Perth Amboy evening news., 1905-12-06
MAKE PLEAS
FOR HONESTY
Insurance InquisitOrs Would Re.
form Business Methods :
Morality and Success.

NEW YORK, Dec. Cat the dinner
of the New York Alumni association OF
the University of Rochester Senator
Armstrong, chairman of the insurance
inquiry, and Charles Il. Hughes, its
chief counsel, made vigorous and nota-
bic pleas for honesty in business deal
ings. Mr.. Armstrong said in part:
"We are not a faultless people, and
who is so credulous as to believe that
the revelations of the insurance inves-
tigation are peculiar to the insurance
business? The morality of the bust
ness of the country has been subor-
dinated to success if not, indeed. to
greed. 1t is time for us to halt and
mark time lest we rush over Il preci-
pice.
"Yet we shall lose the lesson If we
but point with scorn to the men who
have been unmasked-if we do not
inspect our own consciences. The leg
islature ONE from the people who
have developed these business prac-
tees, and the legislature reflects per-
ICNllg ~ NiNCo as wei no liz w
of the constituents. You always will
have the legislature you deserve You
never will have a legislature that is
better than you yourselves are.
You have spoken of reforms needed
in football. We need the same reforms
in business. We want more open play
and less mass play with secret signals
We need a minimum of legislation with
a maximum of publicity. Competition
will do the rest. The committee in
vestigating insurance has not been car
ried away by the space given it by the
press or by the criticisms directed
against conditions and men we have
unmasked, and we shall get the great
est good from the moral awakening
that has been brought about"
Mr.. Hughes said:
your president secured from me a
promise to attend and speak at this
dinner long before a time when had a
thought of the embarrassing position in
which | might find myself. Later, when
| tried to get out of the promise, l
found Mr.. Payne more 'rantankerous'
by far than our friend up the river
who didn't care a hang
81 cannot speak to you of what is up
permost in my mind, for the i%nterroga-
tons of tomorrow must not be uttered
today. 1t Is not yet time to add to our
literature the "Reminiscences Of An In
quisitor.'
ssXy14 ALo,o 40 noptain nnfQl
principles which | may speak about.
This is not a time for any one to be dis
heartened. 1t is Il time for confidence
and not for despair. l believe in the
soundness of American life, and yet !
know we need an illumination of vision
to see the multitude who will not bow
the knee to greed nor betray a trust
nor falter in the presence of an oppor-
tunity for evil. This is a time for
searching hearts, a time of repentance
and of resolve, when we need a revival
of the sense of honor and a better per-
spective.
1T is a time when we want to hear
less of the man who was born poor
and achieved great fortune II want
to hear more of the man who remains
unsullied although he may have died
O 1t is a time when we want more
of chivalry. more of the spirit of knight
hood, that sensibility to pain and chas-
tity of honor that feels a stain like a
wound. 1t is a time when we need a
change of the burden of proof so that
every man of wealth OF of office may.
answer Immediately when asked,
Where did you get 1t?
I'VE must look to the college hall for
a place lacking a spirit of sordidness.
College men are the very ones to whom
we ought to look for men who will
never mistake true manhood, and yet
the American desire to get there, the
American desire for success. breaks
down many a college man and sends
him into the world ready to make a
N rod vot.d 1och for yyqalth and Onci-