The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-10-21
GIANT RACE COURSE
AUTOMOBILE SPEED CONTESTS SUG
 GESTS REGULAR TRACK.
"Policy King" Thought Himself Martyr. Tardy City Employes-Prop0sal for Government Bank
 Hughes H0milies.

last Saturday by Wagner, representing France. comes suggestion from JeI- ferson de Monte Thompson, chairman
 Of the Racing Board that in future similar races. if run in this country,
 must be held upon courses guarded bJ troops. or else upon private roads. The
 establishment of private course or
 sufficient length to enable the racers
 to cover the repaired distance of ap
 proximately 300 miles in ten or mora
 laps Is well within the range of possi-
 bility. Never before has 1t been dem- onstrated to what extent enthusiasm
 for automobile racing prevails. Prob
 ably the most forceful object lessol
 which the public has received of this
 was the attendance of nearly 100000 persons at the Vanderbilt cup race.
 The marvel of these races has been and
 always will be that in spite of the great element of danger attending them. both
 to the races and the spectator, so few
 fatalities actually occur. In spite Of
 the horror expressed by many persors at the death of one victim of Saturdays
 race. this accident, together with the
 injury of several other spectators. has caused no perceptible change In public
 opinion regarding the popularity of automobile speeding as sport.
 The possibilities of the human mird
 in the matter of self-justifcation for
 crime Is astonishingly illustrated in the solemn announcement made in the newspapers here that Al Adams, policy king. who was convicted and declareed
 by the judge to be the me anest man III
 New York, and who killed himself last
 eek, actually died in the belief that he was a martyr. The few defenders whom Adams has. take the public into
 their confidence and state that until the moment of his death, Adams be- 'lieved firmly that the policy game which ho. ran, and which took food from the
 mouths Of the needy and the last pen E:es from the pockets of hundreds or
 victims of poverty. was legitimate business, and that he believed himself. in spite of his conviction ani impr'son-
 ment, to be as respectable as many ot those who contributed to his downfall. Comptroller Metz, whose frankness in | criticising the city's methods of doing | business has frequently caused consid- erable commotion. gave terrible shock to the employees in his depart mont by threatening to install time | clocks and to dock the salaries of erl- ployes for tardiness on arrivals. The idea of insisting that a man who works for the city should be required | to be on hand the same as a business
 man. Is one that the veteran ofice
 holders cannot grasp. Payday is the
 only time when he has felt it neces-
 sary to be prompt. The statement has
 been made frequently that if a pri-
 vate business were run as the cttys l business Is, 1t would result in bank l ruptcy That is the reason given by
 most of the prominent men who have
 been conversant with the way city af- fairs are run for their opposition to
 city operation of street cars or elec-
 tric lighting systems.
 | An almost forgotten institution
 which once held aa important place | in national finance was recalled this week bzy a proposal made by the Cham l Der of Commerce. for the establish ment of a central bank in which the | government would be interested. This
 plan was tentatively suggested in a general report dealing with present
 monetary problems. This idea was
 first evolved by Alexander Hamilton.
 116 years ago, who proposed a plan l for the establishment of the Bank of
 the United States to be similar in con-
 stitution to the Bank of England. A l charter for this bank was passed by Congress despite the opposition of Jef- | ferson Madison and Edmund Randolph,
 and when taken to the court the act was sustained by Chief Justice Mar
 shal. It was established in Philadel-
 phia with & capital of ten million dol
 lars of which the government took | one fifth. The stock of the bank was
 over subscribed two hours after the | books were opened. Branches were es- | tablshed in New York, Boston. Balti- | more. Washington, Norfolk, Charles | ton, Savannah and New Orleans In | 1S11 it reported deposits amounting to
 s5,000. 900. loans amounting $15.000, ,000 l and specie to the value of 5000, 900. Its | dividends paid up to 1911, when Con- | gress refused to renew it's charter, av- eraged 8 1-2 per cent year. One of | the reasons for the failure of this
 plan of national finance was the fact | that more than seven million dollars of
 its total capitalization of ten millions
 was acquired by foreign holders, thus | engendering fear that the country's money might come under foreign influ- | ence. The abolition of this institution l was due in large part to the opposition | of Henry Clay. A second similar in-
 stitution was established in the United | States in 1S16. the proposal coming | from New York members of Congress.
 The bill was approved by President
 Madison and the bank with a capital | of $3i.000,000, was established Eigh- | teen branches were created In differ
 ent cities and in 1892 it held total de-
 posits to the value of s14,50000O. It's
 loans and discounts aggregated $6.-
 100000 at the maximum President
 Jackson in 1929 announced that the 1 bank had failed to establish uniform
 and sound currency. and suggested that
 it be replaced with a national institu- l tion founded upon the credit of the government and its revenues. In 1892 | President Jackson vetoed a measure for | the renewal of the banks charter,
 which expired four years later and end- | ed the experiment Sociologists and others of a scien-
 tifc turn of mind see considerable sig- l nifcance in the issuing this week by | Bishop Alexander Walters of the Af-
 rican Methodist Episcopal Zion Church | and President of the Afro American
 Council of a letter calling the negroes 1 to a day of special prayer yesterday. 1 with the hope of establishing by d. | vine aid a clearer understanding and ! more cordial relations between the i blacks and whites of thl> country. Tn
 response to the letter. the negroes con 1 gregated in all of their churches here
 yesterday and held special services 1 characterized hy special prayers. While l the press Is full of dispatches relating ] to the lynchings and mob violence in i the South as result or negro out
 rages, New York itself is somewhat
 apathetic. The race question here. as | concerning the negro individually 1 practically does not exist. In cxpres-
 sions made public during the week a 1 social scientist of prominence here ! ventured an opinioT which probably 1 explains the facts, namely that the i tremendous impetus maintained by the
 people of the metropolis acts as pre- l tn1n n