Evening star., 1936-06-24
TEXT OF BARKLEY KEYNOTE ADDRESS BEFORE DEMOCRATS

ministration of Woodrow Wilson.
And what I ask and the people have
q right to know is whether some OF
those who journeyed to Washington
In the days of their distress with tin
cup, q pair of blue glasses and q dog
and obtained from the Treasury,
through the Reconstruction Finance
Corp, two and quarter billion
dollars of the peoples money in
order that they might live, now pro-
pose to belittle their past predicament
and those who rescued them from 1t
and made it possible for the national
banks alone to turn an annual loss
of $50, 900 900 to net profit Of more
than $200,0O0,0OO.
During the four long years just prior
to the Roosevelt administration more
than seven thousand banks went out
of business, and total deposits in all
banks decreased by more than $15,-
600, 0,OO0, 900.
Ask the 100000 depositors in
these vanished banks whether they de-
sire to return to those days Of ragged
individualiSm. Ask them whether they
favor the repeal or crippling Of the
guaranty of bank deposits and the
election of a man as President who
struggled to obstruct both its enact
ment and its administration.
The answer will be an overwhelming
No!
While under Mr.. Hoover, more than
1000 banks closed their doors perma-
nently; only 264 State and national
banks have closed since March l6,
1898, the end of the bank holiday, and
only eight Of them were national
banks. Thus far in the good year 1886
not a single national bank in the
United States has closed its doors in
the faces Of the people.
Trade Stimulation
BY Hull Cited.
Need I here recount the efforts OF
the great Secretary Of State, Mr.. Cor
dell Hull, to pry ajar the gates OF for
eign trade and start again the move
ment of international commerce and
good will?
Through the trade agreements au-
thorized by Congress and consum-
mated under that authority, our COM
merce with other nations has In
creased from 27 per cent OF normal
in March, 1888. to Sc per cent OF nor
NAL in April, 1886. or from 81, ,933 0o0,-
900 in 1892 to s4,330 900 900 in 1885.
But in spite OF this. We witnessed in
the recent Republican Convention a
bitter denunciation of the power given
to and exercised by the President as
being wicked and unconstitutional, IN
spite of the fact that from 1898 to
1885 Congress has from time to time
conferred such authority on the Presi-
dent in the interest Of American
trade
The Republican platform proposes
to repeal all trade agreements and
the law under which they were ne
gotiated.
The hypocrisy and insincerity Of
those who framed and now accept that
pronouncement are revealed in all
their nakedneSs when We recall, as
they have conveniently forgotten, that
under no less than two past Repub-
lican administrations. similar author
ity was conferred upon Republican
Presidents. and no less than 10 such
trade agreements were entered into
without ratification by the Senate.
Having driven our trade from the
seas, locked our ships in the ports and
hauled down the American flag as the
symbol of commercial enterprise. the
Republican leaders now wall and gnash
| their teeth because we are restoring
the nag. the commerce and prestige
of the American Nation.
What do they offer as q substitute
out of the depths of their own polit-
ical and intellectual bankruptcy?
Nothing more nor less than another
stroke Of commercial apoplexy in
the clinic Of Smoot and Hawley.
But We are told by the Republican
battalion Of death, and its illegiti-
mate brother, the American Liberty
League, that We are laying the ham,
pering hand of government on the
innocent heads of business and finance.
These dismal prophets of panic and
propaganda will continue to annoy
the American people with their la
mentations.
What business are we outraging?
For IL years-yea, for "12 long
years leaders of the Republican
party dwelt in a fools paradise and
allowed the American people to pour
billions of dollars into the sink-hoie
Of fraudulent investment securities.
They saw grow up. If they did not
foster. prodigious system of inflated
stocks. and saw them peddled from
door to door throughout America, and
they saw the market places for them
juggled and artificially manipulated
beyond the power of the average man
to escape or comprehend.
Saw Putrid Pestilence
OF Financial Debauchery.
With bland and callous unconcern
they sat smugly through the carnival
until the mask was torn off and the
public saw the putrid pestilence of
financial debauchery which had blown
into their nostrilS an alien odor, and
the result was the passage of the Sc
curity and exchange acts for the pro-
lection Of the people.
These measures were denounced in
bloc. But the issue Of new and hon
est securities has increased so Der
cent; the value of old ones by more
than 40 per cent.
In their platform they stammer a
pious sentence in behalf Of regula-
tion of interstate securities and inter-
state activities of public utilities. But
We have already done it.
They sat in the folds of comfort
able and luxurious upholstery while
giant system of holding companies was
built one upon another in the public
utility field, wringing exhorbitant
profits from investors, operating COM
panies and consumers.
But did the leaders of old or new
guards in Republicanism lash their
faces into scarlet or their hearts into
Indignation over the spoilation of in
nocent people?