Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1908-11-10
GAY LIFE BANKS, DEATH.
"Great White Way Declared Cause
OF Epidemic OF Failures.


OF Epidemic OF Failures.
Gotham's Rialto- that portion of the
white light district Of broadway which
begins somewhere along oath street and
erds somewhere the other side Of Long
Acre 'Square-came in for eastigation
at the hands of Edward p. aIoxey, ex-
pert bank examiner Tor the United
States Department of Justice. Mr..
Moxey's business is to fit about the
country and peer unexpectedly over
shoulders of cashiers of national banks
here and there in order to find out If
their cash balances are all right NJ
Moxey recently found number of
these gentlemen with cash balances all
wrong and put them in the peniten-
tiary.
you mean the Broadway New
ferk?' he was asked when he sad said
New York was the couse of il ALL
II mean the Broadway New York."
he answered, quietly. Il mean the gor-
geous hotels and restaurants. the bars,
gambling houses, the myriad of thea
tiers, palatial apartment houses, turning
night into day. l mean the flood Of
money in New York upon which this
life is borne along. the craving for vast
incomes by which alone such life can
be lived
ITO say that even bare majority
of the tens of thousands of men who
nightly swell the crowd of amusement
crazed spenders. who live in $4,000
apartments and whose touring cars con-
gest the streets, are doing this with
money which is honestly theirs is ab-
surd They are not earning this mon
ey;. they are either juggling other peo-
pies cash or they are gambling with
their own.
when YOU can go into a restaurant
at o'clock in the morning and behold
$4,000 worth of women's gowns at the
tables and $1,000 worth of food in pro-
cess of consumption, something is
wrong. And when you observe $4,000
worth of automobiles waiting to take
this one supper crowd to their homes
or elsewhere-you may be sure there is
queer bookkeeping somewhere"
ut is not only this sort of life in
New York but in more sinister way
the sight and example of it which are
bringing about a degradation of sense
of common honesty throughout the
country. That American asset, the New
England conscience has become an OBJ
ject of jest. And, as l said, New York
is to blame
"The young banker and business man
Of the smaller community comes to New
York. He is taken in hand by his bust
ness acquaintance here and shown
about town. His hosts spend money
on a scale which dazzles' him.
''He wonders how his friends manage
to share in this prodigalits', and bit by
hit he finds out They tell him funny
stories of transactions which, reduced
to proper financial analysis, are detail
cations pure and simple, or at best
plain gambling. Everybody does it,
they say; it's part of the game and
back to his home town goes the young
banker filled with dreams of sudden
wealth and all the gay life that goes
with it.
100 often this person starts to lead
a gay life before he has got the sudden
wealth. He sees the rich customer of
his bank riding up to the door with
big deposit or TO get letter of credit
for a trip abroad. Perhaps, he tells
himself, it isn't the customers money at
all. Why, then, shouldn't he manipu-
late it for his own gain? Why isn't
1t anybody's to play with who can get
his hands on it? The life he has seen
and the methods he has learned are de-
stroying his sense of property.
''He is somehow getting it into his
head that this money placed in his
keeping is sort of common property,
and that as long as he can keep his
books looking technically right he may
juggle with 1t for the benefit of his
own personal pocket. He really comes
to believe, seriously. that this is So"