Birmingham age-herald., 1895-07-17
TWENTY YEARS AGO.
The Address of MT. Richard M. Nelson of Sel-
 ma Before the Alabama Bankers
ASsOcIatIon

Banking twenty years ago. was to me as unknown as the regions beyond the sea to Columbus in 1490.
 I had about the same idea, too. of it's
 nature, as had the great discoverer. He dreamed of a land whose shores were
 coral. whose mountains and valleys had
 but to be tickled for it's face to laugh
 with plenty, while it's bowels were filled
 to bursting with such treasures of gold
 and silver and precious stones as more than rfyaled the fabled treasures of Gol- conda.
 The reality, how different from his dream we all know. The outside or
 bank was all had seen The inside was
 to me a sealed mystery, and sealed pret- ty securely, too, when impecunioslty
 made it necessary I should approach the barred entrance, where sat within the
 executive committeee to whom, in those
 days, was generally committed the dlih- cult duty of making the discounts. As rule however, these hnancial tflp- ,1nes never sat, but had to be shot on
 the wing Receiving no pay, each went about his business, and one by one had 10
 be brought down by the hunter aller lucre. .,
 If the first said it was all right the otbara agreed. and success was yours but if you got hold of the wrong man
 first and he said mo- mighty little use Tn going further. .,a After all, it was a one-man power, ana that an irresponsible one. Ine prest,uelte ,al, was a figure-head, the cashier clefk, Jrice-presidents and assistant casnlers
 had not been discovered, and things
 rocked along in an easy, comlorla lapie
 way that some of us now envy, since
 generally every bank got along somehow declared good diVldends, anu eFelyoous was happy
 If. unfortunately it rocked over a
 precipice and was broken to pieces, IL was nobody's fault in particular, as there was no management in particular, ana, save the stockholders, nobody felt hurt
 or worried about it.
 Many a good lawyer, prosperous mer- chant and successful manufacturer mas been spoiled and a powerful poor banker made out of him.
 Rut twenty years ago one layman l didn't think so An idea first expressed by Horace during the golden days or | Rome in good classical Latin has been | translated into this doggerel "As a rule mans a fool When it's hot he wants It cool, When it's cool he wants 1t hot, Always wanting what Is not" l And so every layman wanted to be | banker; because in being one he con- l ceived he became an autocrat ana ar1sto- | crat and ceased to be a democrat; 1io l longer being one of the "Oi pollol or l of the great unwashed.
 The outside of the bank was all he 1 saw his imagination furnished the ln- side with Oriental luxury, where, as sul- l tans, the officers reigned in more uhan l eastern splendor, their most violent labor l being the work of drawing large and l princely salaries.
 | Of course the officers owned the bank l that was what the public thought, and | in many instances the officers seemed to l have the same belief and no one could | +a11 anda6 and tne bank l began.
 | They and their belongings had mag l nificent carelessness about money mat 1 ters. very charming to the tradesman, II I embarrassing to themselves, when pay 1 day came. All the churches and public charities were ambitious to have such on their 1 lists and never asked in vain, and this l tended to increase the halo of glory that l encompassed the bankers seat. If one wanted a little accommodation none of his securities seemed to him gol- | den enough; and he approached with | trepdation the receipt of custom, where | on to make his offering, and If counted among the elect thought hlmself hlghiy | honored and made himself slave 10 l debt with a sense of elation, at the loss | of his freedom.
 l No wonder then that so many of us were dazzled and blind to the real facts when temptation came, and no wonder 1 we fell before it.
 | E,iohteen years agone, and the fated | moment came when, laughing and 1 proudly. I surrendered my freedom and 1 kissed my chains. Introduced into the | penetralia, found all serene and lovely, 1 as long as everything went right, 1ust | as it is in every other business uhoer- l taken by man.
 | But when things go wrong in what l are more worries, more labors and less | thanks? For a poor man what place! | Money money everywhere, but none l your own Tantalus with water every 1 where and not a drop to drink, had a | good time in comparison. | And then, in those days what syS- l tenn we had for doing business. In the l cotton season we'd ship one week to l Mobile and New Orleans. wait all the 1 next week to get our money back by ex- press or by boat, that we might pay for l and ship the receipts of the third week. l While cotton was moving, nobody, not | even Vanderbilt or a Rothschild, could l Have borrowed our money. We would
 have thought him daft for asking. The paying and receiving was done l by one man. and the way his cash re- l fused to balance was edifying, but not l refreshing.
 One bookkeeper struggled to keep the
 accounts straight on the old ledger sys-
 tenn, and gave a trial balance the last
 day of the month, instead of, as now, | the last hour of the day. | The president did the heavy standing
 around; the cashier wore himself thin l over the correspondence the collections, | the latter of which he did with the help
 of small boy.
 | A big deposit was a scarce thing and 1 the Alabama bank, which had deposits | equal to one-half of it's capital, was the envy of all the craft
 1 The doing business on other peoples
 money was an undiscovered secret, and | don't know but it should have remained | undiscovered.
 r One per cent month was the ruling l rate of discount, and all the banks in Ala | bama, except those at Selma, even at this
 ungodly figure. stole one day more than | they were entitled to by charging for l the last day as we'll as the first l The Selma banks have never sinned in
 this regard, either against the law or | good morals.
 The express rate from New York was l S3 a thousand for currency and 50 per
 cent more for gold, and our minimum rate for New York drafts was F per
 cent when we bought. and when the
 cotton season was over $5 a thousand