The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1933-07-25

- N~%ANNAf~N% E'NAANf WV AANAANlOAl
with it an increased determination
TO manage and control.
While the fundamental cause of
the extremely unhealthy specula-
ton has been the indecision and
indetermination Of the administra-
ton monetary policy, an important
contributing cause was the excess
sive efficiency with which American
markets are organized to encourage
the deep speculative instinct of the
American people
Our love of speculation has its
roots deep in our history. A ma
ton that has expanded as we have
expanded upon the richest natural
resources in the world is naturally
and inevitably bullish. There is no
reason to be astonished that specu-
lation is easier TO incite in Amer
lea than anywhere else in the
world.
On the whole, speculation for a
rise always has seemed to Justify
itself.
DUT this instinct TO speculate has
- cost much in the past. In the
present. when the economic ma
chinery has become so intricate.
speculation is by WY Of becoming a
dangerous vice. That is the reason
it has become necessary to seek out
measures to restrain it.
1t is not easy to devise such
measures and even less easy to have
the courage to employ them. But the
main facts are perfectly clear.
1t is altogether too easy to buy
on the exchanges and much too
easy TO borrow in order TO buy.
The trading mechanism is so eff
ficient that, with the large public
participation in the markets, the
ordinary man scarcely realizes that
he has bought into a property when
he telephones his broker TO buy
some shares or that he has gone
into debt when his broker sets up
a margin account.
When to this you add the fact
that really understandable informa-
ton on which to base judgments of
value is not available to the ordinary
man. so that he really buys blind,
on tips. under pressure Of sales
men. on superstitious lunches. and
under the invisible influence of
pools. you arrive at a condition
where. to the large public. the stock
market is a gambling casino.
1t is no eXaggeration TO say that
the average small Spectator knows
less about his stocks than the man
who bets on horses OF a race track.
The horse he can at least see. but
his stocks are abstract symbols COM
municated TO him on the ticker.
IF all that happened on the eX-
Il changes were that the lambs
were shorn. one might say that
gamblers must take their losses. But
this form Of gambling which we in
dulge in is far more dangerous than
horse racing, or roulette, or poker,
or the national lotteries which are
common in other countries.
Our gambling is inextricably EN-
tangled with business and agricul-
ture, and whenever it becomes Sc
rious it endangers the whole sys-
TEN by which men earn their liv-
ing.
It is so thoroughly infectious that
when the fever is on banking and
business and political Judgment are
betrayed. as they we're on a grand
scale in l928-1929. on a smaller
scale in the last thirty days.
For it might as we'll be admitted
that the same fear of hurting busi-
ness which prevented the Coolidge
and Hoover administrations from
acting in time has in some con-
siderable measure prevented the
Roosevelt administration from TAX
ing control
TINE lesson of this crackup is
Il clear. The administration must
make up its mind 10 manage the
dollar.
All its other projects are impor-
tant, but unless there is firm. intel
ligent management Of money they
will be insecure and will in the END
be defeated.
Over and above the recovery
which natural forces here and
abroad have produced. the great
recent advance in the United States
has clearly been due TO monetary
influences.
These influences are the central
and dynamic part of the move
ments since April. and nothing else
is much worth doing unless these