Politics

One of the wealthiest States in the Union is sound, solid, barn-bursting Ohio. But ever since 1935, when the Federal Government turned relief back to the States, Ohio's relief program has suffered crisis after crisis: one rolls into the next like waves on the beach.

Last week in dire distress again were Columbus, Youngstown, Lima, Cleveland, most of the urban centres. Toledo shut its poverty-stricken schools, sent 40,000 children home, wondered how it would care for 5,913 unemployed persons and their dependents besides. In Cleveland, 60,000 people dependent on direct relief saw little chance of getting it. Starvation, sickness were spectres at the Thanksgiving feast.

Ohio seemed an outstanding example of the paradox of want in the midst of plenty. But Ohio's trouble was not essentially economic. Clue to the paradox was Politics.

Federal spending for relief in Ohio had amounted to $80,000,000 a year. When the State itself was presented with the whole bill, a rural-dominated Legislature cut the figure to $15,000,000, later reduced it further. Estimated minimum need of the State: $30,000,000. Families who had been receiving $35 from the U. S. got $9, $10, $12 from the State.

The relief bills that were passed with support of utility and business lobbies were inadequate, haphazard, with distributions based not on needs but on geography. Examples:

> No relief problem to speak of existed in rural Monroe County. Nevertheless, the State gave Monroe $44.43 per month per relief case. The county paid out only $21.17 per case, made $23.26 on each. Urban Cuyahoga County (Cleveland) with the highest living cost in the State, got $599 per case per month, spent $24.40 per case, had a deficit of $18.41. In 1936, 30 counties ended the year with a surplus from unnecessary relief money, while Lucas County (Toledo) had a deficit of $300,000, Cuyahoga $1,250,000.

Laws of the State government made it virtually impossible for cities to raise the necessary relief funds even by taxing themselves.

With expedients exhausted, Toledo's deficit last week reached $800,000. Cleveland had only a few thousand dollars to pay for relief until Jan. 1, said it needed $1,000,000. The urban centres pleaded for a special meeting of the Legislature, but Republican Governor John W. Bricker, elected on a platform pledging "adequate relief," insisted that other means should be found first.

At week's end the Legislature had not met, rich Ohio was still desperate. To a group of labor leaders, deeply conservative Republican Mayor Harold H. Burton of Cleveland, suggested in a discouraged mood: "Labor can go to the Governor independently of the city. You can give him the devil far better than I can."

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