The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1844-02-10
Astounding Financial Deveiopme"s-A"s
North American Trust Company.

| North American Trust Company
| The Journal of Commerce Of yesterday contained
| a very extraordinary report or statement made by
Mr.. I,eaviu the receiver of the broken North
| American Trust. Company, statement, too, that
| contains more astounding developments as to the
morals and wisdom of Wall street fnanciers, than
ANYTHING that has yet come before the public. In
another part of this days paper, we give the
material portions of this extraordinary document
to our readers; and we particularly call their at
tention TO the facts which are there recorded by
authority. We cannot, however. give this docu-
ment to our readers without accompanying it with
some few remarks applicable 10 its character and
Its developments.
1t will be perceived that the men concerned in
getting up this banking company, or trust company,
or bursting company rather, are those characters
pretending TO possess morality, virtue intelligence,
legal requirements, and all those qualities of heart
and head that constitute respectable, highly re-
spectacle individual in the highest degrees of our
society. Some of these men, co-managers of this
institution, assume the highest rank in society, both
in this country and in England, for themselves and
all connected with them, and look down with a
degree of hauteur and superciliousness upon the
great mass of the community, who earn
their honest bread by honest labor. Yet look
at their conduct! Look at their morality!
Look at their principles, developed in this
astounding and atrocious report. Here are
several millions property, belonging to the indus
trious farmers agriculturaliss, small traders, WI
dows and orphans, Of this and neighboring commu-
mites entrusted to their hands, and yet in the short
period of two or three years, we see the whole OF
that property attempted to be thrown away into the
hands of Spectators in other countries, and
in other communities, without the slightest
remorse or the slightest feeling, for the
injury they innict upon those who confided
their property to such care. Yet these are the
men who call themselves respectable! These are
the great fnanciers-the dignifed Wall street
characteristic moral members ofmoral churches
the leading characters in society-the men who APP
pear at opera houses and play houses, and fashion
able soirfes, and balls-the very men who occupy
the first posts in the government, and perhaps may
be managing the affairs Of some department Of pub
lie matters with the same nefficiency, folly, and
absurdity, as they managed this Trust Company.
What becomes of responsibility, or what is meant
by responsibility, when we see such things pass be-
fore u.s. and not throb of Indignation rise up in the
mind or heart of any man in the community? Why.
almost the very stones in the streets cry out against
such villainy, such folly and absurdity, and such
roguery, as here is pictured and if the fire from
heaven were to fall down and consume both the
just and the unjust, as 1t did in the of Sodom
and Gomorrah it would be no more than doing
justice to this wicked and unprincpled but respect
able, moral, religious, and refined generation.