STATES & CITIES
(See front cover)
Silk hats shone as they were handed in at the cloak room. Shirt studs twinkled on the spotless expanse of many a broad political bosom. Legislators' ladies beamed right and left under their freshly marcelled hair. Round & round couples cumbrously revolved to music. Many a white-gloved hand was wrung enthusiastically. And the most smiles, the most handshakes, the most congratulations were reserved for one man. It was a fine thing to be a governor and attend your own inaugural ball —ten years ago.
Not so fine, not so blithe, not so bed-of-rosy will be the lot of the 34 "Honorables" who will be inaugurated Governors of 34 sovereign states in January 1935. Ten years ago they could have looked forward to the peaceful enjoyment of a reasonably good salary for the next two to four years while they devoted themselves to promoting good roads and state parks, to improving state universities and agricultural experiment stations, to making after-dinner speeches, conferring political favors, capitalizing on their political power to get into that Hall of Fame to which all good Governors aspire—the U. S. Senate.
But in 1935 the snows that used to lie on the lawns of executive mansions as unsullied as January white sales will be printed all over with the dark footsteps of the unemployed. To be inaugurated Governor in almost any state will mean but one thing: the burden of growing demands for relief, of falling revenues, of citizens' appeals for tax relief, of a bare treasury requiring more taxes.
The Governor of South Dakota faces the fact that some 35% of his constituents are on relief. The Governors of New Mexico, Florida, Arizona, Utah and North Dakota must provide relief for 20% to 25% of their people. The most fortunate of all Governors, in New Hampshire and Vermont, count more than one out of 20 of their people destitute. Yet the new year's grief for Governors will consist less of the magnitude of unemployment than the lack of means for providing relief.
Relief Bills, The Federal Government, which in 1933 shouldered 60% of the costs of relief and in 1934 shouldered approximately 70%, has definitely decided to reverse this trend in 1935. Federal Administrator Harry Hopkins is demanding that the states assume a larger share of the relief burden. The states, however, will not resume a burden they gave up; they will be asked to assume a much larger burden than they ever bore.