The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1907-03-25
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DIDN'T SAY HARTMAN
But Fish Won't Deny He Meant Him
in Speech.
From the. New York Sun.

From the New York Sun.
Stuyvesant Fish said yesterday that he
was disappointed that some of the things
he said In Philadelphia on Thursday were
interpreted as referring to y, II. Harri-
man. His speech was before some of the
students of the University of Pennsyl-
vania on the subject Faith the Basis OF
Finance" In the course of his speech he
was reported as saying. in explanation of
the recent panic In Wall street:
1.-THE causes of the lack of confidence
by the public in the integrity and hon.
esty Of railroad directors were the rotten
conditions In certain railroad circles I'M
earthed by the investigation. These con-
ditions can only be characterized by ex-
tremely strong language"
at did not mention Mr.. Harriman's
name once" said Mr.. Fish yesterday.
do you wish to deny that you were
referring to Mr.. Harriman?"he was asked.
ut is against my policy to deny things
that appear in the papers. I have never
done so. If you were to publish that
had just fallen out of the window and
broken my neck I would not deny it,
Mr. Fish was very positive in his state
ment that President Roosevelt's attitude
toward railroads had had nothing to do
with the slump in stocks.
"Mr Roosevelt had no more to do with
1t than that church steeple,' said said,
pointing out Of the window of his office
in the National Park bank building, at
PA Broadway. "It was foreordained long
ago l remember last summer / was
talking with a friend of mine about the
stock market and compared 1t to a dirigl-
BILE balloon. At that time l said 1t was
being held down by four large ropes rep
resenting four institutions or groups OF
men, told my friend who these ropes
represented, but will leave you to guess
about it, The balloon was then under
very good control, and the men on the
four ropes could pull 1t down little and
let it up little at pleasure. From that
time on, however, things began to change,
and instead of the four ropes, by the au-
tumn We had about a hundred small
ropes. The control was not so good, and
I foresaw that some time soon the bal
loon would be allowed to rise too high
and would burst In the rarefied atmos-
phere."
IT indorse the recent action Of the
President heartily" he went on. Il think
his initiating Investigations of railroads
and other companies when 1t appeared
that they were in need of 1t was only
common justice. Two years ago opposed
some of his actions and told him frankly
that I disagreed with him. 1 felt that
no more legislation was needed at that
tf,,,, - tn,
terstate commerce. The Elkins bill, If en-
forced, was amply sufficient, l held, and
still hold. OF course some of the state
are running the thing into the ground
with their accent fare regulations. This
is a very bad time to start that sort of
thing and the only result will be that
the railroads will have to lower their
standards. They can't afford to run
3-cent service with 2-cent rate
do you think any of the railroads will
be forced into the hands of receivers?"
IT hardly think it will be as bad as
that We are coming into period in
the railroad world of greatly increased
operating expenses with gross earnings
staying about the same, and of course
that Is bound to do harm 1t has been
foreshadowed in England for some time
In the last thirty-five years the ratio OF
operating expenses to gross earnings of
the English roads has increased from As
to 60 per cent"
In regard to the watering of railroad
stocks Mr.. Fish said:
II don't think it exists. Roads in this
country are capitalized at about $4,000
ill., l.
almost as many pounds per mile. The
value of American roads is at least that
per mile. I recognize that large amount
of the value of the roads lies in their
terminal properties and that these proper
ties were acquired at much less than their
present value, but 1 don't see why rail
road has not just as much right to an
unearned increment as an individual