EASTERN CLACKAMAS NEWS
Devoted to the Interests of Eastern Clackamas County
Formerly Estacada Progress
V olume 9,
N umber 27
JUDGE ABLY DEFENDS COURT
Monday’s Meeting Best Yet Held I
by Taxpayers’ League.
A crowd of seventy-five ' or
eighty persons attended last Mon­
day’s regular meeting of the East­
ern Clackamas T a x p a y e r s ’
League, which met at E ly’s hall
in Currinsville. Among the au­
dience were sever*', wnn.en, be­
sides a number of taxpayers from
Boring, the Swede Settlement and
Oregon City and local delegations
representative of all parts of
Eastern Clackamas.
County Judge H. S. Anderson,
who, although not in physical
condition to have made the trip
in the inclement weather, was
present and delivered the main
address of the afternoon.
The Judge ably defended the
actions of the County Court and
explained to the local taxpayers,
many
hitherto
misunderstood
questions.
The subject of the
Judge’s talk, was “ Taxes and
Taxation’ ’ and in part he said,
“ I do not come here as an in­
structor or advisor in any sense,
but for the purpose of learning
something more of the purpose of
your organization.
Our taxes are not to be looked
upon as an evil to be shunned, or
the payment of them, as an un­
pleasant duty, to be evaded if
possible; but on the other hand,
the money we pay as tax upon
our property is the best invest­
ment we make from year to year.
It might be a good plan for those
who decry taxation to ponder a
little on the condition of things
as they must necessarily be, were
there no taxation.
Such a system would take us
back to a primitive state of exist­
ence, where each individual lived
to himself and for himself alone.
Not many of us look with favor
upon Socialism, as that term is
usually understood, yet neverthe­
less, most, if not all of us are so­
cialists to the extent that we do
not wish to stand entirely alone,
but feel to a greater or less de­
gree our mutual dependency up­
on each other and the community
of interests which ties us all to­
gether. To say that we will cast
off this tyranny of taxation, would
be to say that we will go back to
the Stone Age, if not farther.
When we study taxation, we
must take into effect our modern
mode of life, we become so accus*
toined to our present mode of life,
that we perhaps do not think of
its complexity. Our system of
government reaches from the cap*
itol at Washington to our hum­
blest home and touches every
transaction. We pay for a record
of our birth and our death; our
taxes school the youth to more
successfully fight life's battle and
if he is defeated and age or in­
firmity disable him, our taxes give
some degree of comfort to his
helplessness.
Bv means of our taxes, we em­
ploy servants to guard our prop­
erty interests by carefully reeord-
E stacada , O regon ,
ing and preserving our records
and to maintain courts to protect
our rights, without which our
deeds and mortgages and bonds
and securities and even our money
would be worthless.
That the authority to levy tax
has been abused, is not doubted
and I suppose it is one of the ob­
jects of taxpayers* leagues to cor­
rect these abuses. It is for that
purpose that the law passed by
t he Legislature in 1913, known as
the Budget Law, was enacted.
Thi« law provides that no tax shut!
be levied without au.eevinate hav
ing been made of all items of ex
penditures to be met and these
estimates published and also a
time set for a meeting for the tax­
payers to discuss the same.
This law, as at first passed, re­
ferred only to counties, but was
amended or rather extended in
1915 to apply to “ all tax levying
bodies,” which mak-s it anply 1o
all municipal, road and school dis­
tricts.
Now it would seen that the
people’s interests were pretty well
protected and yet it is impossible
to get a full and fair expression
of so large a body as the taxpay­
ers of Clackamas county, in a
mass meeting, and one can only
judge the sentiments of the whole
taxpaying body of the county by
the general temper of the as­
sembly.
The budget law is good but dif­
ficult to carry out fully and some­
what expensive to operate. Dif­
ficult, because it demands an item
of every expense for the coming
year, which would require a pro­
phetic foresight on the part of
those who prepare the estimates.
The cost of the different county
offices can be pretty closely esti­
mated provided no unusual de­
mands are made upon them, but
the wisest cannot foretell when
the unusual will occur.
By looking back over the ex­
penses of the Circuit Court, a
pretty good guess mrgiit be made
at the amount necessary to run it
for a year, but ttiere have been
single eases in the Circuit Courts
which would exhaust the entire
estimate for the ordinary year. In
this, us in many other matters, the
County Court is between the
“ Devil and the Deep Sea.” Li­
able on the one hand to be grilled
for making an estimate larger
than necessary and to suffer the
penalty on the other hand of
spending more than the amount
named in the budget “ and ten per
cent thereof.”
To scale the estimates for the
different offices down to the last
known dollar of expense, will al­
ways cause a deficit somewhere,
for the unexpected is always hap­
pening. And just here, is where
the County Court of Clackamas
County made a painful blunder
this year, for the different county
officials scaled down their esti­
mates as low as they thought pos
sible; partly to provide for emer­
gencies, the County Court made a
pretty liberal estimate for its own
Continued on page 6
T hursday , M arch 23, 1916
New Books For Library
The Estacada Public Library
was this week increased by the
addition o f about fifty new books,
which the Civic Improvement
Club purchased.
About one-half of the new
books are for boys and young
folks, vith the balance being
good standard fiction.
With the increasing demand
for books from the library, it is
not likely one of the new books
can be obtained for weeks yet,
except as reserved in advance.
To Open Broadway Store
Allen & Samson of Estacada,
in order to facilitate the han­
dling of their growing flour, and
grain department, have decided
to segregate that part of the
business from the lumber and
building material.
To accomplish this, they expect
to open up in a short time, a
salesroom and warehouse on
Broadway, between the depot
and 2nd St., in the building, for­
merly occupied by Waterbury &
Chapman, continuing to operate
their lumber business from the
present quarters.
School Supervisor Here
County School Supervisor Bren-
ton Vedder is spending this week
in this part of the county, attend­
ing to his duties at the various
rural schools.
Mr. Vender, being the only
county school supervisor, has
jurisdiction over about 135 schools
and consequently cannot cover
the entire field, oftener than a-
bout three times per year.
County School Superintendent,
Calavan also attends to similar
work, when his other duties will
allow.
Tax Assessors Here
Someone has wisely said
“ Death and Taxes are ever with
us” and it is the truth right now,
as the assessors began this week
to round up the valuations for
next year, while the Sheriff’s of­
fice is still making life miserable
with the collection of the current
taxes
Assessor Jack has announced
the following named deputies,
who are now in the field, with
others to follow later; W. H.
Holder, Chas. Thompson, Jerome
Avery, Wm. Avison, E. W. Ran­
dolph and J. 0 . Staats.
$1. P er Y ear
ESTACADA TROOP FORMED
National
Boy Scout
Underway
Movement
Through the efforts of Rev.
Spiess, the Estacada Troop of
the Boy Scouts of America is be­
ing formed. Already sixteen or
eighteen boys are practicing
marching and learning the rudi­
ments of the drill.
The formation o f this troop is
not in any ways a denominational
or purely church matter, being
open to all boys between the ages
of 12 and 18 years in this com­
munity, who are willing to apply
for membership in the Boy Scouts
of America and who promise to
do their best to keep the Scout
Oath and Scout Law at all times.
Application blanks for mem­
bership may be had on applica­
tion to Rev. Spiess, whose official
title is Scout Master.
In further conformation to the
laws regulating the movement,
it is necessaary that a Scout
Council of older men be formed
and the following persons have
been asked to act temporarily in
j that capacity: Dr. B. V. Adix,
Dr. R. Morse, P. B.‘ Guthrie,
Wm. Dale, Irwin D. Wright, Lee
Bronson and R. M. Standish.
The furtherance of this nation­
al movement in this vicinity is
one of the best actions that can
be taken for the good of the boys
and young men, as the methods
of work, coupled with the high
ideals of living and the honorable
code of morals, called for on the
part of each scout, makes direct­
ly for better citizenship and bet­
ter, cleaner manhood.
Infant Son Dies
Linn Albert, the year old son
of Mr. and Mrs. .1. A. Kitching
of Currinsville, died last Friday,
following a short illness, incident
to stomach trouble.
The funeral services were con­
ducted by Mr. A. Demoy, Sunday
afternoon at tue M. E. Church,
with interment in charge of Un­
dertaker Henthorn, following at
Lone Oak Cemetery.
Dog License Law
To Be Enforced
For sometime past, the Esta­
cada City Council has shown es­
pecial leniency in the matter of
the collection of dog license mon­
eys, but on complaints recently
made, the marshal has been in­
structed to proceed at once to
collect the licenses or destroy the
animals.
As there are a number of worth­
less, stray dogs in town, the en­
forcement of thiB law will prob­
ably meet with popular approval.