Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-08-12
WARSH|P WASTE
SCORED BY HURLEY
Former Shipping Board Head
Says $500, 1000, 900 Could
Have Been Saved.
BY THOMAS II. HENRY,
STAR CORRESPONDENT Of The Star.


Stan Correspondent OF The Star.
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA, Au-
gust lathe Government wartime
shipbuilding would have cost at least
$500 100000 less II 1t had been con-
Quoted as a private enterprise, but with
the same men in executive positions
and on the pay roll, Edward N. Hurley.
war chairman of the Shipping Board,
tO1- The Institute Of Public Affairs here
today.
Mr.. Hurley was in charge Of the
work for which there was an appropria-
ton of $4,000, 000, 600 and which in 1918
was employing nearly 100000 men.
Mr.. Hurley spoke on the relations be-
tween Government and business.
Quoting q report Of congressional
investigation that the work of the board
achievement in shipbuilding that the
world has ever SEEN" Mr.. Hurley said
that the lack of incentive afforded by
the investment of private capital was
largely compensated for by wartime
patriotism.
Desire to Win War.
EVERY man engaged" he said twas
animated by an overwhelming desire
to win the war. But the fact was in
escapable that nobody was risking his
own money directly and it certainly
had q powerful, II Subconscious, in
fiuence, which tended toward waste.
Nearly every department OF that
gigantic enterprise showed the lack OF
a compelling incentive to keep expense
down to the minimum"
The relations Of government and
business, Mr.. Hurley said. are under
going a process of evolution. largely
through the enormous increase in the
number of stockholders in corpora
lions. which promises q satisfactory
adjustment. GAS the number of stock
holders" he said, approaches the
number of voters In an election, It Is
inevitable that new modes OF political
thought and new forms OF polltlcal
and social control are developing:
There are around 100000 owners OF
United States. This diffusion Of
ownership is not only bringing about
new conditions in politics, but also is
resulting in a new form of direct pop
ular control of corporation manage
ment. The live corporation xeecu-
tive today cultivates his stockholders
as asSiduouSly as an editor considers
his readers or Congressman hatters
his constituents. A president OF one
Oh the 1dESSSt uIl1Iy CULIlPsalliCS IA cAAe
United States, which has assets run
ming into billions, has all the stock
holders letters go over his desk. so he
can keep his hand on the pulse of their
opinions. The stakeholder frequently
registers his opinion of corporate pol
icies by q switch in his investments.
Growing Factor.
"Here we have a powerful factor In
the popular control Of business which
has grown up independent Of the ef-
forts Of statesmen or reformers, and
the same instrumentality will evolve
into q political mechanism. The con-
structive relationship between the
stockholders and management Is proof
that the masses Of the country are be-
coming the real governors, not merely
the nominal or absentee owners, OF
these institutions. It Is easy to fore
tell what the political effect of this is
going to be. It will no longer be pos
sible for the mere political adventurer
to attack the business enterprise OF
the country with impunity, as was
possible in the days when people did
not realize that at bottom their own
prosperity and that OF the corporations
OF the country were 1nterdependent."
There is no national interest Of the
United States to be served by increas-
ing the sugar tariff, Henry Kittredge
Norton, author and expert on Caribbean
problems, told the round table of Latin
American affairs this morning. The only
apparent result such an increase, he
said, would be to ruin large number Of
Cuban producers, including many Amer
leans with investments in plantations
there, end to create few more Porto
Rican, Hawaiian and Filipino producers,
without beneflting the beet sugar raisers.
The detached, single family house
should be the American ideal and as
cessible to all American families, Miss
Julia D. Conner, assistant director Of
Better Homes in America, told the coun-
try life section of the institute today.
Admitting that apartment houses and
for years to come, Miss Conner ex-
pressed the hope that the trend would
be away from them and quoted PreSi-
dent Hoover's ideal of "23, 000, 900 fam
lilies living in 100000 houses"
Victim Of Drudgery.
1.-THE mother, who must be both home
maker and housekeeper," Miss Conner
said, cannot be expected to give much
time or thought to the social and moral
life Of her family If she Is victim to
that needless drudgery which character
ICES SO many homes Of the Nation.
Many homes have been wrecked because
OF unClQlneSS, WORN nerves ana loss OF
comeliness incident to the drudgery Of
keeping house without proper facilities j."
There is no growing disrespect for
law in the United States, but only q
misconception by Government Of the
nature of law, w. w. Coke, retiring
president Of the Virginia Bar Associa-
ton. told the institute. There is, he
said, great immovable fundamental,
reaching back to the infancy Of time,
that the laws Of conduct or of private
relations between men. cannot either
by statute or the courts be made or
repealed, but are self-existent or spon-
taneouS and non-repealable, and that
when government invades with legis-
lation the domain of private, as dis
tinguished by from public or political
law, 1T can by enactment declare, sup
plement and reinforce what is already
the law, but 1t cannot create law. Gem
orally speaking. to the extent that. leg
islatureS undertake to originate law az
fecting private conduct, they not only
subvert the purpose Of government,
but create concurrently Herewith dis
regard for the very thing they under
take to create"
True law, Mr.. Coke said, is obeyed
instinctively, as natural reaction, but
when legislation attempts to ''subvert
1t by statute, havoc Is wrought and
maladjustment, called disrespect for
law, is let loose in the land"