Bisbee daily review., 1908-01-18
LETTER ID
 TH[ PRESIDENT
 ABOUT BANKS
Citizen of Connecticut Sug- gests Plan Which Would Give Everybody Money On Equal Terms With Banks.

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 Geo. Le BoutiIlier of Ridgefield Conn, has written the following letter to the President concerning what he belives would be desirable law for the remedying of existing evils:
 To Hon. Theodore Roosevelt,
 President of the United States. Sir:
 The effort on the part of the Gov ernment by the recent offer of 10G millions of 3 per cent bonds to re lieve the financial situation. brings up the question of the adyisability of con tinuing the present method of issuing money upon deposit of Government bonds, which method has some seri' GUS faults.
 I write to suggest a plan which would be much more in the interest of the whole people, and would not be open to the censure of being, in ar essential feature. wholly in favor of class, as is the case with issues oi Government bonds now outstanding.
 Whatever may have been the neces. sity during the Civil War to give the National Banks. exclusively, the priv ilege Of depositing bonds with the Government and receiving in ex change money therefor. that necessity no longer exists.
 The proposed plan Is: I. That every individual citizen or firm, should have an equal right with a National Bank to obtain money upon deposit of Government bond.
 II. That all money issued against bonds should be uniform in design should be full legal tender, and should be printed at the expense of the Gov. ernment.
 If these provisions were made law practically the whole of the interest on the national debt could be saved to the people.
 At the present time, on existing methods, the National Banks receive almost a pure donation of the whole amount of interest on the bonds which they deposit for circulation. It is true, that in the first instance, they perform a certain clerical action, i.e., they buy the bonds from the Gov ernment, the re-deposit them with the Government, and receive back a sum equal to their purchase money. For this clerical action, which need occur only once during the life of the bond, thay receive annually s20 upon every s1.000 bond, which is $20,000 upon every million, and $1,000,000 per an mum upon every 100 million of debt.
 The National Banks have been en- toying this exclusive, very profitable privilege, with varying rates of inter- est from 6 per cent to per cent, for the last 4 years.
 I claim that this privilege, if exer- cised at all should be exercisable by every citizen or firm. #....-
 A private citizen or Firm, not being obliged to keep any reserve, would be satisfied with lower rate of in- terest than a bank, and would take with alacrity an entire issue of bonds of 100 millions or 1000 millions at a brokers commission of IS of 1 per cent per annum. That is, on 100 mil lions of debt the Government would pay in interest S125,00O per annum in- stead of as at present, S2,000,0 900 per annum.
 And further, if Congress will enact that when a public loan is authorized, that citizen having applied for bonds with privilege to take out cir culating medium, may assign such rights back to the Government, and let the Government issue and receive the money in his stead, then every dollar ot interest may be savd.
 The Government having received such assignment would deposit the bonds with the Treasurer of the United States and issue to him the face value thereof in money, which would be paid out for current ex- penses of the Government.
 The rate of interest would be nil, as the Government would pay it to It. self.
 $100 would be ample remuneration to any citizen for making such appH- cation and assigpmment-
 As a result, on an issue of 100 mil lions of bonds the total cost to the Government during the whole life of the bonds would be but $100, as against an outlay under present laws of 40 millions Of dollars on a 20-year issue of the same amount of per cents.
 The entire public bonded debt of about 1000 millions could be refunded on this plan, saving to the people the whole interest expense of more than s2O. 900. 900 annually.
 Believing that you are desirous of doing all in your power to establish equal rights for all with special privi- leges to none is my reason for recon mending to you this modification of existing laws. hoping that you win give 1t your valuable personal in- fluence.