National Affairs: Deficit Averted

Last October—just before the election—President Coolidge announced that he was troubled by the prospect of a deficit next June 30. He could see only the "narrowest margin between revenue and expenditures." An air of anxiety, if not gloom, was thus cast over the Treasury—in voters' minds. The conservative conclusion could only be: If a deficit threatens, let us not change horses, i.e., political party control, in midstream. The President's announcement was also used as a fiscal hackamore to make Congress stand hitched.

Last week the U. S. paid its 1928 income tax. And as has invariably been the case under the Mellon...