The review. [volume] (High Point, N.C.) 1908-19??, 1913-06-26
PRESIDENT WILSON SENDS MESSAGE
TO CONGRESS ON CURRENCY REFORM
PRESIDENT URGES IMMEDIATE ACTION BY CONGRESS-
RENcY REFoRM-THE THE SHORTEST
COUNTRY.
NEEDS OF coUNTRYs BUSINESS ARE POINTED OUT
planned in the Message-An Able Which
to the Country.

Mr.. Speaker, Mr.. President, Gentle
men Of the Congress:
It is under the cOmpulsion of what
seems to me clear and imperative
duty that I have a second time this
session sought the privilege of address
ing you in person. I know, of course,
that the heated season of the year
is upon us that work in these cham
bers and in the committee rooms is
likely to become burden as the sea-
son lengthens, and that every consid
Grafton of personal convenience and
personal comfort, perhaps, in the
cases of some of us, considerations
of personal health even, dictate an
early conclusion of the deliberations
of the session.. but there are occa-
sions of public duty when these things
which touch us privately seem very
small when the work to be done is
so pressing and so fraught with big
consequence that we know that we
are not at liberty to weigh against
it any point of personal sacrifice. We
are now in the presence of such an
occasion. It is absolutely imperative
that we should give the business men
of this country banking and currency
system by means of which they can
make use of the freedom of enterprise
and of individual initiative which we
are about to bestow upon them.
We are about to set them free; we
must not leave them without the tools
of action when they are free. We
are about to set them free by remov-
ing the trammels of the protective tar
if. Ever since the Civil war they have
waited for this emancipation and for
the free opportunities it will bring
with it. 1t has been reserved for us
to give it to them. Some fell in love,
indeed, with the slothful security of
their dependence upon the govern
ment; some took advantage of the
shelter of the nursery to set up
mimic mastery of their own within it's
walls. Now both the tonic and the
discipline of liberty and maturity are
to ensue. There will be some read
justments of purpose and point of
view There will follow period of
expansion and new enterprise, freshly
conceived. IL Is IOf us 10
now whether it shall be rapid and
facile and of easy accomplishment.
This it cannot be unless the resource
full business men who are to deal
with the new circumstances are to
have at hand and ready for use the
instrumentalities and conveniences of
free enterprise which independent
men need when acting on their own
initiative.
1t is not enough to strike the
shackles from business. The duty of
craftsmanship is not negative mere
ly. 1t is constructive also. We must
show that we understand what bust
ness needs now, and will need in.
creasingly as it gains in scope and
vigor in the years Immediately ahead
of us, is the proper means by which
readily to vitalize it's credit, corporate
and individual, and it's originative
brains What will it profit us to be
free if we are not to have the best
and most accessible instrumentalities
of commerce and enterprise? What
will it profit us to be quit of one kind
of monopoly if we are to remain in
the grip of another and more effective
kind? How are we to gain and keep
the confidence of the business COM
munity unless we show that we know
how both to aid and to protect it !?
What shall we say if we make fresh
enterprise necessary and also make 1t
very difficult by leaving all else except
tSe tariff just as we found it? The
tyrannies of business, big and little,
lie within the field of credit We know
that. Shall we not act upon the
knowledge? Do we not know how to
act upon it? If man cannot make
his assets available at pleasure, his
assets of capacity and character and
resource, what satisfaction is it to him
to see opportunity reckoning to him
on every hand, when others have the
keys of credit in their pockets and
treat them as all but their own pri-
vate possession? 1t is perfectly clear
that it is our duty to supply the new
banking and currency system the coun-
try needs, and thatit will Immediately
need more than ever.
The only question is, When shall
we supply it-now, or later, after the
demands shall have become reproach-
es that we were so dull and so slow?
Shall we hasten to change the tariff
laws and then be laggards about max
Ing it possible and easy for the coun-
Milledgeville.-T farming force of
the state sanitarium Is now engaged
IN threshing the large crop of grain
produced at the institution this sea-