Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1906-12-18
TREASURY FULL OF GOLD.
Secretary shaw's Report show

Secretary Shaw's Report Shows
Country's Great Prosperity.
The unprecedented prosperity of the
United States is reelected in the report
of the retiring Secretary of the Treas
ury, Mr.. Shaw. whose statistics were
filed with the House
Never before has there been so much
gold in the United States treasury, ac-
cording to the report. On Oct. 10 there
was $S71,S93, SCOTT of the precious
metal stored in the vaults. OF the
$3.50 chartered national banks, AS
failed and 1,743 were placed in volun-
tary liquidation, and since the estab-
TEN in 1868, statistics show that cred
itorS of these insolvent institutions re-
ceived IS per cent of their claims, on
an average. The money in circulation
in the United States now amounts to
$2,736, 646,62S, or $330S per capita.
The outstanding principal of the public
debt on June 80 was $685., 159, 40, an
increase of $500. Including the issue
of Panama bonds the public debt Nov.
! was 1925, 159,250.
The past fiscal year shows the larg-
est customs receipts in the history of
the country. Over 100000 was col
lected in customs.
In speaking of the weakness of the
currency system, Mr. Shaw says that
the harvest of 1906 strained we'll nigh
to the limit the credit possibility of the
country. and as to his action at the
time, which met much criticism, he
says:
THE government guarantees against
yellow fever; it spends millions to pro-
tect the people against unwholesome
food; it inspects banks in the interest
of depositors, and does a thousand 9th
err things to safeguard the people
against disaster of various kinds. This
policy of governmental supervision re-
ceives universal appreciation. Believ
ing it to be the duty of the government
also to protect tie people against tinan-
cial panics, which in this country have
caused more mental and more physical
suffering than all the plaques known to
man, and recognizing that under our
system no possible cooperation can be
secured among banks, each independent
of the other, and finding these institu-
lions in the interior sending their mon
ey to be loaned on call in the cities, and
the reserve of the country, even in the
idle season, very low, the Secretary of
the Treasury undertook the task of
making some slight provision for the
inevitable He withdrew from the chan
nels of trade $60000,000 and locked it
up. This was accumulated in part by
excessive revenues and in part by de-
liberate and premeditated Withdrawals
His only excuse for withdrawing the
peoples money when they did not need
it, and when its presence invited spec
ulation, was to have it ready to restore
when they did need it, and when its
absence would bring certain disaster"
Secretary Shaw points out various
ways in which the dealings of his de-
partment with national banks could be
put upon such basis as to act as IA
preventive of panics here and abroad.
In this connection he says: IF the
Secretary of the Treasury were given
S1OO000,00O to be deposited with the
banks or withdrawn as he might deem
expedient, and if in addition he were
clothed with authority over the re-
serves of the several banks, with power
to contract the national bank circula-
ton at pleasure, in my judgment no
panic as distinguished from industrial
stagnation could threaten either the
United States or Europe that l could
not avert"
The Secretary's report is issued in
the revised spelling form, as advocated
by President Roosevelt