Decorah public opinion. (Decorah, Winneshiek County [Iowa]) 1895-1928, 1919-02-26
Finish the Job" Should Be the
Slogan of Victory Liberty Loan
Leaders of Seventh District.
SOLDIERS STICK TO POSTS
Chairmen and Their Aids Must Not
Quit Until All the Governments
War Obligations Have
Been Discharged.

ers in the Seventh Federal Reserve
district are signing up for the fifth
big loan. They are actuated by the
same sense of duty, it is reported, as
fills the breasts of the soldiers now
held in France. The soldiers over
there long for home; but they realize
that their work is not done. Garrisons
must be held along the Rhine until
peace has been formally signed and
the terms Of the peace treaty have
, been carried out.
In the same way it is generally rec
ognized by chairmen and other work
ers throughout the Seventh Federal
Reserve district, the men who are re-
SpOnsible for the financial part of the
war, cannot quit until the financial OBJ
LEGATIONS are discharged. The big bills
for any undertaking come in immedi-
ately after the completion of that
work. 1t would be an irresponsible
business man, it is conceded on
all hands, who would refuse RESPONSE
bility for that part of his contractors
bills that came in after the driving
of the last nail. ...
The Fourth Liberty Loan paid off
the then outstanding treasury certifi-
Gates of indebtedness and furnished
enough new money to carry the gov
ernment until mid-December. Since
that date the treasury department has
been borrowing from the banks at the
rate of $300,000,000 a week, and by
the time the Victory Loan is offered
will owe nearly six billion dollars. The
Fifth loan money will pay off these
bank loans and carry the government
until the money raised under the 1913
revenue act begins to come in.
The sudden termination of the war
brought an increase in the day to day
military expenditures. The total for
December passed, for the first time,
the two billion mark. The January
total was slightly less, but exceeded
any other month except January. Feb
ruary promises to show a consider
liable decrease. The high daily out
lays since the end Of fighting have
been due to the liquidation of the war
machine, and were unavoidable. There
lis still great mass of contract Obli-
cations to be cleared away-contracts
tentered into by business men for the
rush production of munitions that
would have been absolutely essential
had the war gone on for few weeks
or months longer.
Chairmen and workers who happen
ITO hear of anyone who is declining to
participate in the next loan have ready
to their hands a set of the best pos
sible arguments against this sort of
conduct.
In the first place the man who re-
fuses to work in the next loan or to
buy bonds Of the next issue can be
charged with being a gutter or a cow
ard. Neither is an especially Ameri-
can attribute. AS a nation Americans
have the reputation Of seeing thing
through. And the fields of France
proclaim that they are not towards.
But the infrequent loan worker who
Is saying that he cannot find time
to participate in the Victory drive, or
does not feel any obligation to do so
may be charged with cOwardice. 1t is
generally recognized where such an
attitude is encountered that the man
fears the fifth loan will not be a sue
cess. The man who is preparing to
quit now, it is pointed out, is doing so
because he does not want to be iden-
titled with a failure. The answer to
this is that none of the 5000 marines
who stopped the victorious German
march on Paris at Chateau Thierry
asked to be excused from going into
the fight because he expected it to
be failure. Yet all the foreign mill
tary men thought that the Americans
could not stop the Germans ut this
point.
Another argument answers a good
deal of half-hearted comment which
maintains that it makes no difference
whether the banks have to take the
loan. But the business man or the
wage Garner who thinks that Ii makes
no difference to him is decidedly mis-
taken. If the public does not take the
bonds the banks, as everyone knows,
must do so. Now on December 81
the national banks of the country had
resources of S20,042, 224,000. This was
the first time in the nations history
that the total ever got above the
twenty-billiOn mark.
This enormous banking power shows,
for one thing, that the nation can
take another six billion loan with
ease if the. organization gets out and
works. But 1t also shows something
else. The twenty billion, of course, is
greatly more than the total that is ac-
tually available for credit operations
If the banks should have to take the
greater part of the next loan, and to
add this burden to the more than two
billion now tied up I'm Liberty loans
and the additional treasury certificates