The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1932-03-11


have faith in anything They IS
propose to abandon all standards, seek EM
only the easiest course, and live merely S
for the present, on the theory that they
may as well eat, drink, and be merry, -
for tomorrow they die. MAs
1t cannot be denied that many people IS. SsM
have had an experience which at first 49,
thought seems to warrant such atti- EMNMs
tude They had profitable employment E@NM
on which they believed they could rely Es
for permanent income That has gone, v
and they unable to secure work. V
They had house which ultimately they M
expected would be their own and would MM
make a home for themselves and their WM
family. They have been unable to meet ~
the payments due on it and have seen it 49,
taken from them Others have found that ,x4ya
Investments on which they relied for pro- hxsESs
vision for their old age have turned out .SSsAas
TO be of much less value than had been -
supposed. Some have met with losses
through the failure of banks in which
they had money deposited.
1t is easy, in these circumstances, for the in
dividual to conclude that these disasters have
arisen through no fault of his own, that it must
be the fault of someone, and he is inclined to
blame something he loosely calls society. Some
times feeling of injustice results in threat
of defiance against constituted authority.
Among all these people, those who most
strongly appeal to our SympathieS, those who
seem most warranted in their discouragement,
are the ones who want work and cannot find it.
But even they should take the larger view Of
their situation 1t is no new experience for a
wage Garner to be without employment. Such
a condition has always been temporary. 1t will
be temporary now. Surely the country will go
back to work, back to production and consump-
ton. The condition of the wage Garner in Amer
lea has long been the despair of all the rest of
the world. Some hope should be derived from
what has been and some confidence entertained
that the same again shall be.
But new element has entered into the situa-
ton of the unemployed Heretofore few have
known anything about it, few have cared any
thing about it and nobody has done anything
about it. Now the whole nation is aroused.
There is scarcely hamlet in the land where
there is not an organization and active public
effort for the relief of the unemployed They
will be cared for in unprecedented way.
We have had tremendous spiritual awakening
concerning our duty to relieve human suffering.
1t is true some homes have been lost through
default of payments. That risk is always in
Cured when property is bought on credit. But
even in this field where one home has been lost,
an enormous number have been retained. Their
owners now find themselves securely and COM
fortably housed because they saved money and
bought when they had income instead Of
spending all their money on rents and expensive
living.
If all those who have bought homes in the
last twenty years could be assembled, it would
be found, in spite of some failures, that,
class, they were distinctly better off than their
neighbors.
The desire to build and home is one of
the primal human instincts. 1t is especially
strong in women Even the present age of hO-
tel apartments and flats is not likely to eradi-
cate strong natural longing But those who
have given up the effort in despair or disgust
certainly must live somewhere-if not in their
own house then in the house of someone else.
Their real position in the world is disclosed by
supposing that everyone else followed their ex-
ample The whole would be without shell
ter in about generation.
Those who have come to the conclusion that
they will do nothing to make themselves home
are injuring themselves most, but they are also
injuring the whole community.
Any such scheme of things as their actions
presuppOse could not be put into effect. Nature
and reason are both opposed to it.
When examine the complaints of those
who have lost through investments we find that
they fall into three classes: Some lost because
they plainly swindled. We enacting
and more laws and setting up more and
more regulations and safeguards to prevent a
recurrence of such abuses. The practice of swim
ding is very old, and larceny has never been
eradicated from any community where property
was abundant. But because someone does wrong
does not prove that we shall all abandon trying
to do right
Others have used poor judgment in invest
ments. Usually they have been tempted to take
large risks by the hope of making large gains.
Some did not make great profits, while many
more suffered heavy losses
Those who trust to chance must abide by the
results of chance. They have no legitimate
plant against anyone but themselves.
-
Still others, using all the Judgment possible
for human beings and guided by the best finan-
cial advice obtainable, have their invest
ments seriously impaired. But this simply
means what everyone should know; that even
when surrounded by all the safeguards and all
the integrity which it is possible to secure, the
ownership Of property involves a risk. No law,
no regulation, no government supervision no
skill in management, has ever been devised that
could protect invested property from temporary
fuctuation and occasional loss. These are the
hazards of our finite existence. Only omnsci-
ence can guard against them
But that does not excuse from making the
most of what we have and doing the best
While no one can tell with certainty what will
happen to any particular property or what the
market will do at any particular time the best
financial judgment expects that while further
losses may accrue sometime the general level
of good standard properties will rise, so that
some of the present losses will be reduced. Fu-
ture prices Mt which property will sell are al
way uncertain.