The Semi-weekly Madison County Democrat. (London, Ohio) 1923-19??, 1932-08-02
Call Railroad Investors To Action

A call for the arrangements of life
insurance companies, savings banks
and other institutions that own large
amounts of railway securities to tell
their depositors, holders of their pol
icies and other persons to whom they
have fiduciary relationship, the truth
about the present railway situation
and the reasons for it, is made by the
RAILWAY AGE in an editorial in its
current issue.
"The large institutional investors
must come out of their bomb-proof
cellars" declares the Railway Age,
aand, cooperating closely with each
other, assume the leadership Of the
forces at their command" if they are
to give the protection that they should
give to the many millions of persons
who have entrusted to them the bill
lions of dollars that these institutions
have invested in railroad securities.
"There are three broad groups
which join in providing railway trans
portation = managements, the en-
ployees and the investors. What has
been the reaction of these three
groups to the present acute depres-
sion in the industry?
Arrangements have been burning
the midnight oil ever since it began,
finding ways to reduce expenses,
studying competitive problems and en-
deavoring to promote public under
standing of the railway problem They
have not always acted as wisely,
promptly, and courageously, or coop
Grated as closely, as they should have,
but none can deny that they have
worked hard and earnestly.
$50 it is with the employees asso-
Citations in defense of the industry
which have been organized in many
states in recent months. Their mem
bers are working late in the night,
without pay, digging deep into their
own slender purses to pay for postage
and printing. If everyone with a
stake in the railway industry were de-
voting the unselfish energy to the
cause that many members of the en-
ployees' organizations are, the indus
try's difficulties would be much nearer
solution.
'How about the investors? ? Are they
undertaking their share Of the task
of defending the industry? They are
mot.
"The number Of individual investors
in railroad securities is about two mil
lion, but this does not by any means
reflect the effective strength of rail
way investors. A comparative small
number of large holders are not in
yestors of their own money, but other
peoples. They are the savings banks,
the insurance companies, the trustees
| of educational and charitable institu-
! tions, whose clients and benefciaries
number, probably, at least three
| fourths of the American people. Most
/ of these people do not even know that
/ they are investors in railways, nor
that they stand to lose heavily if the
railways future should be what their
enemies desire. These are the SOM
nolent investors who, with the general
taxpaying public must be awakened
into action by the active investors, the
employees and the arrangements, if
the solution of the railway problem is
to be advanced as it should be.
1T would take courage for large in
vestment institutions to send letters
broadcast telling the whole truth. but
is it not risk which must be taken
We have tried for a long time to find
our way out Of the woods by blinking
the facts. The time has come to tell