The morning journal-courier., 1908-01-31
CENTRAL BANK OF ISSUE.

CENTRAL BANK OF ISSUE.
 It is becoming more and more ap parent that a national bank of issue will have to be discussed as a possible way out of the wilderness of doubt and incredulity which makes for peri odical panics. Strong and capable men are in favor of it. men who are familiar with the science of banking and who are entitled to have their views considered seriously by their fel- lows. Unconsciously, too, those who argue for a more elastic form of cur rency point the way to a national bank of issue as the one sure way to take to settle the problem.
 It is undoubtedly true that Andrew Jacksons hostility to such bank controls the judgment of most mem bers of the Democratic party and practically all men who fear the poli- cy of concentration. Most men, too. are apt to form their judgment of things by what their attitude would be if it were given to them to display an initiative Perhaps Andrew Jackson feared a national bank of issue more because he realized as practical politician the use to which it might be put in controlling the money mar ket than because he approached the consideration of the subject from a scientific point of view. Most all American institutions can be easily in troduced to the table where the politi- cal game is being played if those in terested in it's management see fit to act as host It would be difficult for the best of them to escape the contact If so controlled and managed So that if the fear of politics controlling a proposed bank of issue is to be talk en as a sufficient rebuke to the estab- lishmert of such an institution it would be in order~.es go farther back and begin to discuss the probable fail ure of all American institutions which are supposed to be safe because of our political foundation. We have not heard. for example, that the presi- dency should be taken out of politics on account of it's ability to disturb the public serenity. I've are rather dispos- ed to believe as people that what ever it's shortcomings they will be met and overcome
 It is a debatabe question, too, if we should not have less politics in our currency system if the responsibility for it's control was more clearly locat- ed which it is claimed would be the case if a national bank of issue was organized. It is difficult to see how we could have more politics than is be- ing injected into the present consider ation of the subject The Aldrich bill are strictly political in the sense that they seek to give the handling of the United States treasury to the money dealers. It is a matter of personal judgment whether the same secret plotting would be possible under 8 national bank of issue system, but there is certainly ground for the hope If not belief that it would be more diff fcult. Somebody in the final solution must be trusted to be honest and de- cent in the handling of the currency system, which is in a sense of itself an answer to the apprehension that our captains of finance in their scientific capacity will if the chance is given them monkey with the buzz saw. :" We should think it mighty queer if the postponement of tariff revision for an indefinite period was to be pre- dicated upon the fear that politics would enter into the consideration of the subject. It may have been creditable to President Jacksons vis- ion that he tore the national bank of issue scheme into a thousand pieces and yet be possible for us, who live in another generation, and who are more subject to the laws of inter. dependence and of intelligent selfsh- ness, to entertain a different vision It ought, in other words. to be possible for us to contemplate a national bank of issue without feeling the chill of 8 f1eeting and a traditional fear. If we cannot perhaps it would be better to confess general rather than particular incompetency.
 Another word before we drop the subject for the time being Is it not a fact that we practically had na- tional bank of issue during the recent panic? Would not things have not gone to pieces worse than they did but for the intervention of J Pierpont Morgan, acting as though he were 8 national bank of issue It was h. who stirred the government to act and it uas he who called the bankers of New York together and made them finance