The Grenada sentinel. [volume] (Grenada, Miss.) 1868-1955, 1907-04-27
FRENzfED FINANCE.
How the Stock Gamblers Play with
the Peoples Money.

The director of the United States
mint in his recent review Of monetary
expansion and its effect upon prices
and industry, brings out the fact that
the last statement OF he national
banks shows that the cash reserve
averages only about one dollar to each
ten dollars of deposits. That Is a very
startling fact, for 1t shows that II de-
positors we're to withdraw one-tenth
Of their balances 1t would take all
the money the banks have, and at
once produce a disastrous panic. He
therefore concludes that credit is ex-
banded to the limit" and believes that
| to save the country from financial dis
! aster a contraction of speculative &C
tivity is necessary. The history OF
| other such periods Of speculation in
| dictates that the boomers will not let
| up until a crash forces them to. But
| Mr.. Roberts also tells us that the
worlds production of gold for the
| past year exceeds $500, 000, 900 and is
increasing at the rate of over $25,0OO,-
900 a year and the annual production
| has more than doubled during the past
| ten years. AS long as this gold expan-
sion continues prices will continue to
rise and unless our spectators great
ly Overrun their credit there should
be no smash up" though there will
undoubtedly occur periods of depres-
sion due to over activity.
nnd0n EannnnoiCf uyrifor fokoQ
a most pessimistic view of the danger
of the increase in prices and declares:
Unless the prices of commodities
cease to rise, it is to be feared that
the present crisis will not pass away.
and If the rise continues, the position
may easily become so acute that all
the chief banks of the world may find
it necessary to take yet more sternly
defensive measures to avoid a very
serious and worldwide calamity"
There is no doubt that the enormous
ly increased cost of commodities
Sc per cent on the average-requires
much more money to carry on the
business of the country and keeps a
much larger amount of cash in cricu-
lation in the hands of the people. This
increase in prices has been ~accentuat-
ed by the advance in the market price
of securities on the Wall street stock
exchange and elsewhere, mainly due
to the clique control Of railroads and
other corporations and the frenzied
financing by the Wall street specula-
tors. We have a glimpse of this in the
evidence given before the interstate
commerce commission Of the Harri.
nan stock dealings with the surplus
of the Union Pacific and other rail-
roads controlled by the same inter
ests. We know that hundreds of mil
lions of dollars hat have been wrung
from the people through unreasonable
railroad rates have been tied up in
vast stock exchange deals in which
Hartman, Rockefeller and others are
interested, instead of the money find
ing it's way into the channels Of legitj.
mate business.
The operations of the United States
treasury under Shaw and approved by
President Roosevelt have been help
ing these frenzied financiers by de.
posting in national banks all the
available money in the treasury with
out even charging them interest. And
the enormity of these transactions is
made worse by the fact that the in
terest rates on money in Wall street
has averaged over Is per cent during
the past three months.