The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-10-19
Never Before Has Such Col lection of Products Been
 Offered to Him
BUY UP FACTORIES"
 IS LATEST ADVICE
Ice Men Are Expected Next to Ask the Government to Issue Bonds and Buy Ice Output
 and Store It

Washington, October 1S.-(Speclalp Like a benevolent old plutocrat with a horde of poor relatives anxious to take him in on the ground floor with them selves on some capital Investments If he'll furnish the cash Uncle Sam has been beset fin the present Congress with schemes, embodied in various bills, for him to go into every kind of business wholesale, retail. manufacturing and az ricultural. Prominent among these meas ures is one from Senator Martine-"by request" let it be explained-that Uncle Sam purchase a large and varied as- sortment of factories and turn his atten- tion to that line of commercial activity.
 So, Uncle sam soon may start a depart ment store, with advertising signboards on his coasts and frontier lines, like this:
 EVERY DAYS BARGAIN DAY! Uncle Sam Buys High and Sells Low.
 EVERYTHING IN STOCK
 Made on the Premises.
 First of the investments into which he was urged to put his cash was silver, sun dry statesmen from the west arguing that now was the time for him to get it on the bull side of the market. Prices were greatly depressed. they averred. because of the war in Europe, and Uncle Sam would do well to salt away 100000 or so ounces for q rainy day. And so silvery was their speech that Uncle sam yielded to the point of permitting such a bill to pass the Senate, and If he isn't mighty careful the House may put 1t over also.
 Encouraged by the success of their fellow miners, the copper men then got busy and introduced bills at both ends of the capitol for the purchase of several million pounds of that base metal, con tending that if Uncle Sam would take care of the pennies the pounds would take care of themselves. Copper, they cited, was like treasure In heaven. which neither moth nor rust could corrupt, and which thieves were not likely to break in and steal, so Uncle Sam would be safe in secretlng some in his stocking against the rainy day which would dawn coinci- denty with the European war. The bills still are pending.
 That started things, and the onset of Uncle Sams impecunious relatives re- sembled the reception held by Martin Chuzzlewit, ST.
 Came the cotton men with bills for the purchase of cotton at remunerative prices to the growers. these having some iOklt on FtnelT sue through tDe 1att l1At all outlets for the staple had been closed and cotton was a drug on the market. Buy at 10 cents. sell at 12," cooed the cotton men-that Is. some of them-and pointed to the precedent of the silver purchase and the bills for the purchase of copper.
 Then from behind cloud of smoke came troop of tobacco men from Kentucky, anxious to dispose of a jeb lot of burley a nd Ofbar hra n6s a a n n nripag They even would give trading stamps and matches with cigar bands and coupons and other Inducements. Uncle Sam never had such an opportunity and probably never would again.
 .'Watermelons! Nice, fresh water melons!' came chorus from the fields, from which sturdy tillers of the soil were harvesting late crop. As collateral for Panama bonds other government se- curities, nothing more substantial than watermelons could be found, they said unless perchance. 1t was cantaloupes and they had a few hundred thousands of those to exchange for $1.000,000 or so in bonds at per cent
 Whereat a battalion of hucksters' wag- ons rolled up to Uncle sam's front door In some were wheat and in some were corn; others were filled with eggs and fruit and a couple of carts carried canned salmon and naval stores.
 Came the climax when at the behest of constituent Senator Maritime present. ed bill for the purchase of joblot of factories. By this measure Uncle Sam was to buy all Idle factories, or any which showed indications of housemaid's knee or infantile paralysis, and Inject into them the serum of government owner ship" Idle hands were to be employed at union wages to turn out goods of every description, to be sold to the ultimate .t. would play against Uncle Sam in the middle and peace and prosperity would cover the entire land.
 So, soon some enterprising wight may arise with a proposition that Uncle Sam buy 100000 tons of ice and store it in the cellars of the treasury as security for 100 years.