Palestine daily herald. [volume] (Palestine, Tex.) 1902-1949, 1907-12-03

and directors of national banks should
ever be allowed to loan to themselves.
Trust companies should be subject to
the same supervision as banks; legis-
lation to this effect should be enacted
for the District of Columbia and the
Territories.
Yet we must also remember that
even the wisest legislation on the sub
iect can only accomplish a certain
amount. No legislation can by any
possibility guarantee the business
community against the results of
speculative folly any more than it can
guarantee an individual against the
results of his extravaganza. When an
individual mortgages his house to hay
an automobile he invites disaster: and
when wealthy men, or men who pose
as such, or are unscrupulously or fool
ishly eager to become such, indulge
in reckless eculation-especially If
Il is accompanied by misunderstanding
jeopardize not only their own future
bat the future Of Of All innocent
fellow-citizens, for they expose the
whole business community to panic
and disaster.
The income account of the nation is
in most satisfactory condition. For
the six fiscal years ending with the
LIST of July last, the total expenditures
and revenues Of the national govern
ment, exclusive of the postal reve-
nues and expenditures, were in round
numbers, revenues, 1885, 900, 900. and
expenditures, 1925, 100000. The net
excess Of income over expenditures,
including in the latter the fifty mil
lions expended for the Panama Canal.
was one hundred and ninety million
dollars for the six years, an average
Of about thirty-one millions a year.
This represents an approximation be-
tween income and outgo which it
would be hard to improve The salts
factory working of the present tariff
law has been chiefly responsible for
this excellent showing. Nevertheless,
there is an evident and constantly
growing feeling among our people
that the time is rapidly approaching
when our system Of revenue legisla-
ton must be revised.
This country is definitely committed
to the protective system and any eff
fort to uproot it could not but cause
widespread Industrial disaster. In
other words, the principle of the pres
ent tariff law could not with wisdom
be changed. But in a country of such
phenomenal growth as ours it is prob
ably well that every dozen years or so
the tariff laws should be carefully
so as to see that no Excess
sive or improper benefits are confer
red thereby, that proper revenue is
provided, and that our foreign trade is
There must always be as
4 minimum a traiff which will not
only allow for the collection Of an
ample revenue but which will at least
make good the difference in cost of
production here and abroad; that is.
he difference in the labor cost here
md abroad. for the well-being Of the
yage-worker must ever be cardinal
,oint of American policy. The ques-
ion should be approached purely from
business standpoint; both the time
md the manner of the change being
UGH as to arouse the minimum of agi-
alton and disturbance in the business
world. and to give the least play for
eltish and factional motives. The
ole consideration should be to see
hat the sum total OF changes repre-
ents the public good. This means
hat the subject cannot with wisdom
e dealt with in the year preceding a
election, because as a
natter Of fact experience has conclu-
lively shown that at such time It is