The Extravagance of the Times

Pacific Press Publishing Association · Mountain View, California · Oct 20, 1909

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 36, No. 41.

The Extravagance of the Times

As showing the extravagance of the times, the following item from Harper’s Weekly is pertinent: “The latest ‘estimate’ of the cost of the Panama Canal is $500,000,000. The first was $140,000,000. The last, in our judgment, will approach a billion. But that is not why the Government needs money. Eight years under Cleveland cost the country $2,519,524,867; eight years under Roosevelt, $4,627,855,383, a difference of more than two billion dollars. The army and navy under Cleveland cost $551,559,393; under Roosevelt, $1,781,426,471, a difference of nearly a billion and a quarter. And fifteen years hence not a single battle-ship now afloat will be fit to go into action.”