The Washington herald., 1917-07-17

that they may be ready to take up
the work of selling the new bonds
after the secretary has made the
offer. But the chairmen Of all the
organizations and the men of influ-
ence as bankers who are persuaded
that the new loan can be fioated even
more easily than the first are, above
all anxious that the secretary shall
make his offering in such manner
that there will be good understanding
OF all the details.
Although not yet has there been
final analysis of the statistics which
tell the story of the floating OF the
liberty loan yet 1t is the opinion COM
monty held in this city that the over
subscription of a billion dollars re-
fleets in great measure the heavy
subscriptions made by the banks of
the United States. These subscrip-
tions were thus written because the
managers Of the banks of the country
were anxious to feel assured that the
liberty loan would be fully subscrib-
ed and therefore were not taking any
chances that the popular subscription
would be sufficient.
But IL there be careful. thoroughly
systematic preparation for the nation
wide campaign for selling the new
bonds it will presumably not be neces-
sary for the banks so heavily to SUBJ
scribe as they did when the liberty
loan was on the market. The secre-
tary presumably has received various
suggestions. especially from the man.
ayers of the Federal Reserve Banks
in the United States, which refer to
preparations for floating the new loan.
One of the suggestions relates to the
best method of advertising the new
loan. In some respects the advertis-
ing of the liberty loan by those who
were in charge of the advertising and
publicity department was of little
value to the men who were carrying
on campaigns of education. This was
especially true of many districts in
the West. Frequently the material
prepared in Washington came too late
to be of any service and it seemed
to be clear that those who did prepare
it did not possess accurate knowledge
of particular conditions as those ex-
listed in various reserve districts.
Necessarily the advertising material
was not fully adopted to the purpose
and it is now known that a con-
siderable amount of it was discarded
as useless.
No doubt the manager of all the
Federal Reserve Banks are persuad-
ed that with adequate advertising and
publicity carried on upon a national
scale the people as a whole will be
of good understanding respecting the
meaning which lies behind the second
loan Offering and will be the more
ready to subscribe to that loan. 1t
has been suggested that Secretary Nc
Adoo call to his support the very
expert and experienced men who in
cooperation make up the national
advertising advisory board.
This body includes the advertising
men of the United States. and it is
said to be represented by the best ad-
vertisinS ability in the country.
Therefore, it is suggested that Sec
retlry McAdoo turn over the entire
Work of promotion, advertising and
publicity to this body. and having
done that, direct the body to nomi-
nate a committee of five members
who will sit in Washington during
the period of the new loan without
compensation, except, of course, their
actual expenses, and who under Sec
retary McAdoo will take personal
charge of this entire work. The
suggestion is that to one member of
this committee should be assigned
all matters relating to display adj
vertising. He should make arrange
ments for a campaign in the daily
newspapers CT the United States
and various periodicals that are ma
tionally distributed. He should act
in an advisory capacity with the
local organizations Of the twelve
Federal reserve districts. A second
member of the committee should take
charge, in cooperation with commit
tees in the twelve districts. of posters
and similar material. A third mem
ber should cooperate with the twelve
bond-selling organizations so that
circulars and pamphlets of explana-
tory nature available for the use of
the solicitor when he approaches an
individual to whom he hopes to sell
bonds.
A fourth member should be assigri-
ed by the secretary to act in an
| advisory capacity so that he may
assist the reserve district bond SELL
| ing organizations in standardizing
their newspaper display advertising
and help them prepare copy Of the
right kind The newspapers In the
J next campaign will necessarily be ex-
tensively employed and the best
opinion is that they should be prop
erly recompensed for this service. In
the liberty loan campaign the news
papers contributed, without cost, con-
siderably in excess of one million dol
lars worth Of space. Probably all the
Federal reserve bank managers, Ger
tainly some of them, are of the opin-
ion that plan along this line should
be adopted at once. although it will
entail the services of men of the best
ability. For the experience gained in
many parts of the country when
various committees and organizations
were trying to sell liberty bonds to
1.-THE people made it clear that one of
the great obstacles to the early popu-