The Washington herald., 1914-06-29

with pending legislation, would be thaa
through the neglect by business men ot
their duty In helping create q well in.
formed public opinion. the reaction I an
ticipate-might be delayed.
have tried to give some hint Of how
important I believe It is that business
men at the present time should take 8
wider interestiin politicaItanairs. have
no serious criticism Of Congress Ny
criticism goes back Of that to the con-
stituency-back to a public opinion which
believe is not wen informed, which
does not fully grasp the force Of great
economic principles that are more potent
than any laws that Congress can enact
You have your full share Of blame II
public opinion is I'll informed. As a
class, you have been silent in the face
OF calumny. Gross misstatements in re-
] gard to business methods and aims OF
business men have gained credit by be-
ing confidently repeated and rarely or
never answered. An important part of
the public holds resentment against busi-
| ness men because Of the accumulat ton
of the charges OF misconduct that have
been made and gone unanswered; be-
cause OF the distorted pictures of your
aims and methods which have gone un-
| challenged.
1t seems to me time II business men
! are men OF honor that they stand up
and fight for their honor. You do not
need to be told that in large part the
motive back of the drudgery of business
life Is a motive. not OF gain. but OF
accomplishment, an idealism as pure ana
clear as any statesman can boast of;
but the general public does not know
that and will not believe II, while men
bend cravenly to their tasks and never
look up to answer detraction. misrepre-
sentation and slander.
For the comparatively rare examples
Of greed. of blindness to social obliga-
TONS of unfairness. and even Of dis
honesty we have all been made to suffer
because In the main we have silently
submitted to generalizations drawn from
these comparatively rare examples
Now. II is useless to complain about
a condition. unless one can suggest q
remedy. Fortunately. It seems to me,
the remedy lies directly in our own
hands.
I have tried to indicate how important
it is to the future Of business that we
now have a background of sound and
well-informed public opinion against
which the new legislation which we need
and are certainly going TO have may
stand out and be tested.
Must Have sound background.
I can-hardly overemphasize how i'm
portant I believe that is to the bust
hess in which every one of you is en-
gagged. With this in mind, you will not
be surprised If I tell you that believe
the time has come when we should see
made the most gigantic contributions that
were ever made by business men to a
political campaign. do not care TO
which party the contributions are made.
for the contributions that must be made,
If you are to do anything that is ef-
fective. will not be contributions of
money-they will be contributions OF
service; contributions OF experience, of
understanding, Of truth: contributions in |
the way of an effective demand that the |
men whom you select as your represent |
atives in the way of watchfulness that |
shall insure both honesty and inteIli- |
gence in the exercise OF representative |
obligations.
Now, all that is very well as a gen.
eralization: but We need something more |
specific, and I believe you have In the |
nature Of this gathering the germ Of |
specific action.
Let me make one more historic refer |
ence. and this time go back of the date |
of the foundation OF the nation. and to |
those days when a public opinion was