same thing that the
Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said earlier this year.
The resolution also recognizes the danger in an ad
ministrative officer having the wide powers to liberally |
give away the public lands with practically no limita-!
tions. (
Had our Indian leaders cooperated with the govern
DELIVERING THE GROCE WES
i ■-T———
men! and agreed to abide by the terms of HJR 205 un
der which timber on the lands falsely claimed by the
Indians would be sold for pulp through the government,
they would have lost nothing and stood to gain all. This
legislation was absolutely fair to all concerned. Recog
nizing that Alaska had a chance to market the timber
now and secure several large pulp mills in Alaska, the
legislation provided that until the aboriginal claims
were settled, either by Congress or the courts, the
money derived from the sale of the timber would be
placed in escrow, later to be paid to the Indians if they
established claims, or to the government—Federal and
Territorial—if the claims were shown to be non-exist
ent.
Even in the face of two Circuit Court of Appeals de
cisions which went sharply against the aboriginal
claims, the Indians, through their attorneys, continued
to block the pulp program until they forced such re
prisals as the legislation which Senator Butler has been
forced to introduce for the good of the Territory as a
whole.
In an attempt to scare off prospective investors who
were to bid on timber now up for sale, the Indians’ at
torney wrote letters to the companies known to be in
terested, warning them that the government had no
right to sell the timber and suggesting they buy direct
from the Indians. They also set up what looks suspi
ciously like a “dummy” corporation in New York
which they reported was contracting to buy the timber
direct from the Indians. Senator Butler also plans to
investigate this corporation. We predict that the results
will show that those behind it have connections with
the old Ickes gang which started the whole aboriginal
mess a few years back.
by GEORGE 3 BENSON
President of Haidmg College
Searcy. Arkansas
-
GOVERNMENT AND
RAILROADS
The American railroads are be
ing put increasingly on the spot.
They had tough timse during the
depression years of the Thirties.
Some of them went bankrupt and
remain that way, despite the tre
mendous volume of wartime busi
ness. Times are good on the ra l
roads now, too_ They are hauling
all the freight they can haul' Well,
asks the public, if business is so
good, why can’t the railroads keep
on granting wage increases?
Folks coming to* our town ride
the Missouri Pacific. Although it
went bankrupt in 1933, this rail
road now has on order $35,000,000
worth of. new cars and locomo
tives. That’s an example of how a
bankrupt railroad has to pay out
money. And that’s not all. Its
gross revenues were up 54 per cent
in 1947 as compared with 1929,
and net income was up 40 percent.
But here’s the catch. >Its taxes
,have gone up 173 per cent
Government Trouble
! As a matter of fact, payrolls and
' payroll taxes took more than half
; the gross revenues of the railroads
in 1946. At the same time, the rate
i of return for stockholders, based
on property valuation, has dwin
, died to around 3 per cent. Not
i
l more more than 3 V* per cent is
; the estimate by the Interstate
| Commerce Commission for 1947,
and this does not include wage in
j creases. That’s mighty poor in
' vcs.ment!
:
Everybody seems to be unhappy
| about the railroads. The various
unions are usually ready to com
! plain about wages. Yet manage
ment finds wage increases coming,
with no profits to absorb them.
And sometimes the public gets
sore. Pretty soon somebody gets
the bright idea. We’ll just let the
government take the railroads
over, and that’ll settle everything.
They just think it will. That’s
what the trouble is now. Govern
ment trouble.
Some On The Rocks
In my opinion, the extensive
government regulations are funda
mentally to blame for the rail
! roads’ failure to make ends meet
despite the greatest volume of
business they ever had in peace
time. American railroads are prob
ably regulated by government
more than any other major indus
try. In years when railroads see
i that profits are too small, or even
j non-existant as in 1946, they may
! petition the government for rate
! increases.
! These may be granted or they
may not. Some relief was granted
1 the railroads early this year. But
these prospects were at once swal
lowed up in wage increases, and
additional increases are . being
i asked even though many railroads
are already on the rocks. If things
go on for another decade in this
manner, we shall see a great and
important industry fold up com
pletely.
How to Pay and Pay
There is one alternative: com
plete government management
and operation. Obviously, this is
no answer. More wrong ways and
methods will not make things
right. Although some persons in
America like to think that more
government management is the
way out of any difficulty, the ma
jority of American people do not
want our railroads to be govern
ment owned. In countries that
have adopted socialism, commun
ism, and fascism, one of the first
steps has been to nationalize
transportation.
The future of our industry de
pends much upon the future of
our railroads. Yet, unless railroad
credit can be restored, unless the
lines are permitted to earn enough
money to pay fair dividends and
attract new investment, to keep
equipment and properties in gou i
condition, then it will not be pos
sible to keep paying good wages
to employees. In this critcial pe
riod, wage increases may be the
burden that breaks the railroads.
If the railroads are crippled, or if
government ownership comes, the
public will pay and pay and pa/.
3-Year-Old Bov For
w
Polio Posters
NEW YORK, f/’P) — Three-year
old Terry Tullos, who was stricken
with poliomyelitis before‘he learn
ed to walk, has been chosen as the,
1948 march of dimes campaign
poster child, symbolizing the vic
tims of polio.
Basil O’Connor, president of the
national foundation for infantile
paralysis, announced yesterday
that the golden-haired boy, only
child of Mr. and Mrs. Clarence E.
Tullos, of Laurel, Miss., has been
picked as the youngest child ever
to appear on the poster.
ICE HOCKEY ESTABLISHED
a new attendance record during
1945-46 when more than 2,000,000
fans witnessed the 150 league
{tomes, according to the Encyclo
paedia Britannica 1947 Book of
the Year.