The Daily bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Hawaii]) 1882-1895, 1893-08-29
The Condition of the Country.

country. Everybody who has money
is boarding it, in fear of what may
happen before this senseless panic
is at an end. That is what's the
matter, and it is pretty nearly all
that is the matter. There is moth
ing else to complain of in this other
wise wonderfully prosperous coun-
try of ours Every material interest
throughout all the land is thor
oughly safe and sound. There has
been no wild or rash specializing to
speak of visible anywhere. Indus
try is everywhere prosecuted with
profit. Labor is fairly we'll remuner-
ated-better, indeed, than in any
other country-and capital nowhere
else yields such large returns. Our
fertile soil is at this moment yield
ing crop of abundance the equal
of which has never before been seen
in all the world. The capital value
Of our different crops, now ripe unto
the harvest, would bankrupt all the
nations of Europe if they had to
forthwith exchange their gold for
our cotton, wheat, corn, pork, fruit,
wine, etc. Our country is new one
with teeining wealth unparalleled,
and our people are workers with
out equals. They have been trading
nowhere unprofitably. They have
made no foreign advances that threat
en- loss. Yet the extraordinary spec
tacle is at this moment presented Of
a people unprecedentedly rich in all
that is good to eat, drink, wear or
otherwise enjoy, boarding their coin
and thereby rendering the exchange
of commodities among themselves
difficult, if not impossible. The re-
| suit is condition almost amount
ing to general paralysis. That is
the disease of the hour. What is the
cure2
1t is au Immediately existing and
temporary trouble, yet one of sharp
and critical character that ought to
be ended in SO many hours, or, at
most, few days. There ought to
be and there can be way found to
cause our monetary machinery to
resume its normal operation. Sud-
denly and almost without warming it
ceased to perform it's functions.
That is to say: banks, savings insti-
buttons, and other money handling
machines refused to loan money, no
matter what the security, and, Of
course, this withdrawal of the pivot
upon which nearly all the wheels of
commerce are made to revolve, caus-
ed a sudden cessation of large part
of the business of the country, and
the existing decentralization is the
natural and inevitable consequence.
1t is in this particular money panic,
unlike others that preceded it, un-
true to say that the badness of bust
ness caused the withdrawal of conf
dence. No such condition existed.
In no other period in our entire his
tory has the business of the people
been so absolutely controlled by
confidence-inspiring conditions as
now. Let that fact be proclaimed,
illustrated, elucidated and made
clear by the press all over the couu-
try, without regard to craftsmanship,
and within two or three days, we are
persuaded, there would come from
such appeals to reason return to
reason. With such return the crisis
would end.
Happily it is not the unthinking
crowd we have to deal with in striv-
ing to improve the present state of
affairs. The men who, if they willed
alike, could wake up on Monday
morning and end the crisis before
night are bankers, merchants and
capitalists, who, claiming in some
sense peculiarly their own to be con
sentative, are supposed to be par
excellence thinkers. What amount
of thought and right-reason has
been brought to bear upon the
financial situation in our own city OF
San Francisco it would he hard to
say. The occasion was met by lock
ing up the money-vaults. Simply
that and nothing more. In con
Germs where financial feebleness ex-
listed that might be very safe expe.
dent, but it was thoughtless, heed
less and very cruel one on the part
OF those who were under no compul-
sion to abdicate their rightful func.
tions as bankers. We mistake the
temper of the times, or there will
come day Of serious reckoning for
many of the money-hoarding fnan.
ciers of the period through which
we are now passing. That is not
conservative banking or Just bank.
ing, or even banking at all, which
becomes SO scared at the approach
of tight money market as to know
nothing better to do than sea-
up its plethoric vaults and refuse
to do business until we see how
the tide turns" That is the way
to prevent the tide turning I'M
til it has swept all before it. The
bank that refuses to do business
when it is in position to do it, is
about like the otherwise well-founG
ship that goes down in storm be-
cause in command of a captain who
loses his head when there is the most
need for his seamsnship. 1t is known
that our savings and commercial
banks are OVERLOOKING with money
Provided the security be good anG
the interest satisfactory, the sooner
this money were put into circulation
the better Yet the policy has beer
to loan no money, "no matter wha
the security" Though the needs o
this particular season are AWAY