The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1907-10-30
Financial Disturbance Was Not
Panic But Hysteria.
Might Have Been Prevented by
Forces That Stopped 1t.
COLLAPSE OF COPPER.
Aud Election of Heinzes From
Banks Started 1t.
Wall Street Has Habit of De-
pending on Uncle Sam.

| ial correspondent in New York sizes UP
! the causes of the financial furry as
| follows:
| Now that confidence in the money
market has been so rapidly destored, SO
| that the situation can be discussed
| calmly, it is worth while finding out
| who and what started the trouble. OF
course, it was lack of confidence, but
| even some of the old heads of Wall
street are pitifully at sea regarding the
real origin of this lack of confidence.
The big moneyed men of New York
have for such a long time resented any
| criticism of the financial methods of
themselves or their neighbors, and have
or Hughes, or some other individual,
that they have overlooked much more
| definite causes than lack of confidence
right under their own eyes.
The banks and trust companies of
New York, as a whole, are undoubted-
ly solid. Even those which suspended
in the closing hours of last week ex-
pect to resume in day or two with
out resorting to receivers.
The banks of the rest of the country
are even better off. Business in the
west has been booming. There is none
out of employment, and the reserve
savings of the farmers, of the skilled
mechanics. and even of the more thrifty
common laborers must be enormous.
License to pirates the Cause.
These conditions show that the rum
pus in New York last week was local
and not national 1t was not panic, but
hysteria. II was inclined to grow rap
idly and to a dangerous degree, just
as Mysteries spread in a girls school.
1t was dangerous only during the time
while combination Of the government,
the clearing house, and the moneyed
generals like Morgan were combining
to stop it.
The ease and promptness with which
this was accomplished go to show that
the hySteria might have been anticipat-
ed and prevented by the same combina-
ton of great financial interests The
conservative bankers and fnancferS
could have prevented this furry, and
they can prevent others like it in the
future by making 1t impossible for
financial pirates and highbinders to do
business.
The conservatism which prevails in
Chicago ST. Louis, New Orleans, and
other interior cities would do whole
lot of good in New York and Boston.
There IS need for flushing of the sew
ers and ceSspoolS of Wall street, and
some people are dimly beginning to re-
alize that if this had been done quietly
and methodically q short while ago the
whole risky episode of last week might
have been avoided.
Copper Deals Bare Jugglery.
This financial disturbance, which is
not to be dignified by the name of
panic, was precipitated by the collapse
of the copper combination. Helnze and
Morse were forced out of a string of
banks into which they had injected
themselves not to do a legitimate bank
ing business but to supply money for
their own stock operations.
When the crash came in copper, and
HeinZe and Morse were pushed out OF
their own banks by the determined ac-
ton of the clearing house, it was too
late. The public had taken alarm, and
naturally so. 1t was startling enough
for depositor to learn that his money,
which he had a right to expect should
be safely invested, had been used for
stock jobbing operations of the most
indefensible character.
Then the hysteria happened. The
public could not discriminate suddenly
between banking houses. Runs were
instituted on perfectly solvent concerns,
and a disastrous ending for thousands
of people was averted only by prompt
and wise action on the part of the con-
servative element
ssRespectables'' at Fault.
The difficulty with Wall street today
has been that this substantial element
has always stood" for the pirates un-
til crash was actually in sight. Then
they disavowed the buccaneers and
took credit to themselves for their
virtuouS action.
The condition of the big insurance
companies was perfectly we'll under
stood in the inside circles long before
Hughes began his surgical operations.
Many of the strongest men in Wall
street had had their cOnsciences so
blunted that they looked on idly while
these great corporations were being
Systematically MIXED.
Hartman, too, was not one of the
small fry nor of the ephemeral sort.
He was trained to the business from
early life, and he could command the
support of the strongest men in the
financial world.
Even Heinze and Morse had with
them on the directorate of the banks
thew controlled men who would scorn
to be called anything but solid and
conservative.
Wall street always acts well enough
when it does act at all, but it always
acts too slowly and 1T never seems to
take a radical step until the situation
becomes so acute as to threaten the
pocketbooks of the really big men, 1t
lets piratical firms get such a start that
in the end they can not be crushed
without crash.
NDisinfection' Proper Remedy.
1t has been the habit in the f1nan-
ciaI district of New York to consider
that the United States treasury could
and would step in to avert a panic at
any time.
twenty-five or fifty years ago if the
secretary of the treasury should ar
rive at the subtreasury and cause 1t to
be known in the street that before sun
down he proposed to dump into the
principal banks twenty millions in
money the reaction would be instan-
taneous.
one secretary after another has
been appealed to and has always used
the money of the government to
strengthen the banks. No action of
the treasury of this character nova