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THE SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL
ATLANTA, GA., 5 NORTH FORSYTH ST.
Entered at the Atlanta Postoffice as Mail Matter of
the Second Class.
JAMES R. GRAY,
president and Editor.
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Atlanta, Ga.
Not every man who wins a diploma is a diplomat-
Huerta should consider the defeat of Tammany
and take warning.
Democratic doctrine still jeems to prevail in sev
eral* sections of the country-
in fact, President Wilson won in every election
3*e6terday where he happened to he the issue.
The Downfall of Tammany.
In one of the most important elections in the
municipal history of America, Tammany and its can
didates were repud.ated Tuesday at the polls of the
'city of New York. The oldest political machine in
the nation was defeated. For that result, all good
Democrats will return much gratitude. Tammany has
masqueraded under the colors of 'democracy during
many years of power.
Few are not acquainted at least generally with
Tammany’s works. Few have forgotten its insolenee
in the Baltimore convention that nominated Wood-
row Wilson for the presidency. That occasion marked
the height of Tammany’s tide of success. By the
breadth of a hair, Charles F. Murphy^ the organiza
tion’s chief, missed nominating a presidential can
didate- From then the powtr of Tammany has
grown steadily less.
Perhaps never will it be possible to extirpate the
roots of Tammany from New York's soil. They
- have grown deep', and a mere clearing at the surface
will not remove them- But for a time, at least, Tam
many Is down.
I.ts defeat may have a chastening effect upon it.
Where it has fattened upon public spoils and fed
the pap to all its loyal ones, it now faces leaner
■ times, and reorganization upon healthier principles
becomes a necessit; if it is to survive.
It is said that Murphy is to he deposed as leader.
Tammany’s present misfortune is charged in many
quarters to him. He is held guilty of the heinous
tactical blunder of leading Tammany out to fight in
th.e open, where it has been attacked front, flanks,
and 'tear. Since the time of Aaron Burr, Tammany’s
principle of warfare has been Fabian—to fight de
fensively, make the enemy wear himself out on you,
be patient under any condition, be silent always
' under criticism. To Murphy is charged the viola
tion of that rule observed so rigidly by his prede
cessors—Wood, Tweed, Kelly and Croker. To Mur-
■ phy’s loss of temper and patience when Governor
“ Sulzer turned on ’ him last May is ascribed the
pressnt situation; for then it was that Murphy,
drunk, with power, rancorous under the trouble that
Mayors McClellan and Gaynor had given him, smart
ing under the cold disapproval of Democracy’s true
leader at Washington—then it was that Murphy de
termined to make one terrible example of Sulzer
as a warning to all of Tammany’s creatures who
might wish to defy it. There came the tactical
blunder, from Tammany's viewpoint. H« might
have waited until Suizer’s term expired, and then
-ignored him. Instead, he charged into the open with
Tammany.
The man Murphy is an interesting personality.
I son of immigrant parents, he first drove a horse car
n New York, then became a bartender, graduated
rom that into saloon ownership, and so entered pol-
tics as a precinct captain and then a Tammany dis
trict leader. In the disorganization following upon
the retirement of Croker, he rose rapidly to the
ehieftancy of Tammany Hall. He gets no salary in
that office. He has no other business than politics.
Yet he is said to live at the rate of more than
$30,000 a year. He owns a toWn house and a country
home, but makes his real home and his real headquar
ters at an expensive hostelry in New York. Nowhere
save in that city could a man like he, holding no
office and with no visible means of support, crack
the lash over the backs of governors, mayors, judges,
legislators and plain citizens and rule a great city
and a great state with king-like autocracy.
Tuesday’s ^election means at least a temporary
snd of this. It means sad times for Tammany. New
York city’s patronage is said to he greater than that
ot the president of the United States. The loss of
it hits Tammany hard, for Tammany cannot flourish
without patronage.
But the organization is a business concern, its
business being politics and its commodity votes. It
is busy at politics twelve months of the year, as
against the two or three months that its enemies
play at the game. Some day it may come back;
but if it does, it will be as a better and a cleaner
Tammany, with its real leaders the men for whom
the people are asked to vote. ,
• The egotist thinks he has a good “I.”
A man never knows what he can do until he tries
—then he may be sorry he fopnd out.
It looks as if the rebels would solve the Mexican
problem-
The next Mexican jail victim will probably be
Huerta himself.
\
THE ATLANTA SEMI-WEEKLY JOURNAL, ATLANTA, GA., FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 1913.
Huerta Must Go
Victoriano Huerta, dictator of the harrassed
Mexican republic, must quit his office. President
Wilson's ultinjatum was conveyed to him Sunday.
The fact has just become known. It commits the
United States definitely to the elimination of
Madero’s betrayer, the man with the slain president’s
blood upon his hands. Peace and good government in
Mexico, and perhaps peace in the western hemisphere,
demand his retirement either under suasion or
compulsion.
That the issue between the United States and
Mexico now has been reached is evident. Wednesday
is the last day upon which, under the Mexican consti
tution, Huerta can validate the recent farcical elec
tion. If Huerta declares the election valid, he
declares himself president- Anticipating the
moment, President Wilson has informed him that
not only must he quit the presidency without loss
of time, but that also he must not leave Blanquet or
any other member of his official family as his suc
cessor.
There are few citizens of our own country who
do not hope that the cause of upright government
can be served in Mexico without intervention by our
armed forces. The attitude of the United States is
most unselfish in the matter. We have nothing to
gain in Mexico save the recognition of abstract prin
ciples which benefit all nations equally in the two
Americas; and we have much to lose there. Yet the
Monroe doctrine, whose integrity we must preserve,
compels us, who proclaimed it, to intervention of
some sort, peaceful or with arms, in the interest of
order.
Huerta has not yet replied to President Wilson’s
ultimatum. Those who know him best believe he
will refuse to accede to it. That refusal will mean its
enforcement. What we then will do no one knows
save the high and capable officials on whom rests the
responsibility. It may be that plans have been per
fected for stopping Huerta’s supply of money, which
even how is short enough to trouble him considerably.
Perhaps the constitutionalist or. rebel cause may be
recognized by Washington, thus permitting it to im
port arms and ammunition from the United States-
It may be that our troops will cross the border and
our marines will land on the coast; but that will be
the last measure and the least desirable, t
A well bred child never reproves its parents in
public.
New Wealth in Corn.
Some three thousand or more exhibits are
expected to make up the 1913 Georgia corn club
show, which will be held in the capitol in Atlanta
from December 2 to 5. J- Phil Campbell, state, agent
in charge of this work, believes that the number of
boys who have tilled their acres of corn under club
rules this year is at least 50 per cent greater than it
was one year ago.
A semi-official estimate last year stated the in
creased corn yield due to these clubs at an almost
incredible figure. This year the figure will be in
creased perhaps by half, if Mr. Campbell’s expecta
tion is fulfilled.
Constructive work like this is what Is building
Georgia for a destiny greater than could have been
hoped thirty or even fifteen years ago. The corn
club boys themselves add to the state’s riches at
once when they cultivate their individual acres of
ground- The spirit of emulation which their ex
ample stirs in older farmers adds so much more.
But the bigger results are coming when the corn
club hoys are men, and when they grow not one
acre, but many acres of corn, and make each yield
a bounteous harvest.
With the boys’ corn clubs are allied the girls’
canning clubs. The latter, in their own sphere of
influence, are doing a work just as great and just as
important as that of the former. Where the corn
clubs teach the conservation of energy and resource
by making less land yield more corn, the latter
teach the conservation of energy and resource by
storing that which the land has yielded and wasting
none of it. A farmer who works must be fed. The
clubs teach the young farmer how to work intelli
gently in the cultivation of one great staple food,
and teach the young women who some day will he
farmers’ wives how to keep the pantry full of good
things for the table.
The encouragement which the Atlanta chamber
oP- commerce has given in the past and will give
again this year to this movement is directly in line
with its purposes. The cordiality with which the
city as a whole has indorsed the chamber’s activity,
and the hospitality which her residents have shown
to the young workers gathered here at the show each
year, are but feeble expressions of Georgia’s appre
ciation of the work that is being done.
People who talk the most disseminate the leaBt
wisdom.
Mr. LaFollette’s Fairness.
It is refreshing to hear such open and frank ap
proval of the administration from a Republican party
leader as that which United States Senator Robert M.
LaFollette, of Wisconsin, uttered in Atlanta Wednes
day,’ Mr. LaFollette expresses high admiration for
"the skillful and diplomatic way” in which President
Wilson is handling the delicate Mexican problem. He
asserts confidently that if the Mexican question
reaches the crisis of force, the president will have
behind him the unanimous support of congress with
out regard to party.
Mr. LaFollette says that President Wilson seems
to have won the confidence of the entire country and
so to have stilled the criticism once made of him
that he was not sufficiently aggressive. In that the
Wisconsin statesman is eminently right. Congress
^and the people whom it represents are together in the
feeling that the very serious situation between the
United States and Mexico is being guided on our side
by a strong, sure and conservative hand.
Mr. LaFollette, whq came to Atlanta to lecture in
the Alkahest Lyceum course, improved the opportu
nity further while here to predict that the currency
bill will be strengthened, not weakened, in the sen
ate and that it will j ass the house as amended.
More than usual interest attaches to what Mr.
LaFollete says in regard to these matters, because
he himself occupies a unique and free-thinking posi
tion in politics. It was he who laid the
foundation on which others have reared what is
termed the progressive party, yet who stayed with
the regular Republicans to lead the progressive
movement there. It was his vote from the Repub
lican side of the senate which helped to pass the
tariff bill.
After all our fright about probable intervention
in Mexico, comes Bryan’s calm denial that an ulti
matum has been delivered.
BOGUS REPUBLICS
BY DR. FRANK CRANF.
(Copyright, 1013, by Frank Crane.)
It was Gilbert Chesterton who forged the sharp say
ing that the world had not tried Christianity and dis
carded it, but that the world had never tried enris-
tianity at all* It might with equal truth be said that
the world has never yet given democracy a fair trial
There is no genuine democracy extant. England,
France and the United States come nearest it; but all
three are governed, not by the people, but by parties;
and parties exist, not to do the will of the people, but
to provide plunder for the lew.
There can be no democracy without general intelli
gence, thorough organization of the entire community
(not a part of it), and a considerable development of
civic conscience.
The form of a republic can be used to cover tne
greatest tyranny. The Caesars were adepts in this in
ancient Rome; the *aedici in Florence kne- f - the trick
perfectly.
Many of the so-called republics of today are intol
erable autocracies.
The republic of Mexico is. and always has been, a
joke. Porfirio Diaz was a more unlimited monarch
than any ruler in Europe, possibly excepting the Czar
of Russia.
The amicable Huerta Is just now giving us a sample
of how a blood-thirsty autocrat can carry out his pur
pose perfectly under the form of popular government.
Ostensibly a government by the people of Mexico is
controlled by organized brigands. The people have no
real votes. Officials have no real responsibility.
The republic of China is a melodrama. Yuan Shi
Kai, the president, is an absolute dictator. He owes
his position to the fact that he owns the army.
He is a shrewd diplomat, and one of the most skill
ful rascals that ever mastered men.
He is a *horough Machiavellian. He betrayed the
Manchus when he found he could do better for himself
with the republicans. In turn he betrayed the repub
licans and repressed them with the most cruel fire and
sword.
“A fierce cat,” says Charles Pettit of him, “he ca
resses his prey with a velvet paw before he tears him
with his sharp claws.”
Witness him giving a grand dinner at the Hotel d^B
Wagon-Lits in the legation quarter x of Peking, with
enthusiastic toasts, floods of champagne, and plenty
of good cheer, in honor of two generals he wished to
get out of the way; after dinner as the two were go
ing home they were surrounded by soldiers, backed up
again a wall, and shot. With exquisite politeness he
expressed his regret at the unfortunate accident, sent
the corpses of the murdered men home in gorgeous
coffins and funeral trains, and ennobled their ancestors.
The city governments of New York, Chicago and
other great American cities are almost as great farces
as the governments of Mexico and China.
The reason Americans have little real democracy
is because they do not want democracy. They want to
get rich. They are mad with individualism. They
don’t understand team play. For this reason a small
group of men, wnose sole interest is in getting office,
manipulate the people. -
The only remedy is to teach democracy and organi
zation to children, and to develop the civic conscience.
Without these there can be no democrac3 r .
Huskin’ Time
You may talk of jolly April and of May time in the
trees,
With the buds a burstin’ open, and the little honey
bees
Wadin’ ankle-deep in sweetness and a-singln' up above
Where the breezes are a-blowin’ and a-whisperin’ o’
love.
But therejs somethin’ more appealin’ in the rustle and
the chime
When the katydids and crickets are a-callin' “Huskin'
time!”
There’s the labyrinthine srtiftimer with its blooms a-run-
nin' wild,
And the brooks a-laughin’, laughin' like a happy little
child,
And you think it ’most completeness, but it isn’t aft
er all,
For there’s somethin’ more appealin’ in the rustle of
the fall,
When the katydids and crickets in the pastures are
a-chime
With the sweet content of heaaren, and you know it’s
“Huskin’ time!”
*
O the harvesters are happy with their brown arms full
o’ sheaves!
And there’s somethin’ in the color of the corn that In
terweaves *
With the hazy hangln’ distance, that no poet has exprest.
It’s a sense of satisfaction like the blessed boon or rest;
And there’s somethin’ most appealin’ in the rustle and
the chime
When, the katydids and crickets are a-callin* *‘Huskin’
time!” ,
—HERBERT RANDALL, in the Hartford Courant.
When You Dine With King George
Dinner at Buckingham Palace is never later than 8.
King George, unlike King Edward, plays the part of
listener rather than talker at the dinner table. The
rule that no guest should touch on a subject of talk
that had not been first introduced by the royal host
and hostess is now out of date. At a private dinner
party the king and queen are addressed as “sir” and
“ma’am,” and never as “your majesty.”
A rather curious rule that concerns the serving of
wines which are not decanted is observed at the king’s
dinner table. The name of the grower or shipper of
the wine is always removed from the bottle berore it
is taken into the royal dining room. The reason of
this is to avoid giving the grower or shipper the big
advertisement of his wines appearing on the king's
dinner table. It dates from the reign of George III.
Major Gillette’s Misfortune.
Senator Hoke Smith’s point in the case of Major
Cassius E. Gillette is well taken. The former army
officer, after resigning from the army several years
ago and going to Mexico, applied recently for rein
statement in the nation’s military service. Senator
Smith introduced a bill to reinstate him. In a speech
the other night Major Gillette assailed the adminis
tration’s Mexican policy. The next morning Sena
tor Smith withdrew the bill. Major Gillette will
not return to the army. He must find another
job in which he can talk to his heart’s content
and criticise anyone who displeases him.
“His act was not that of a patriot,” Senator
Smith is quoted as saying. "If he were now in the
army, he would be courtmartialed for what he
said.” The senator continues by 3aymg that the
former major s conduct entitles him to no special
consideration from the president or congress, es
pecially since he seeks reinstatement in that branch
of the government which might be involved most
actively in a sett ement of the MexiCon problem.
“This Is a time when all friends of the country
should uphold the president’s hands,” says the sena
tor.
In no sense has Major Gillette been punished by
the withdrawal of the bill in his favor. That with
drawal followed as a natural sequel, as a matter of
course, after he had atacked the administration- By
his own superfluity of talk he disqualified himself
from service under the flag. He made his own mis
fortune.
ouHtfcy
a, j E* YlKELTY
OME topics
Conducted w.m&'WHJriro/i
POISONING THEIR HUSBANDS.
If we might judge of this subject by the very sen-
Rational court trials of the present year, we might feel
authorized to say there has been an epidemic of poi
son cases. Mrs. Eaton and now Mrs. Crawford’s trial
to come on next week, etc.
When they are acquitted there is a muttered com
ment that they did not get what ought to be coming
to them.
In my long life-time I have never seen or heard of
such a continuous succession of legal trials where
women were suspected and arraigned for poisoning
their husbands.
As a rule with but few exceptions the husbands
arc arraigned for shooting their wives.
Taken altogether it would seem that the sexes dl-
“vide on methods and weapons when they also decide
to rid themselves of unwelcome mates.
To be perfectly serious, it is getting to be hazard
ous for a woman to dose out medicine if the husband
dies, because she might make a mistake, or what is
more dreadful, somebody who disliked her, might con
clude to accuse her of the crime of poisoning. If
there is a will that excites envy or indignation, or If
there is considerable money or life insurance at stake
there seems to be a rush to the courts for a poison
case. Granting that there are some evil-minded wom
en who do not hesitate at the crime of murder, when
they are tired of their husbands (and we hear every
day of men getting rid of their unwelcome wives), it
nevertneless appears that there is a public disposition
to suspect, to injure, to start sensational court trials,
as a sort of public excitement. Human nature, unre
strained, likes the horrible, the mystery that goes with
horrible crimes and suspicious and mysterious death.
And when a story is set a-going the thing widens
and spreads with exaggerations.
When a poison plot is discoursed all sorts of cir
cumstantial proof will loom up. The further it goes
the more tragic It gets. Is it that the world is grow
ing morbid as well as suspicious? x
* • •
THE WONDERFUL. RADIUM.
It is proof of the coming wonders, not yet discov
ered, that it was only in 1896, seventeen years ago,
that anybody knew or had heard about radium. Now
it is reported to be the only absolute cancer cure
known to medical science. In this stated year 1896 a
scientist, by name Becquerel, in experimenting with
uranium found a metal that had the power of produc
ing photographic or electric effects by a process simi
lar to radiation. The discovery was titled “Becquerel
Rays.” In the year 1898 Madam Curie, by the same
process, discovered that the compounds of thorium
possessed the same quality, and with further effort
she, with other diligent scientists, reported radio-activ
ity in radium, a metal or radiator, hitherto unknown
to the scientific world. Radium is derived from piten-
blende and exists in exceedingly small quantities.
The process of collecting radium is exceedingly te
dious. One or two kilograms of radium were after
wards obtained at a French laboratory, still impure,
and the operators used a ton of pitchblende to secure
the fragment after an extended process covering two
and a half months. x
In the year 1911 the price of radium salts was *o0
a millogram, almost infinitessimal. But its wonder
ful power enlisted hundreds of scientists. It was
discovered also that radium had the power to effect
diseased tissues in the human body.
In January, 1910, a radium bank was begun in Lon
don for lending radium to investigators, and $200 was
charged for the use of 100 milligrams for a single day.
A safe was built to hold the precious stufr, a steel
shell covered with a lead jacket three inches thick
was built by one corporation. The late King Edward
instituted the London Radium Institute. An insti
tute in Vienna is the possessor of three grains of ar-
dium salts. These radium salts have a luminous prop
erty which they can impart to other salts of like na
ture.
This luminosity dies away aftet* continued use. The
present excitement over radium and which Is extending
all over the medical world, is its power over human
tissues that are diseased and cancerous. It seems to
eradicate cancer germs without the use of the sur
geon’s knife. It is different from what was called
Roentgen or X-Rays. It is far more wonderful.
WHO WANTS THE SWORD?
Dublin, Ga., Nov. 6, 1913.
Mrs. W. H. Felton, Cartersville, Ga.
Dear Mrs. Felton—I have a Union sword found or
captured by my grandfather, Captain G. W. Bishop, in
the Civil war.
It has engraved on one side “N. P. Ames, Cutler,
Springfield;” on the other “United States,” and also
has engraved on the hilt what looks like “I. M.”
I would be very glad to find the original owner or
his descendants. O. BOYER.
If Man Were Only
As Big as An Ant
If man were much larger or much smaller than he
Is he could not have accomplished many of the most
Important feats of civilization, says a writer in the
World Magazine. For man, by his stature, is just the
right size to make the best use of everything around
him. In an article in La Nature, Georges Claude
points out some of the reasons for this.
If man were the size of an ant, for example, he
could have made none of the machines with which he
has conquered the world. The dimensions of such ma
chines as he could have built would condemn them to
uselessness, as the surfaces upon which friction musi
take place would be out of all proportion to the Vol
ume of the apparatus.
Such a man could not make a balloon that wouh'
float in the air. The delicacy of the materials he
would have to employ would prevent this, for when a
certain point of tenuousness is passed the gas diffuses
quickly through the envelope. He could not build
ships that would cross the ocean or float on any large
body of water, because the dimensions of such vessels
would have to be so inferior to the length and lieigm
of the waves as to make certain the immediate swamp
ing of the tiny craft.
He could not even produce great heat, because the
external surface of his furnaces would be so large in
proportion to their volume tnat most of the heat
would be lost. This would cut him off from all the
chemistry that involves high temperatures, and there
fore from metallurgy and mechanics.
But a ch-nge in the size of human beings would
not make their existence impossible, nor would it pre
clude a high civilization. This, however, would be a
very different civilization from ours, perhaps one
evolved from some such primitive beginnings as those
of the ants.
Cows Pose as Deer
(Monticello, N. Y., Dispatch to the New York World.)
The deer hunting season in Sullivan county has
opened, and will continue for fifteen days. There are
probably neatly 1,000 hunters in the forests near For-
estburg and Highland.
The farmers in the deer country expect to reap a
harvest from New York and Brooklyn sportsmen, who
are unable to distinguish between a cow and a deer.
Last year a number of cows were shot, and the owners
received fancy prices for them. This season they have
purchased extra cows and turned them loose—each
with the name of the owner on a metal tag tied around
the animal’s neck.
The first accident of the season occurred when
Chester Lupton, of Monticello, was shot in the mouth
by Joseph Newkirk with a rifle. The boys were play-
irg “deer hunting.” Several of Lupton’s teeth were
knocked out, and the bullet passed through his tongue.
RURAL CREDITS
V’—State and National Rural Banks.
B. FREDERIC 2. HASKIN.
In the Fletcher scheme of organizing a national
rural banking system, the local banks of each state
will form a banking association which will act as the
link binding them to the big central institution which
will be located in Washington. As soon as thirty lo
cal banks are formed in any one state they will be ad
vised by the government that a meeting has been
callled for the purpose of organizing a state bank.
Each local bank will send one o*f its directors as a del
egate to this meeting. Here they will organize a
state bank will serve as a -Searing house for its
with power to indefinitely increase • it, the shares of
which shall h-ve a par value of $100. The charter
will be for fifty years with power of reriewal. The
stock of the bank will be owned by the local banks
of that state exclusively.
• • •
In addition to having general banking powers, tlfe
state bank will serve as a clearing house for its
members and serve them as a reserve agent. It Will
rediscount their paper, and may act as a broker In
selling long-term farm bonds which bear the guaran
tee of a local bank as well as Its own O. K. It can
buy such bonds in its own name, and it can also deal
in the government securities of the United States and
of foreign nations, as well 0 as of states^ counties and
municipalities.
• • •
The management of a state bank will be vested In
a directorate of at least nine members, chosen by the
local banks, one vote to each bank, no proxy voting
being allowed. There will be the other usual banking
officers, the president and two vice presidents being
elected from the board by the local banks. No mem
ber of the state bank board can be a member of a
board of any local bank. The profits shall go first to
the payment of expenses, then a 6 per cent dividend
on the stock, and then to the creation of a surplus.
When this reaches one and a half times the capital' all
further profits shall go Into annual dividends.
• • •
This bank must always maintain a reserve of one-
fifth of Its check deposits and a tenth of its time
deposits, of which one-half must be in cash in Its
own vaults. The balance may be deposited with the
national rural bank or*with other banks approved by
tne treasury department. It may establish branch
banks, and enter into reciprocal relations with other
banks with the consent of the treasury department.
• • •
The national bank is to be known as “The National
Rural Bank of the United States," and each state bank
must Invest one-fifth of its capital ln_the stock of tne
national bank. This national bank shall begin with a
capital of half a million dollars, in shares of $100
each, and it shall have a charter for fifty years, re
newable ot the option of congress. In addition to the
usual banking functions It will act as a clearing house
for all rural banks and co-operative societies, whether
they be organized under state or federal laws, and also
will serve as their reserve agents.
• • •
It will also act as a depository bank for the fupds
of the United States government, particularly for pos
tal savings bank funds, paying interest on them and
relnvestiftg them under appropriate safeguards. It
will rediscount paper for the local and state rural
banks, and guarantee both as to principal and Interest
mortgage based bonds or notes guaranteed by these
banks. It will also rediscount farm loans held by
national banking associations under the provisions of
the federal reserve act.
• • •
In addition to these functions the national bank,
it is proposed, will be allowed to Issue debentures to
run for not exceeding fifty years, and to be secured
by trust deposits of farm mortgage one and a fourth
times as large as the face value of the debentures.
These must be distributed as nearly as possible over
the five great sections of the United States. It may
also purchase and sell on Its own account farm loansi
that have been guaranteed by the banks below, and
may operate branch banks. The surplus must be
brought up to one and a half times the value of the
stock, after paying a 6 per cent dividend, and there
after all extra earnlngB will go to dividends. The
bank must always have one-fifth of Its deposits In re
serve, half of the reserve In its own vaults.
• • • i
It Is proposed that the management of this national
bank shall be-vested in a board of nine members, four
of them appointed by the president and confirmed by
the senate, to serve for life or during good behavior,
and the other five to be selected by the stockholding
banks, one for four years, two for six, and two for
eight. Thereafter the banks may fill any vacancies
that occur in its quota, and the permanent term shall
be eight years. In choosing the directors allotted to
the banks each state bank may cast a number of votes
equal to the number of local banks by which it Is con
stituted, and the local banks may Instruct the state
banks for whom to vote. Out of the nine directors
appointed th e stockholding banks shall select two out
of the five elected by them and one from the four ap
pointed by the president, and from these the president
will name the president and the two vice presidents of
the bank, who will serve for eight years. The sala
ries shall be respectively $15,000, $12,000 and $10,000
for president, vice presidents and directors, all of
whom shall devote their entire time to the business of
the bank and glv e bond In a penalty of $100,000 for
the proper performance of their duties.
• • •
t
A temporary organization for this national bank
is proposed in the Fletcher bill. Under it the rural
banking board, created under the bill, and consisting
of the secretaries ot the treasury, agriculture and labor,
will select a board of five directors, making one ot them
president and two vice presidents, all of whom shall
serve till the permanent organization Is effected. A half
million dollars Is set aside out of the treasury to be
used in buying stock of the national bank, this sum,
with interest, to be repaid as the state and local banks
take the stock of the central institution.
• • •
The whole rural banking system will be under the
immediate supervision of a division of rural banking,
to be established by the treasury department. It will
exercise the same functions with reference to the ru-
fcral banks that the comptroller of the currency exer
cises over the national , banking system. He will
serve for a term of twelve years. He will have the
power of examination over banks, and of forfeiture of
charters whe nthe laws are violated.
The whole scheme outlined by Senator Fletcher is
one that endeavors to combine in one system all of
the meritorious principles of the German system. It
combines the functions of the land mortgage banks or
Germany, such as the Landschaften, with those of the
personal credit banks, such as the Reiffelsen banks
and the Schulze-Delitzsch banks. It is not limited to
farmers as are the Reiffeisen banks, or mainly to
wage earners as are the Schulze-Delitzsch banks. It
aims to afford every possible form of credit to the
small borrower that has been proved by experience
to be sal^ to the lender and advantageous to the bor
rower. It seeks to place the creators of wealth—the
people who produce it by their physical labor—on a
credit par with those who mainly enjoy its fruits.
* • *
It is not to be expected that this Fletcher bill will
become a law with the dotting of an “1” or the
crossing of a “t,” but that it embodies? the general
principles that will within a year or two become the
law of the land, seems to be accepted on every ^and.
That it will encounter opposition from present bank
ing interests is probable. The savings banks opposed
the postal savings banks upon the belief that their
creation would be a great blow to the savings’ bank
interests. But in practice it has been found by the
savings banks that the postal, savings banks get busi
ness that they could not command, and teaching the
art of saving and frugality to new people, have be
come a help rather than a hindrance to the ordinary
savings bank. The friends of rural credits say that
the existing banking system, of the country will have
the same experience—that for every dollar they lose
by tlie operation of the rural credit banks they will
make two out of the financial independence of the
farmer growing out of the law.