Evening star., 1915-11-16
EXPLAINS ATTITUDE
OF ADMINISTRATION
Carl Vrooman Says There Is No
Desire to Tie Up Legiti-
mate Business.

ST. LOUIS, November 16.-Carl Nroo-
man, assistant secretary of agriculture,
made an address this afternoon at
luncheon meeting of the City Club in
which he explained the attitude of the
present national administration toward
the business men of the country. He
said, in part:
I'VE are frequently asked. What is
the attitude of the Department of As-
riculture toward business? Some peo-
pie seem to think we are cunning for
the business man. that we are trying
to tie him up with useless restrictions
and regulations that throttle initia-
tive. This is very far from being the
case. The policy of the Department of
Agriculture is that of the entire Wilson
administration. That policy has been
and is primarily constructive, and only
secondarily critical, regulative and
punitive. At time has it been icon
oclastic or destructive.
In attempting to bring the practice
of the business world up to a higher
standard, it has in no case run
amuck.'
slightest vindictiveness or desire to
impose punishment for other than re-
1ormatory purposes. 1t has invoked
the principle of the ''indeterminate
tence" wherever possible 1t has done
everything in its power to reorganize
and to regenerate the business world,
and has done nothing to disorganize or
the surgeons knife as sparingly as
skilfully.
Praises Federal Banks.
The greatest single piece of legisla-
tion to the credit of the Wilson admin
fstration. or of any other administra
tion during the lifetime of any one
now living, was the law creating the
federal reserve banking system. This
measure visited no retribution upon
the heads of those who had piled up
immense fortunes by the unjustifiable,
though not actually Illegal. financial
methods so widely in vogue before the
Wilson regime. 1t put stop to these
unfair and unjust practices, not by
prohibitory enactments backed up by
the imposition of heavy legal penalties.
but by inauSuratlnS better system
for controlling the credit facilities of
the country. The result has been that
when the recent world war burst upon
US. even before the federal reserve sys-
tenn had gone into effect, the business
men of the country looked to the fu-
ture srlilingly and confidently, know
ing that under this new banking sys-
tenn no panic could seriously disturb
our finances long as crops We're
good and business was conducted along
sound and legitimate lines. .
For the past three years the Wilson
administration has been working day
and night trying to undo the mistakes
of the past and to put business. COM
merce and industry on a sound and
healthy basis, a basis that will give
justice to the worker and the consumer
as well as to capital and managerial
skill. Once we have settled our indus
trial and social problems at home.
broad and peaceful paths to power
stretch out before us in bewildering
and alluring profusion. This is one of
those historic crises in the life of our
nation when its moral fiber is to be
tested to the uttermost, when it has
but to measure up to a fair degree of
Intelligence and a reasonable moral al
titude in order to have placed in its
hands the scepter of the moral and
material leadership of the world"