Evening star., 1932-10-02
Secretary Of Labor Also
Supports Five-Day Week
in Address.
PRAISES CREDIT POLICY
FIXED BY Government
Tells Bankers of Methods Used to
Hasten Recovery in the
Business World.

Opposing cutting OF wages, support
ing the five-Gay week, lauding the
extension of credit, and praising meas
ures taken by the Government aimed
| at restoring prosperity, Secretary OF
Labor w. N. Doak aroused marked
enthusiasm among the delegates to the
Morris Plan Bankers Association at
their closing session at the Shoreham
Hotel last night.
mo economic system can survive,
! Secretary Doak declared, which will
| not support standard of living COM
| mensurate with the social enlighten-
ment of its day. Rather, it is our job
to weed out of our system those col
lossal wastes involved in mere money
| making without return of goods or
services. We must eliminate the usurer
whether he be fund in high or low
places. We must bail the water out Of
| soaked and sinking capital structures.
We must call waste by Its right name
wherever 1t Is found-and cast 1t over
board.
by such vigorous action alone can
we fully restore and stabilize employ
ment And I hold the minimum inter-
probation of the American principle of
equal opportunity is the right to a Job.
II that involves the five-day week, I
say let us face the question courage
ously. We must readjust ourselves to
current realities When we fail to do
SO, economic and social facts have an
inconvenient way of rising up and
ment of Labor operates upon five
day week.
Calls Government Move Necessary.
"As bankers, I know that you are all
cognizant of the degree to which the
Federal Government has found 1t
necessary this year to enter the field
of private banking. Through the Re
construction Finance Corporation. and
its allied agencies, and the Home Loan
Bank System, billions of credit are
being pumped into the financial organ
ism of the country. This TRANSMISSION
of credit necessarily must proceed
through the main financial arteries. 1t
has taken time for its effects TO reach
the capillaries.
There are those impatient souls who
contend that we should have reversed
the process and given skin injections,
but by SO doing We should have never
reached the vital points in the finan-
cial structure. We should not have
realized the stimulating effects which
are already apparent.
This emergency supply Of credit
should not, however, be viewed In false
perspective. 1t is stimulant. 1t IS
an emergency relief measure. 1t Is IN
fact debit against the future. 1t IS
not in any sense substitute for that
normal income which flows from pro-
duction and consumption. Only as 1t
may serve to restore national income
will 1t have served its Purpose.
Government credit extension pro-
ceeds on the theory that it is justifi-
able and necessary to spread the evil
effects Of a public calamity-to place
some Of the burden on the future. The
Government as an institution has no
measurable life 1t can choose its own
settlement dates.
But In private banking, sound credit
principles impose vastly more rigid
limitations. I hold with the founders
Of the Morris Plan system that pri-
vate credits should be keyed upon
earning capacity, and that they should
period consistent with the reasonable
convenience of the borrower.
Other Factors in Recovery.
I'VE should realize that the speed of
our recovery will depend upon the eX-
tent to which we have effected funda-
mental business correctives. Among
these none is more important than a
statesmanlike control of our national
credit-a control which will prevent an
early repetition of that inflationary
prosperity which we have now all
learned to call by its right name.
1T appears to me that we should
have convinced ourselves that low bad
oh 70 htyc
health, or they may mean unjustifi-
ably high collection costs. We ought to
have learned that credit delinquency,
measured by yardsticks designed to
conceal business facts, does not have
anything to commend it.
1.-THE use of credit instead Of sales
manship or advertising. the high-pres-
sure extension of credit, the imposi-
ton Of credit costs on cash customers
in merchandising, and similar unsound
practices of the boom period ought now
to have been relegated permanently to
the business scrap heap, Secretary Doak
asserted.
II do maintain, however, that with
all our difficulties we have retreated
less under the crushing weight of this
depression than any other people upon
the globe. I do say that we have sur
rendered less of principle, we have re-
sisted more the pressure against our
material and spiritual standards than
any nation on earth.
And I would be remiss if did not i
add that for conserving these more
vital assets we owe debt of lasting
gratitude to the President of the United
States" Secretary Doak concluded.
Morris Plan Banks Lauded.
In his introduction, the Labor Secre-
tary noted the fact that not a single
Morris Plan Bank failed during the de-
preston. He pointed out that reduced
earning power means reduced borrowing |
power and reminded his hearers that
the first move of the Government to |
meet the exigencies of the business |
slump was directed at maintaining |
wages.
j. Rodney Ball, president of the as
sociation, presided and Thomas Cough |
lin was toastmaster. After Secretary !
Doak had discussed the workingman |
and his financial problems, the toast
master introduced Strickland Gillian, |
who discussed "The Other Side of |
Banking" the humorist being at his
best.
Greetings from Arthur Morris, founder
Of the banking system, and several other
features concluded the dinner program.
Yn oro, eo1 mn nm