The Evening statesman. [volume] (Walla Walla, Wash.) 1903-1910, 1905-07-24
perhaps Providence will appoint a
breeze to visit you at night, provided
you are at home.
THE PASSING OF DEPEw.


If one may judge by the tone Of the
eastern financial press, and the atti-
tude of publications of influence to-
wards him, the indications are that
the genial Depew has lost his grip and
is fast sliding away from his former
position in the money world. The lat
est feature is the plain statement of a
journal Of high standing that, in fair
ness to thousands concerned, Mr.. De-
pew should resign from his position
on the board of the New York Central
railroad.
This is the severest slap of all. The
mixup of Depew with the Equitable
affair, and the showing of the use of
influence for personal advantage and
against the interests Of the society was
bad enough; still there was a stencil
about the whole Equitable matter, men
of great prominence financially had
had their regulations blasted by the
disclosures, and perhaps, after all, De-
pew, in the general display of financial
nastiness, might not have come in for
special condemnation. But the sug-
gestion that he should sever his con-
nection with the New York Central
interests is body blow. Depew has
s.
years, and the Vanderbilts made him.
He has been looked upon by thousands
Monies and railroad management as
the indispensable man. To have it sug-
gested, then, that the New York Gen.
trail could do better without him; that,
have done better without him; that,
in fact, instead of being the wonderful
help to the road that he has generally
been supposed to be, he has become as
a barnacle that should be scraped off,
is to strike at the heart of all that has
made Depew.
1t is to destroy the idea of great
ability that clings around the reputa-
ton of the man and leave only the
shallowness of the joker and creator
of after dinner amusement. 1t is to
take away substance and leave what
in the street language Of the day is
known as hot air.
Nevertheless, it is a fact that within
the past five years the New York Gen.
trail, great railroad that it is, has not
held it's own, nor have the Vanderbilts
held their own relatively, in the rail-
road world. The reasons for it are
many. The old Vanderbilts are gone
and the later generation gives more
time to amusement than to business,
and while the present head of the fam
lily appears to have inherited no small
snare of the ability of his prOgenitors,
there is lack of that aggressiveness
that characterized the founders of the
name. But this is only one reason.
Principally, if we may believe good
authority, the evidences Of dry rot in
the Centrals management are the re-
suit of what is called "Depewism."
Just what constitutes "Depewism" it
would be difficult to explain in brief,
but is is said, for instance, that the
free list of the New York Central is
astonishing in length; that to exchange
passes over the road for theater tick
cts and like favors has been the prac-
tice, and that, in fact, anyone who
knew Chauncey could get anything he
wanted, and anyone who did not found
it hard to get anything This is just
one little illustration of -Depewism. 1t
means the running of great corpora
ton by joker.
Today the Vanderbilts do not control
New York Central as they once did.
There is a powerful element in it
known as the Stillman- Rockefeller
crowd, a group of men without a spark
Of sentiment, interested not in jokes or
after dinner speeches, but in the run
ming of the road as a road should be
run.
This is the element that may put
Depew out if he does not brace up a
little, and it may be that the Equitable
scandal will be the starting point of
the Depew decline.
RECIPROCITY REVIVED.