The Wrangell sentinel., 1947-04-04
FROM OTHER EDITORS - (From an editorial in the Ketehikan Chronicle by
 William L. Baker)

Tt has been said by a great man that little minds discuss peo- pie, good minds discuss events and big minds discuss ideas.
 This may provide good gauge to the calibre of AIaska's Territor- iaI legislature. It has misspent most of it's time in personal wran- gles, discussing people - mostly people the individual members didn't like. That they should use their public office and the pub lies money to carry on their pri- Vate feuds is miscarriage of public duty.
 After they had failed to indict Governor Ernest Gruening, they went on to individuals, including the editor of this newspaper, Mild red Hermann, a commentator and reporter of the legislative dOings eff any) and the McCutcheon boys of Anchorage.
 We happened to be in Juneau when the bank examiners came back from Anchorage where they had checked into the operations of a new bank one of the McCutch- cons helped organize. These great statesmen of the Senate, who had circulated a malicious rumor abour Attorney Stanley McCutcheon of Anchorage and his handling of the property of a Japanese during the war, called an executive session. They wanted the inside dope on the Anchorage bank.
 The banking board, however, is supposed to get these reports and they're not designed to be kicked a. round for political purposes. How much dope the Senate received we do not know, but the banking board held a hurried meeting to head off Senate action. We have as yet heard nothing as to what it all amounted to.
 "The Senate then proceeded to push a bill forcing stockholders in banks to post bond for $95,OO0 a piece. The old law under which no Alaskan bank has thus far failed, seemed good enough until the pol iticians got angry at the McCut- cheons. They hoped to get at these lads in an underhanded manner, forcing all banks to pay tribute to their political machinations.
 The legislators went ey- en farther. They thought the in terest rate shoul be reduced by law from to 6%. We would like to have it reduced, if it were practi- cal under Alaskan conditions, but We fear Alaskans on the whole would lose under present condi- tions for these reasons: 1. The bor- rover now pays much of the cost of bank operations. If the interest rates were cut, the depositor would pay more of these costs through new service charges. 2. Alaskan loans on fishing and mining equip ment are more risky than on cars, appliances and merchandise, which constitute a larger proportion of collateral for banks in the States. Even the real estate market in AL aska is probably less stable than in older, more established areas
 "Too, if money could be made at less than S%, there would be peo- pie lending it in quantities.
 "The banking bills are, at th> moment all but dead. Thus runs out another effort to play. politics Gt the expense of the public and If business. Isn't is time CIV elected some statesmen instead of the children We have been sending to Juneau?"
 Bob Atwood, publisher of the Anchorage Times, who like Fill Baker took off time to cover the legislature personally for a short time had this to say about the law makers:
 (From the Anchorage Times
 By Robert Atwood