Evening star., 1933-10-21
Freeing a Billion Dollars.

Freeing a Billion Dollars.
Farm prices will have their ups and
downs until adjusted to the new level
Of recovery-and even after that-but
the surest way of raising them and
maintaining them is to increase and to
maintain the purchasing power of those
who consume farm products. And the
most Immediately effective way of add
ing to the purchasing power of all the
people now is being taken by the ad-
ministration in fastening the liquida-
ton, under relatively lenient conditions,
Of the assets of the hundreds of closed
banks, scattered in every State of the
Union, and in freeing for the use Of
the people the hundreds of millions Of
dollars in frozen deposits.
The demand from the farm belt is to
put the money in the pockets of the
people, SO that they may buy what the
farmer must sell. The money, it is
charged-and without reasons being
poured in at the top of our commercial
structure" instead Of the bottom. 4"
There are many ways in which it may
be demonstrated that this is not true.
No other nation ever attempt on such a
large scale the direct transfer of dollars
TO those most in need of them as this
Nation is attempting it today. But none
OF the expedients on trial now or urged
for trial will place so many dollars so
quickly and SO directly in the hands of
people anxious to spend them as will
the freeing OF the thousand or more
million dollars now tied up in closed
tanks-where they have been tied up
for more than seven months. This
money, once it is freed, will be spent.
Men will again know where they stand.
Once more they may plan for the fu-
ture and end the paralyzing uncertainty
which has held them bound since the
moratorium.
The effect of making available a bill
lion dollars or SO to those who rightly
own them may be considered in rela-
ton to the wild proposals for imitation,
through direct debasement of currency,
now emanating with renewed force
from the misled advisers of the stricken
farmers. The money represented in frozen
deposits of sound banks will, when re-
leased by liquidation of assets, md Is
way directly into the normal and ortho-
dox channels Of trade and commerce.
It's expenditure will serve to aid In the
creation and renewal Of the confidence
necessary for recovery. On the other
hand, If there were truth-and there Is
not-in the assertion Of the inf1ationists
that the vast expenditures for various
forms of emergency relief today are
not reaching "the people" they should
doubly fear the effects Of an effort to
reach those people by imitation Of the
currency. Short of the plan recently
proposed, facetiously, by the Governor
Of Georgia, whereby sirplanes would fly
over the country plastering the land
seape with twenty-dollar bills, there is
no practical or possible distribution Of
money outside the channels of trade
and commerce. And in the case Of cur
rency imitation the distribution Of
money gains nothing, while the .pur-
chasing power Of the money spent de-
creases out of all proportion to the price
Of goods for which it Is exchanged.
The workingman and those whom CAL
win Coolidge liked to call "the ordinary
run of people" are the tragic victims Of
currency debasement.
The effectiveness of money in hast
ening the recovery depends upon its
use as credit and upon the velocity"
with which it changes hands In the
markets. Utilized as credit, money Is
represented in the creation of work,
and upon the availability of work de-
pends the distribution of dollars. The
billion or so dollars to be available
with the release of frozen bank de-
posits, unfettered from the fear which
sent them into hiding before the mora
torium, will double and redouble them
selves in the form of credit, adding
their force to the other efforts OF the
administration to make credit available
for work-creating projects.
The millions of Americans whose
money Is tied up in closed banks will
spend it on their accumulated needs
once 1t becomes available. In amount
1t is almost three times the sum to be
distributed to the cotton farmers Tor
blowing under their crops. 1t Is more
than four times the money being spent
for and distributed through the Civilian
Conservation Camps. It is more than
fifteen times the estimated gain IN
weekly industrial pay rolls since March
(se4, 900 ,ooo). It will practically equal
the amount made available for Federal
projects from the Public Works Admin
istration. The release Of this money
win hasten, not retard or destroy, as
would imitation, the extension OF credit
The dollars will md their way into
practically every community. The re-
lease of frozen deposits in closed banks
eoupled with the assurance that hence
forth deposits win be safe. Is the prac-
teal way to put money In the hands Of
those who need it and who Will speno H.
-SR3O-S------