Los Angeles herald., 1907-04-25
BUSINESS MEN
ENJOY SPEECHES
At BIG BANQUET
Integrity in Business
Bishops Subject
PreIate's Remarks Well Received by
Assembly of Two Hundred and
Fifty Merehants-Other
Speakers Heard

-WO hundred and fifty representative
business men Of Los angeles gathered
around the banquet board last night at
Levys under the auspices of the Mer-
chants and Manufact Lrers' association.
]. M. Schneider, president of the Mer-
chants and Manufacturers association,
made preliminary remarks, calling for
c. c. Desmond as toastmaster, who in
turn made q brief address in behalf of
the association.
Mr.. Desmond introduced the following
speakers: Bishop Conaty, Acting Mayor
Niles Pease, Perry w. Weidner Lewis
H. Mertz, G. H. Plummer, Superintend-
ent of Schools E. c. Moore, and others.
Bishop Conaty was tn Principal
speaker of the evening and dwelt in
his usual eloquent manner on Ills topic,
Business Integrity" In ps~t he said:
In the whirl, in the mad rush for
gain, and especially when that rush
brings great results, men are carried
away by their oversuccesses and are
apt to forget the ten commandments.
The moment the moral side Is lost
sight of we are getting away from the
knowledge of the eternal law, and the
sanction of conduct is in danger of
being lost. Success often seems to de-
termine our moral belief measure our
convictions and give an accepted esti-
mate of them. If we go working to-
ward the purely commercial we will
have commercialism, if we work for
personal integrity we will get it.
There is nothing further removed
from integrity in business than the
feeling that business acknowledges
dishonesty in employees as an absolute
condition of work, when because of in
sufficient wages, occult compensation
q w
an unwilling public is forced to pay
tribute even when the service demand
ed has already been paid for. Crime
is committed against business integ-
rity both when employees seek to JUS
tify themselves in taxing the public
by reason of the little or no compen-
sation received from their employers
and when employers fail to give a
decent wage. Anything that forces a
man to seek from the public that which
should be paid by the employer is an
education in ways destructive to busi-
ness integrity. If one cannot be hon.
est and succeed in the line of business
in which he is engaged then he should
seek some other means of livelihood,
for dishonesty destroys character and
is a crime against God and society.
Manufactures Needed
We have a city to be proud Of; 1t
bition should be to reach out toward
more manufactures so as to provide
for our many and increasing necessi-
ties. The great and mighty waters of
the Pacific should carry from Los
Angeles harbor our trade to the far
east, to Mexico and the south, for the
time has come to link together by
steamship lines the far points of the
earth by our Los Angeles trade. With
the purest of water from the slopes
of Mt. Whitney for a Greater Los
Angeles from the mountains to the
sea we are destined to take high rank
among the cities of the world Our
ambition should be to make Los An
geles synonymous with happiness,
honor, right living\ and integrity.
May the sunshine of our southland
never be marred by business dishon-
esty, nor will it be if our business
men be always true to the example
set them by those who, in the early
days of this city's life, struggled
against untold difficulties under the
Inspiration of the hope they nourished
of a great and good Los Angeles.
Let us then write the words large
and clear that our business world may
read them: Business integrity, the
avenue to true success. Business in
tegrity, the watchword and pride of
our business world. Business integrity,
the aim and purpose of Los Angeles.
Business integrity is vital subject,
far reaching in it's consequences, enter
ing as 1t does into individual life and
touching at once at the personality of
the business man, who, by his integrity
becomes the very strength of the COM
munity in which he labors. / am re-
minded at the very outset of the words
of our old Latin friend, Horace, who
speaking of the integrity of life sets
before us his views of integrity:
JJnsullied honor, pure from sin,
Roams the wide world, serene, secure.
He would have us feel that there is
nothing so conducive to happiness as
spotless character which the whole
world honors That other word, ITO
thine own self be true" is an invitation
to integrity, while the great dramatist
bids us "Be Just anC fear not; let all
the ends thou aim'st at be thy Gods,
thy country's and truths"
Integrity Is Justice
Integrity is justice and tho just man
is blessed of God and an. Integrity
suggests Wilderness and wholesomeness
of life. Integrity is moral conduct,
conscientious living. It is synonymous
with honor and justice and in business
it is it's very tower of strength. Merely
to be rich or to be merely rich, prac-
tically means nothing SO far as the
DeneHllIlB Ol HOClSly 10 tOiSSAhChb IL
rather tends to the stuntiny of social
growth and is oftentimes a stumbling
block to permanent improvement.
Wealth has in itself the power of in
fiuence which needs only the strong
hand of integrity to develop it into
blessings upon him who possesses 1t
and upon those who are the recipients
of its favors on the contrary, in the
hands of the worthless it is a force
disintegrating and destructive.
Business integrity is business moral
ity and this reduces itself to the moral
ity of the individual as we'll as or the
class to which the in 'ividual belongs.
There is only one standard of morals
and 1t is that established by the laws
of God. Business integrity is BUSINESS
uprightness, 1t is business character
honesty in methods, honesty in deed
and honesty in results.
Business, commerce, trade, at one
time In the hiatnrN of the world were