The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-12-05

1 it's characteristics from business panic. No matter how rich a man was. unless he had ready money he was in desperate situation.
 c. O. Huntington, with millions of High grade securities In his pocket, was sor a time unable to secure cash with which to
 meet imperative obligations. George Westinghouse, with high grade securities aggregating $500,O00 offered as security for a loan of $4o.0O0 in cash was unable to obtain it and his paper would have been protested had not a personal friend who happened to have cash on hand lent him the needed money. E. H. Hartman passed three sleepless nights with the spectre of bankruptcy before him because he was unable to secure funds, although offering the highest kind of security in large amounts
 The clearing house association decided resources. It accepted securities upon suf- ficient margin for which it issued clearing house loan certificates. The amount of these certificates increased daily until at last the aggregate was greater than any issue before that time made by the asso- citation.
 When at the special session of Congress called by President Cleveland for the pur- pose of repeating the so called sherman CSo without debate gave a majority vote for repeal of the law: on the day following came the first liquidation of clearing house certificates. The Senate discussed the resolution for some weeks, but as it grad ually became apparent that ultimately the Senate would also vote in favor of repeal clearing house certificates were more and
 more rapidly liquidated until. at the time of the adoption of the repeal resolution Ia bo Ia Sf off tfoo& was liquidated. It was an unexampled | Illustration of what the restoration of confidence means
 Something like this is chara cteristic of the clearing house associations experlence since August 1. When confidence was completely shattered and the financial world was standing in the thickest of l fogs, appeal was immediately made to the clearing house associations. That body I accepted securities and issued loan cer.
 tificates upon them in the aggregate oi nearly s125,000, ,000 This service was oi ! instant value It aided indirectly, at least | in the formation of the syndicate of New York city banks which pledged itself tc raise $S2 GOO in gold to be applied in the 1 liquidation of the debt of New York city
 l on account of short term notes held
 abroad. It was of great service in facili
 tating New York city's share in the si00,
 1 100000 gold pool.
 It therefore paved the way for what al
 l first was slight, almost imperceptible
 change from anxiety to confidence ant
 that change was in few days made evi
 dent when banks which had taken ou
 clearing house certificates began to re
 deem them. As conditions improved ant
 l confidence was being more firmly estab. lished, so also these certificates were be- ing redeemed until at last on December | it was possible to proclaim to the world that so far as the New York clearing house association is concerned. confidence
 has been restored and what are substan- | tially normal conditions in the money market and in the nations financial sit uation are re-established. How great the resources of the bankseo of New York city | are is demonstrated by the fact that in l the aggregate they placed in the control
 of the clearing house committee $460, 900. l 000 of securities. which so far as the clearing house is concerned, were con. verted into liquid funds aggregatine | nearly $125, ,O00000.