The Bridgeport times and evening farmer. (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1918-1924, 1918-11-08
PALMER TELLS
PLAN TO Make
llYtI FOE PAY
Would Use Funds From
Enemy Properties Sale to
Meet Damage Claims.
THANKS BANKS
FOR THEIR AID
Says Germany's Strange
Hold on Essential U. S. In
dustries is Broken.

unconditional surrender of Germany's
huge industrial and world trade or
ganization in the United States on
Tuesday night in a speech at the
Quarterly club dinner in the Metro
politan club.
Mr.. Palmer explained that he al
ready had in his custody between
500, 900, 900 and O,OO0 900 of German
owned concerns, and he said that this
amount soon would be swelled to ST.
900, 00O, O00 He thanked the banks and
bankers for the aid they already had
given the government in taking over
this property and called for more aid
in the direction Of financing punchas-
ers for these vast properties, many Of
which he said would be placed on the
auction block within 60 days.
He admitted the vast difficulty that
the government would have had in
handling the more than 10000 sep
arate trusts involved in the vast task
of taking over the German owned
concerns if the banks and trust COM
panies had not aided, and he made a
strong plea to the bankers to help
convert the Teutonic industries into
100 per cent. American institutions.
He explained it was the hope of the
administration to make the seized
German industries pay the damages
incurred by Americans through lille
gal methods Of German warfare from
the sequestered funds now in his
hands.
It earnestly hope" he said, that I
will be given the power to use this
money to pay the just claims Of Amer
lean citizens against the German gov
eminent due to its illegal warfare.
Why should Americans have to wait
for years for the payment Of these
claims when so much enemy money
is available to pay them at once?
Whatever accounting is ITO be made
when the war is over for enemy prop
erty taken here during the war" Mr..
Palmer continued, 80 far as that &C
u1untir j affects investment in Amer
lean industry, will he for the money
value thereof and not for the thing
itself. Without attempting to proph-
esy what may be done with the pro-
ceeds, for this must remain to be set
tied by the treaty of peace, it is safe
to say that the businesses that the
Germans built up in America will be
lost to them forever.
mo other course would be compat-
ible with the safety of American in
situations. No other course would
make the American field of industry
and commerce safe for democracy
for the German autocracy is quite as
apparent in it's economic exploitation
of the world as in its governmental
domination of central Europe.
mo greater favor could be shown
to Germany than by carefully man.
aging and conserving these enemy
properties against the time when, al
the end Of the war, upon accounting
for properties of any kind, the former
German owners could take up the in
vasion of American industry and COM
merce on the very salient which they
had erected before the war.
Demands Industrial Disarmament
Germany must be made to under
stand that her plan has failed in the
industrial field as we'll as in the mil
itary. Industrial disarmament must
come along with military disarma-
ment. Autocracy in industry mus
fall with the fall of the Hohenzollerr
dynasty. 1 have no doubt that Amer.
lea will be glad enough to compete in
the worlds markets with German pro.
duction when that production is no.
controlled and subsidized by an auto
cratic power for the purpose of ex
tending that power the world around
1.-THE cooperation and assistance Oh
over 500 banks and trust companies
Throughout this country and in it's in.
sular possessions have made possible
the quick and accurate handling o
nearly 100000, 900 OF property during
the first year Of the activities of the
Custodian. If It had not been fol
such cooperation it would have beer
necessary for the Custodian to main.
tain an enormous office, with a cler
ical force running into the thousand.
and storage vaults of great magni
tude.
There is greater need for co-opera
ton now. 1 want the bankers of thi
country to help me crush the strange
hold which Germany, through it,
bankers and agents, has had upo
most of the essential industries o.
this country. I want to Americana
every German owned industry in thi
country. I want to see every factory
every workshop and every manufac
turing plant that is enemy ownet
placed in the hands of 100 per cent
Americans for all time.
I'm the next few weeks we will sci
approximately 100000 worth o
enemy owned concerns in this countr,
at public auction. They include grea
woollen mills IN New Jersey, 1arg
drug, chemical and color companies
lace works, machinery plants and
magnetic company. More sales viii
follow. There will be no Ietup in tn
characterization of the German owne
concerns in this country.
Part of World Control Plan.
"IIong before the war the Germa,
government, through it's agents in thi
country, sought to control practicall
every important and essential indus
try. This was part of the plan to col
onize, subdue and control the WorIt
1t planted great industrial and com
mercial army on American soil, an
that army had beco@Ns so large an
so powerful that when the war brok
out in 1914 Germany believed it woul
be strong enough to keep America GU
of the war
Germany planted that army i
every State Of the Union, and its ten
tacles stretched out across the Pacifi
to Hawaii and the Philippines, in tn
Atlantic to Porto Rico and the Virgi
Islands, down to Panama and UP
Alaska, without any part of America
soil free from its touch.
This great German industrial o.
Canization exploited our great n
sources and husbanded them for i
own use and power. 1t kept seer
from America the processes and pa
ents which might some day be use
against it and built up industry afte