The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1931-11-06
Cherry
" Where with s1r
We tell the truth
about many things. Sometimes pre-
foundly, sometimes Aippantly.
sometimes recklessly.

A good many years ago Edward
Bellamy, in Looking Backward"
compared 'the scientific manner in
which the nation went to war with
the unscientific manner in which it
went to work" He drew quite les
son therefrom.
Of course any discussion of how the
nation goes to work today would have
to concede, to begin with, that good
part of it doesn't go to work at all.
Some are so confounded rich they
don't have to work; several millions
are in need of work, but nobody of
fers them a job.
Into this situation the president has
launched what is called a National
Credit Corporation. Discussion of
that step brings out some figures so
big they battle the Imagination.
Big bankers are asked to kick in
five hundred million dollars to fund
for the new corporation for the pur-
pose of releasing frozen assets. A
frozen asset is one that nobody
wants, it seems. 1t won't move and
ordinary banks won't look at it.
Some estimates of the. total frozen
assets run as high as four BILLION
dollars, of which one and a half Bill
LIONS are in closed banks, an equal
amount in defaulted real estate bonds
and whole BILLION in old socks,
under mattresses and in safety de-
posit boxes in actual cash.
How come all those frozen assets
1t would seem time to get out SUBJ
poena for those who froze the assets
Anything that calls for such dras-
tic action is important enough to pin
on those who did it.
WHO FROZE THE ASSETS?
Well, in general way, ladies and
gentlemen, it was done by bankers,
manufacturers, real estate promoters
by and large the employers and
financiers Of the nation.
They are the persons who froze the
assets that must be thawed now by
five hundred million dollar credit cor
poration, out of which the bankers
will, later on, make another neat
profit.
Having froze more assets than were
conquered by all the campaigns of
Alexander, nobody much starts out to
heap any opprobium on the heads of
the gents that did the freezing. No
body gets hot and bothered and goes
shouting that an asset freezer is
dirty bum and louise. No, he re-
mains respectable member of So
ciety and sits up front, as usual. In
spite of the fact that he has put a
nation on the fritz.
1t is respectfully set forth here and
now that if it is crime-and it most
assuredly is-to swipe loaf of bread
or to break window, it ought to be
something of major offense to put
nation on the toboggan. Those who
through mismanagement or an over
dose of greed, pile up four billion
dollars of frozen assets that break
banks and throw thousands and thou
sands out of work ought to be called
something nasty and there ought to
be some fitting form of punishment
Having caused this jam, we find
just about the same group, the same
type and perhaps even the same indi-
viduals, coming with projects to in
fict the punishment upon the wage
earners
"Times are bad," they wall. "You
will have to take lower wages for
those that work"
If the world has even seen more
biting and bitter irony, more sad and
sinister sarcasm, let it be trotted
forth.
| It's a good deal like the big fellow
who says to the little fellow, "Get up,
| wanna sock you again!"
Observing, with Bellamy, that we
don't go to work organized, like we
go to war, we observe also that the
wage earners are fast learning that
the sooner they go to work organized
the sooner they will cease paying pen
alties for someone else's greed and
stllpidity