The watchman and southron. [volume] (Sumter, S.C.) 1881-1930, 1907-12-04
fastening TO RUIN.
CHAIRMAN FOWLER DENOUNCES
ADMINISTRATIONS POLICY.
Unless There Is a Change i'm the Cur.
rency System in the Near Future
the Worst Panic America Has Ever
Known Is Inevitable.-Present Sys.
tenn Fundamentally Wrong.

AO"A ID ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS SyS.
tenn Fundamentally Wrong.
new YORK, Dec. 1.-Chairman Fow-
Ter, Of the house committee on bank
Ing and currency, made the following
statement today respecting the out
look for financial legislation in the
Sixtieth congress:
There certainly should be some
remedial legislation and can. assure
you that the members of the commit
tee on banking and currency will bend
their energies to that end. What W.
shall be able to accomplish no man
can answer But that there is urgent
need for help no man can deny.
AT the dinner Of the American
Bankers Association, at st. Louis, a
year ago. l Dedicted that the thing
which, has happened must happen un-
less some immediate action was TAX
en-; that there was not a banker in
the United States who would not re-
gret it II something were not done.
AT the close Of the last session of
congress said that the condition OF
our finances and currency was such
that it would Of necessity lead to the
destruction Of our prosperity.
again I now declare that IL this
government continues its presnt pol
Icy of injecting into the arteries Of
trade and commerce a fixed bond Sc
cured currency-by exchanging Sc
curities, by bond speculation, by
treasury manipulation, by executive
order or by any other form of thin
ble-rigging-we shall continue to
move, but with greatly accelerated
speed, toward commercial crisis
compared with which the present
panic is only a pleasant summer out
ingA Our condition, this tell has been
one of real prosperity. Dur crops are
worth about seven billion dollars. the
products Of our mines about one bill
lion four hundred million our manu-
factured products about seventeen
billion, a, total Of twenty-five billion
dollars.
meanwhile we have the advantage
OF an extraordinary consumption of
food stuffs and are enjoying excep-
tionally high prices. If all this were
not true, but on the other hand our
business conditions had been bad, or
crops poor and foreign prices low,
imagine what would have ,transpired.
Notwithstanding all this and
wholly because of the mal-adminis-
tration OF our financial affairs we are
in state Of panic.
1--WE have today in the banks of this
country about twelve billions Of dol
lars OF deposits and about the same
amount Of outstanding loans. Against
, this fabulous sum the banks, hold as
reserves about nine hundred million
dollars, or less than per cent And
even Of this per cent reserve nearly
one-quarter-two hundred million
dollars-is in bank notes mere
credit. a mere promise to pay.
Stating it in another way, the re-
kServes against two and one half bill
| lions of our bank deposits today are
bank notes and not gold, which is ad-
mittedly the only proper reserve in
any country with a gold standard.
Yet if we continue our present
policy where is it going to endP How
long will it be before all our bank
deposits will Rst upon credit re-
serves? This is obviously the worst
and widest form of imitation. Yet it
is rumored that sheer madness is to
follow, as a scheme is now being
wrought QUITO add to this already
overwhelming burden another load in
the form o, state, municipal and rail-
road bonds as the basis Of our bank
currency liability. No one who has
studied this question doubts that all
OF our reserves, whether for deposit
or for any other form Of bank LA
bility, including bank notes, should be
gold. Yet amazing is 1t may seem, at
the annual meeting Of the American
Bankers Association a year ago, a
reslution was introduced declaring
tnat national bank notes were a fit re-
serve. The argument was that a na