The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1905-04-23
SHOULD KEEP MONEY AT HOME.


not be delayed too long-when life in
surance for protection, not investment
will be State function and State gov
eminent will create insurance de-
partments that will insure the lives of
its citizens in such sums as will pre-
vent widows and orphans becoming a
charge upon the State. OF course no
State will ever carry policies for in
vestment or insure any man for large
sums and there will always be a large
field for existing and new insurance
companies which will write more and
more endowment, tontine and like pol
icies that embrace the investment as
well as the protection feature.
The disclosure of the wanton ex-
travagance in the management of the
been exposed except on account
of disagreements between those
in the inner circles has
opened the eyes of many to the heavy
cost of insurance and started in
quiries that will help future policy
holders. The Equitable is not the only
company that pays it's officers extrava-
giant salaries and is run upon policy
that would be ruinous but for the big
prices charged for insurance. The
lavish use of money in management,
the enormous commissions paid. and
the general extravaganza coupled
with the useless and dangerous extra
large surplus piled up, will cause a
searching investigation into the cost of
life insurance that will more than
to all the companies.
The Charleston News and Courier
urges the establishment of a life in
surance company in that State, COR
rectly pointing out that this is the OPP
perfume time and predicting that a
home company would keep millions
and millions of dollars within the
borders of South Carolina to develop
her resources and enrich her people.
There is no reason why the suggestion
of the News and Courier should not
be acted upon at once. In Charleston,
Columbia and Spartanburg there can
be found plenty of men with as much
brains and business sense as in the
Equitable, the New York Life, or any
of the great insurance companies. IL
surance company and call it The
Palmetto or the Calhoun it would not
only do great business in that Com
monwealth, but in other States as well.
Why should not The Calhoun Life
Insurance Company. of Charleston.
write insurance in Boston as well as
the Massachusetts, Life write insurance
in South Carolina? There is no reason
except this: Life insurance companies
are modern institutions. All have
been organized or grown great since
1860. During these years until recent
ly the South had the problem of hog
and hominy that called for ali it's eff
forts. War and Reconstruction wiped
out its capital, and the little money
remaining was necessary for farming
and merchandising. With the coming
of better days, the South has organized
strong trust companies. banks, insur-
ance companies and is now in a posi-
ton where to fail to establish strong
insurance companies is to show lack
of business sense that would do vio-
great and growing progress of the
South in every line. Discussing the
matter of an insurance company, the
News and Courier goes on to say:
THE statement is printed that for
the year ending December 81, 1904,
the sum of $362,621 in premiums was
paid by South Carolinians to the Equi-
table, while the amount of losses paid
by the Company in South Carolina
was $199,SS4. To the Mutual Life of
New York $397,225 in premiums was
paid and $144,5S0 was received for
losses. The figures for the New York
Life were respectively s466,374 and
$780, 23.
with what seems to be a clear de-
monstration that insurance is costing
South Carolinians too much, their
duty in the premises is plain. They
should organize and manage their own
company. Commercially, the capital
lists of this State are relatively as
strong as were the capitalists of the
are equal in ability to the best men
of the North of that or of any other
period. AS to their business integrity
it can not be said that any evidence Of
gigantic Crookedness, such as appears
against the managers of the Equitable
or against the promoters of the Ship
building trust has ever been adduced.
Our bankers, manufacturers and other
wealthy men are large buyers of in
surance. There are numbers of men
in the State who carry policies aggre-
eating from $4,000 to $25e 900. To
organize a company in South Caro-
lima with a capital say, of a half mil
lion, should be an easy matter. The
character of the men who would be its
directors every South Carolinian could
and would know. 1t would be able to
employ in the North if necessary such
actuaries and other experts as the
business in it's inception would require.
A company with a directory including
20 or 80 South Carolina business men,
bankers, manufacturers. merchants
and lawyers, who have proved their
business sagacity, would appeal strong
ly to the insuring people of this State.
1t will not be argued that our own
people would trust the Hydes, the AL
exanders and the Tarbells of New
York, with their money rather than
the business men of Greenville, An