Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1905-08-14

spheres what they do in theirs. We
are at fault because we uphold and
follow them.
"A large part of our modern pros
perity consists of an overproduction of
fraud and sham. The crisis is acute.
A. feeling of distrust is growing
throughout the country. Many
branches Of financial business have
been in one way or another taken pos
session of by the INSCRIPTIONS for the
purpose of deceiving the unwary.
Trust companies have been made
the mediums of the floation of spacious
and fraudulent promotions.
Some life insurance companies, the
highest and what should be the most
sacred form of investment, are, as we
all knoy now, conduits through which
the savings of the policy-holders are
steered into operations for speculative
purposes.
Credit and good faith, not money,
are the basis of business. Good or
bad, our modern prosperity is founded
on public confidence. Take that away
and the whole fabric falls.
Well, we are taking it away.
Distrust-the rust which corrodes
public confidence-is spreading in the
land. Suspicion is taking the place of
belief, scepticism is taking the place
of public faith; many are inclined to
view an honest investment with feel
ing Of doubt and fear; many refuse to
invest in new enterprises, because
they prefer to place their funds in
savings banks, trust companies, insur-
ance companies, where they think
their savings are safe. And there
also, ye are hearing, these savings are
used by those in control for private
speculation. We hear Alright. These
facts make every educated man and
woman stop and ponder, as I bid you
stop and ponder now. But what
want to see Is how human these faults
are; how natural; how they come
home to all of US; and how we-you
and I-are the people to blame, the
people who alone can check the evil.
But this indictment of our business
life is not based upon an inherent, in
durable defect in American character
If this were true it would be useless
to discuss the matter further, for, how
ever keenly we might rebel against
the situation, we must perforce either
tamely submit or join in the riot for
easily acquired wealth of which these
evils are the outgrowth.
The fact is that the unprecedented
material growth Of the country, the
resulting creation of immense private
fortunes, the bringing together Of
great aggregations of corporate capt.
tai, Industrial ordinations and railroad
mergers, all have tended to center the
attention Of the people upon great
financial deeds and to rank men &C
cordingly, causing men to forget
virtues of private, individ-
ual life.
The effect upon the great men them
that they are of
the same honest makeup as the aver.
age American-of turning their entire
energies and attention to the tremend-
Gus projects possible only in this coun-
try Of tremendous possibilities, has
been to cause them to forget the same
elementary proinciples of right and
wrong in their business life, however
they may attempt to adhere
to them in their religious, family or
social relations /
So, in a spirit Of optimistic rather
than pessimistic analysis we look at
the recognized evils in our national
life and trace, II we may, their be-
ginnings.
Danger No. 1-Pretense.
The early temptation that comes to
an educated man or woman is to seem
rather than to be.
It may not seem very wrong to pose.
and yet the poser Is an incipient fraud.
It Is passing human counterfeit
on the public. You and are not only
the coin. but the manufacturers Of the