Evening journal., 1913-03-19
NEW NEWS OF YESTERDAY
How Men Without Previous
Training Became Great
FinanCierS
BY Holland

~ 0VAAah0a
"In my boyhood days I used to hear
a great deal about Nicholas Bddlc,
who was really the creator and the
highly successful director Of the
United States bank, which went out
Of existence as a national institution
soon after President Andrew Jackson
vetoed the bill re-chartering IT,"
SO said the late Judge Ashbel Green
to me one afternoon in the fall Of
1897.
Judge Green was OF a distinguished
New Jersey family. Some OF his fore
bearers served as Presidents Of
Princeton College He was near OF
kin to the Stockton family, one Of the
American Navy, and another, John p.
Stockton, was United States Senator
from New Jersey in the mid-seven-
ties
Judge Green himself could have
been Governor of New Jersey had he
been willing to accept the nominal
ton II was chiefly by his political
skill that the nomination of General
George b. Mcclellan for Governor OF
New Jersey was made in 1877. A
brother of Judge Green. Robert, was
elected Governor of New Jersey some
twenty years ago.
Judge Green's family and the Stock
ton family were in somewhat inti-
mate personal, although not political,
relations with Nicholas Biddle, during
all the time that the latter was presi-
dent OF the now traditional United
States Bank.
1T was not until after ! was adj
mitted to the bar said Judge Green
TO me, that | learned what | regard
as the most valuable lesson taught by
the careers OF Nicholas Biddle.
81 used TO hear members of my
family say that Mr.. Biddle had shown
extraordinary sagacity, something
like genius, in the management of this
great national institution, whose CEN
trail Office was at Philadelphia. ] re-
member hearing some one say that
10 was amazing how perfectly Prcsl-
dent Biddle kept his fingers upon
every one Of the branch banks He
seemed 20 know almost by intuition
what these branches we're doing.
Upon one occasion he sent a large
amount OF silver. then the chief
money metal of the country, TO Sa-
vannah In time to prevent the sue
cess Of conspiracy to ruin the
credit OF the Savannah branch.
Of supposed in my early days, that
Mr.. Biddle must have entered some
bank when a mere boy and had been
trained TO the bankers business and
had become at last so thoroughly
equipped by experience and practical
banking that he was well qualified
for the arduous. delicate and very
successful work he performed as
president OF the bank in which the
national government was interested
and which handled it's fiscal opera
tions
"You may judge of my astonish-
ment when shortly after I began to
practice law, I heard that Nicholas
Biddlc was never trained as a banker.
lie did have something to do with the
settlement of French claims against
citizens Of the United States, after
Napoleon sold Louisiana to this coup-
try, and that seems TO have been
about his only training as banker.
] was told that he would have made
conspicuous success as a literary
man had he chosen to adopt literature
as a vocation
81 learned with establishment that
the man who was for years the most
prominent and successful American
banker was never identified, at least
conspicuously. with any other bank
ing institution than the Old Bank OF
the United States. That knowledge
upset all my theories about the
training which qualified a man TO be-
come a great banker.
"Thon 7 began to look into the sub
iect. ] discovered that Alexander Ham
ilton, although he created the fiscal
. system Of the United States, was no
more than a Theoretical banker, and
that Albert Gallatin, who was posi-
bly, the greatest Secretary of the
Treasury we have ever had, was not
qualified by any banking training
10 speak Of for his important duties
I have since learned that majority
of the really great bankers of the
United States and almost all OF the
Secretaries of the Treasury were
qualified for their successes exactly
as Nicholas Biddle was-by great
common sense, by accurate and some
times lntultlNc Judgment anu ny CA
cellent comprehension and under
standing of the fundamental laws
upon which banking upon large
scale must be based II It is to be
successful"
Copyright. 1913. by r. J. Edwards.
All rights reserved)
Tomorrow Mr. Edwards will tell OF
"The Value of a Nickname in Political
Life"