The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1912-02-13


that system in the clearing house asso-
Citations Of the United States. They
must get our banking and currency
system as lar away as possible from
York
who Is to Have Authority?
When men Of capital who express this
opinion are asked Where, thens- IS
authority. control or direction to Pc
centered?" the invarfable reply is, I'm
the secretary OF the treasury
The banking and currency commit
tee Of the house of representatives
which will, If the Democratic caucus
resolution be adopted, make invest1ga-
ton of our banking and currency sys-
tenn, viii certainly hear testimony from
some of the ADLER men of affairs in the
United States in which unqualified OPP
position to that feature of the so-caHed
Aldrich currency reform measure which
establishes a central reserve agency AT
Washington, around which are TO Gus
ter as satellites the clearing house as
sociatioEs of the United States, will be
made These men are prepared to testi-
fly, If they are asked, that in their opln-
ion If the people of the United states
are anxious SO to perfect our banking
and currency system that there wl-i
never be danger of Capitalization OF
power, when the treasury department
at Washington, under the president OF
the United States, must b. the central
authority. The secretary of the treas
ury is the servant of the people. He
may err; 1t is conceivable that he might
use the treasury department for time
for political advantage; yet no score
tary of the treasury has done that since
administrations which were In power
before the civil war.
There are many features of the so
called Aldrich plan which are approved
by the more powerful influence In our
banking and currency activities There
is scarcely any dissent from the propo-
sition that commercial paper be made
basis fer issues that
government bonds as a basis for cur
rency be eliminated as soon as posi-
BILE.
There will be some surprises for the
country If a money trust investigation is
undertaken in sincerity and is carried on
with ability. An investigation of that
kind would show that control of money
capital and credit, far as this exists at
all, is feature of all the larger financial
centers of the United States 1t would be
very interesting and instructive II the
committee were able to show what some OF
the great changes in the movements of
money have been within the past twenty
five or thirty years.
Boston and the Past.
For instance, there can be no adequate
study of this question unless the financial
and capitalistic history of Boston were
from portions of the country which were
being rapidly developed, like the remoter
west, were aimed at Boston rather than
at New York. Relatively speaking, Bos- |
ton was the great capitalistic city of the |
country. Enormous surplus wealth was |
concentrated or held there. When John |
NJ. Forbes undertook to complete the rail- !
road now known as the Michigan Cell /
trial. in the early forties, he found all OF
the capital that he needed in Boston. |
When, later, Mr.. Forbes promoted what |
is now the Burlington system, it was TO !
Boston that he made his appeal and IN |
Boston that he found his money. Boston |
furnished much Of the capital with which |
the Union Pacific railway was completed. |
and for many years that railway system
was regarded as a Boston institution 1t |
is Boston capital which in great measure /
developed the Atchison system and today !
Boston capital, together with that of New |
England, is chiefly represented In the |
telephone company, while it is Boston ana |
eastern New England capital which made |
the expansion of the so-called sugar trust
possible.
Money Accumulation Elsewhere.
With the advent of Pittsburg as pre-
eminent steel manufacturing city and |
with the amazing development OF
Cleveland there began to be large ac-
cumulations of capital in those cities. |
especially in Pittsburg. The growth of
Kansas City and Minneapolis has greatly
changed the relation of those two cities
holders of surplus capital, their holdings
yearly increasing. Boston has parted
with a great deal of her money capital;
her financial supremacy has moved to-
ward the west There can be no thorough
grasp understanding of conditions
which have made concentration of money
tory of the creation and development OF
capital in various eastern cities and the
changes which that capital has assumed
are thoroughly understood
furthermore, a thorough investigation |
will make clear why in the time of great
development of natural resources which
began soon after the close of the civil
war it was inevitable that a few pioneers
should have gained colossal riches. But
the story of these accommodations of vast
personal wealth is not fully told until
there also is narrated in circumstantial
detail the increase of national and individ-
ual wealth which the achievements OF
these men made possible
And an investigation of the kind pro-
posed, if it IS thoroughly sincere, will re-
quire persistent labor carried on for many
months. The national monetary COM
mission was nearly three years In
all the information 1t needed
before it was able to assimulate and
digest what it had learned into q report
which has recently taken the form of a
recommendation to congress. In addi-
ton a thorough and competent investl-
cation will furnish the most fascinating
reading, for there is no romance of fic-
ton which compares with the story of
the accumulation of capital and wealth
and the expansion of banking and the
development of national resources ard
the construction of railways in the United
States HOLLAND.