The Rural Tax Revolt
A Kennewick editor protests the unfair distribution of state highway funds, arguing that the city is subsidizing the infrastructure of larger metropolitan centers like Seattle.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The high finances of Seattle have a way of their own in absorbing from the state more moneys annually than they contribute to the state levies. Take the record for the year 1913: Seattle was taxed under the state levies $1,373.89. Her returns consisted of school apportionment, $549,907; permanent roads, $7,174; university, $477,416; public highways, $166,434; military salaries, $8,255; shore lands, $128,973; support of Crittenden Rescue Home, $4,500: a total of over $1,300,000 in excess of all taxes for state purposes. The smaller communities have been digging up with painful regularity and acting in the role of goat for the big fellows. We have been sending our dollars into the public highways and other funds and kissing them good-bye. It is about time we take an inventory of our rights. Shall we continue in the practice of saddling ourselves with additional taxation burdens in order that the automobiles of Seattle may have easy going?
“The smaller communities have been digging up with painful regularity and acting in the role of goat for the big fellows.”
The tension between the growth of urban centers and the resource needs of rural communities like Kennewick remains a central theme in Washington politics today. This 1914 editorial captures the early frustrations of the 'rural-urban divide' over infrastructure spending and tax equity.
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