The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1932-08-15
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MOREOVER, wish ttat tnere
WI might be wider public recog-
milton of the limitations of that
barometer which is called Wall
Street. I have heard men speak as
if every problem of poverty were
near solution merely because Steel
has climbed from 20 up to 40.
It is we'll to remember that even
If it climbed to forty times 49, there
would still would be millions with
out shoes or shelter.
The benefits of bull market tend
in the long run to trickle down to
the submerged. But, since so many
eat and sleep and have their being
in short runs, I am not willing to
accept the recent activities on the
upside as sufficient reason for dane
ing in the streets and general 1ubi-
lation
There probably are some excellent
reasons to be advanced against the
instinct for gambling, but I am
hardly the man to make them. And
yet it seems to me that we live in
a community which permits topsy-
turvy ethics in the whole matter.
If a citizen of New York has
strong bunch that Gusto is better
horse than Top Flight he will not
be completely frustrated in his de-
sire to back his inclination. But
he must find a bookmaker who
knows him and whisper Surrepti-
tiously into that geptleman's ear.
The law, as it stands, holds that
the transaction is illegal and anti
social. But the same man may bet
as much, as openly and as often
as he pleases upon the printing po-
tentialities of copper, cotton, oil or
wheat Even at the height of the
last gambling orgy in which we all
took part, lotteries, roulette and
poker remained beyond the pale.
Mr.. Calvin Coolidge consented to
stand outside the Casino and make
a public proclamation that brokers'
loans were not too high And on
that same day have no doubt that
in various parts of the country men
were arrested because they shilled
for three-card monte.
To be sure, in three-card monte
the player has no chance at all.
Still, in the Wall Street scramble. I
imagine, very few who started with
a shoestring ended with as much as
either tasSel
Bets Upon the VitaIitieS
7 HAVE notion that in the long
a run it is actually more moral
and less anti-social to have gam
bling confined to such things as
cards and lottery tickets and a
small revolving ball than to take
out normal instinct in bets on
grains and metals and foodstuffs
by which the nation lives
1 do not mean to be sanctimoni-
Gus In the matter. Once upon a
time I owned ten shares of Gold
Dust.
Nor is it my notion now that the
recent rise in securities has been
entirely artificial. Some have said
that the whole thing constituted a
Republican plot designed to rc-elect
Mr.. Hoover
have less faith than that in the
capacity OF the President. 1 doubt
that he can move markets. At least.
I do not think that he can put
them up. If this lay within his
power, ne would have done it long
ago.
Again, I do not see eye to eve
with those economists who argue
that no rise is justified until earn
ings have improved. Wall Street is
not barometer Of tomorrow or the
next day, but of six months hence.
Usually its predictions are more
accurate than that Of any single
individual
And right now it seems to me that
there is evidence that this COM
posite intelligence called Wall Street
has decided that things are going
to be better by 1888.