The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1914-1938, 1935-03-21
(l(lJ|,jjti}d|Iq!@@Sljj
National Topics Interpreted "a f9Y5TFETi
by William Bruckart knEn3T
National Topics Interpreted
by William Bruckart

Was aington.-M ost observers
and thinking citizens have been in
clined TO take little stock in the
talks of Senator Long and Father
Cougnii the radio priest, concern
ing plans for redistribution of
wealth. The consensus has been
that their plans sooner or later
would fall of their own weight.
But it can be denied no longer that
Long and Coughlin have developed
a gigantic following Of people who
lack Information as to the fallacies
of the arguments, however, logical
they sound, that have been spread
by tnese politically smart showmen.
One reason that serious atten-
tion to their proposals is now nee
essary is that some of their argu-
ments are being advanced from
high places in the federal govern
ment. I refer specifically to the
testimony before the house COM
nittee on banking and currency by
Mariner S. Eccles, governor of
the Federal Reserve board and as
such the titular head of the ma
tons banking system. Mr.. Eccles
did not quite take a leaf out of
Huey Longs book. He approached
the position of the Louisiana sena-
tor, however, when he proposed a
redistribution of income, whereas
Senator ding has urged a redis-
tribution of wealth.
Mr.. Eccles suggested in his tes-
timony in effect that it would be
all right for man with say ten
million dollars in capital to keep
that sum, provided his income was
redistributed. Mr.. Eccles went back
to the days Immediately following
his argument and showed that at
the top of the postwar boom zone
tenth of one percent of the families
ct the top of the income received
as much as AZ percent of the fam
lies at the bottom of the list" Fur
thermore, he said that the single
average family in the big income
class got as much as four hundred
families at the bottom of the in
come list.
"This one-tenth of 1 percent was
unable to use all the income in con-
tumption," he continued. "They
therefore had to find an outlet in
the investment field. As result,
the capacity to produce increased
out of all proportion to the capac-
ity to consume"
So Mr.. Eccles took the position
that solution of the depression
was redistribution of this income
with the idea that it would increase
purchasing power in the lower
brackets. The governor offered no
explanation of how those in the
lower income class were going to
obtain possession of the redissrib-
uted income of the rich because his
argument stopped at the point
where the government would take
money by taxation.
That is the recognized weakness
of the programs advanced by Sena-
tor Long and Father Coughlin, and
Governor Eccles showed no ability
to solve the problem.
Proposes Central Bank
On top of the outbursts by Long
and Coughlin and the serious test
imony by Governor Eccles comes
Senator Nye, the North Dakota
Progressive, with a bill in the sem
ate to create a central bank. Sena-
tor Nye's action has caused many
humorous expressions. Here we
have a senator who has fostered,
even boosted about, progressive
ideas and has called himself lib
eral. 1t is necessary only to re-
call that the father of the central
bank idea was the ultra-conserva-
tive Alexander Hamilton, the first
secretary of the treasury.
Senator Nye advances bill with
the thought that the central bank
would avoid hamstringing of cred
it. think financial experts all
agree that this is true. The thing
which Senator Nye overlooked,
however, is that Mr.. Hamilton's
central bank collapsed and brought
ruin and grief to thousands. The
reason it collapsed was because in
removing control of the banking
facilities from experienced bank
ers, the whole thing had been turn
ed over to the control of politicians
who, generally speaking, are ex-
periencei only in politics. 1t seems
paradoxical that the North Dakota
senator should advance as liber-
al scheme the creation of central
bank which one hundred and fifty
years ago was the height of con-
servatism.
The Nye legislation was offered
IN the same week that Governor
Eccles had proposed in his testi-
mony on the banking bill in the
house that the Federal Reserve
board should have complete con-
troll of the credit expansion and
contraction in this country. be-
aieve most persons will have diff
Guilty in considering the two
schemes as separate and distinct.
r. 10 fo ha rotad that there are