Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1924-12-23

By DR.. Frank Crane

~HERE are certain kinds of business SO
public in their nature that the govern
ment is compelled to take them over.
Such the postoffice, the collection or
taxes and the education Of children, all of
which were once managed by private parties.
Little by little the conviction is forcing
itself upon the general mind that when any
business reaches certain point in natural
monopoly the state should attend to it,
The United States has had hundred years
of extreme competition and individualism; our
PEOPLE are. yet rather suspicious of the states
doing anything which might be done by
person
Gradually, however, we are growing nearer
the point where the idea of state operation
of street car lines, railways, and other COM
mon carriers seems not so revolutionary,
where the cry of city ownership Of water.
works, gas plants, electric power works is
not so loudly called socialism.
In other words we are slowly 'realizngn
democracy, and growing into the understand
ing that democracy is imperfect without
thorough organization of the people to attend
to their own affairs, a people; in other
words we are learning the depth and width
of the meaning Of "a government by the
people"
One thing we ought to be ready to do
right now, and that is to have in every large
city a municipal pawnshop.
There are always certain NUMBER OF per-
sons who have fallen in the scramble for sue
cess and are reduced to the necessity Of
pedging their watch or their dress suit their
books or their piano, to get money for bread
and butter
These people are too honest to steal and
too sef-respecting to beg. They ought to
have things made as easy for them as possi-
BILE. 1t is no more shameful to raise money
your furniture than it Is to raise money
railway bonds.
AS the custom now runs, those who are
forced to pawnshops are made the prey OF as
constituencies a set Of sharks, in many in
stances, as picked the bones Of the poor.
Over and over again the public press has re-
hearsed the story Of their spoliation; how
the unwary victims are made to pay the most
exorbitant rates of interest, only at last too
often to lose their principal
The remedy is plain and simple. Let the
city lend to its own poor. Establish a mu-
nicipal pawnshop, with branches throughout
the city, to lend money to those who need it
at reasonable profit upon the pledging of
their personal effects.
Is not this one little bit of decent helpful
ness any city might undertake without fear
Of graft or Laternaism or any such accuse.
ton?
BY our hitand-miss charity" by our va
rious benevolent organizations and mission
workers try to help the needy. Often by
these means it is the most unworthy that are
found. Those whom a little timely aid would
redeem and set again upon their feet are
hard to discover.
Why cannot the city, the great, common or
ganization of all the people, undertake to
stand at least to the extent of secured loan,
between the unfortunate and the claws OF
ruin?
The business of lending to the poor is too
vital, too near to heartbreak and suicide, to !
be ntrusted to any private concern. 1t is
too serious a matter for any hands except
those of the city itself.
On. crln+ i