The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-02-09
Daily Flnancial Gossip
By HOLLAND

New York. February S.-(SpeciaL)-
 Should Mir. Harding make choice of An
 drew W. Mellon of Pittsburg for the
 portfolio of the treasury department,
 then in case MT. Mellon accepts the ap-
 pointment it will be the most conspicu-
 ous example of selection from the short
 list of those who have gained sue
 cesses as bankers For Mir Mellon has
 been all his life identified with bank
 ing, some of 1t upon very large scale.
 This, of course, has brought him into
 important and responsible relations With various industries and corpora
 tons. He will be the first Secretary
 of the Treasury not dependent more
 or less upon his salary, at least the first since President Lincoln's day. He
 may be millionaire up in the hun
 dreds or his possessions may be less
 than hundred million, but he is to be properly numbered among the multi millionaires He will have before him
 for solution partly by his own discre- tionary action and partly by the au- thorlzatlon given by Congress, of prob-
 lems the magnitude, delicacy and diff ficulty of which have not been sur
 passed excepting at the time Alexander
 Hamilton was Secretary of the Treas ury under Washington, and Salmon P CtfeN'7O 'oSb Ctdl Ol the treasury Tn the administration of President Lincoln
 Nevertheless, the part that MT. Mel lon IS a banker of long and great ex-
 perience does not fully justify the opin- lon that the selection of him for Sec retary of the Treasury is made in great measure upon the basis of that experi-
 ence and his justly recognized ability
 For 1t is fact that beginning with 1incoln's day, and perhaps before that .f.. treasury which have become additional were triumphs of secretaries who were not bankers.
 With the exception of Alexander
 Hamilton, the Wall street district has been summed by Presidents when select ing their Secretaries of the Treasury It Is accepted as practically an unwrit- ten law that the President should go
 elsewhere than the Wall street district Tn m making choice of Secretary of the Treasury Nevertheless, it has been
 observed that although none except Hamilton and for a short time General ralrchild went from the Wall street district to the treasury department
 many whose terms as Secretary of the
 Treasury were ended found immediately
 profitable and conspicuous employment in the Wall street district.
 PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S CHOICE rresldent Lincoln selected for Sec retary Of the Treasury United States senator salmon F. Chase of Ohio It is true that Senator Chase was for a brief time director in a small bank in Gin cinnatl, but that relation was due chief ly to his professional association as a | lawyer With the bank. It was Chase who recommended and secured the leg islatlon by which the United States government was able to finance the cost Of the Civil war. It was he who caused to be established the national banking system. He it was who per lected the plan for the issue of legal tenders commonly known as green packs or which one of his successors oohn sherman, years afterward said that expensive as this method was, it undoubtedly was of inconceivably great value in financing the needs of the government Yet, Secretary Chase was accustomed to say that he was not a banker and when he met bankers to