Year: 1871

A Plea I'm Defense of Home Enstitu
tfOns.


To the Editors Of the Union and American:
AS was walking down Broadway, il
New York, short time ago, a residen
of that city, and an old friend of mine
was pointing out TO me all the fine build
ings recently erected on that great thor
ougbfare.


The most prominent of these improve.
ments were the Insurance buildings,
which appeared on all sides. Ny friend
remarked that the enterprise of their city


had secured nearly all the Insurance
business of the South; that Nash.
vile alone sent hundreds of thou.
sands, annually, to the North, which
she ought to keep at home. and
That it was the vast amounts collected
from the South that erected those mag
nifcent buildings, monuments to South
ern carelessness and lack of enterprise.
The above led me TO think of the mat
ter, and to what our city and State are
doing towards building up the North. !
find that Nashville has been sending
North, every year, about three hundred
thousand dollars, which in two years will
amount to nearly her entire banking cap
ital. Now, suppose by some great mis-
fortune our city were to lose its banking
capital, in the short space of two years.
What panic it would createl All bust
ness would be deranged. All enterprise
checked. Yet we are sending away this
amount every few years for insurance.


Is it any wonder we have hard times2
No; when Nashville sends every dollar she
can raise to other parts of the country,
for what she can and ought to get at
home.


The amount paid out, annually, to for
eign insurance companies would build and
put in operation, every year, factory
equal to the cotton factory of North
Nashville, which viii employ about thou
sand people.


By simply changing our past ruinous
policy of sending our money away to
improve other cities, let US stop before
it is too late, and build up our own.
Patronize our home insurance companies,
who will loan US every dollar of their
assets. If there are not enough of such
companies, organize more.


This small change in one branch
of business will retain sufficient
money to erect one very large fac
to--vorI PUItjJIat1vhi ---vvG5 ,y5uIi, = arru
in ten years almost double the entire
wealth and population of our city. This
is no new enterprise, requiring money,
energy, and brains, to carry it out; but
the correction of ruinous error, which,
with others, has kept Nashville poor and
behind other cities.


1t is time for us to stop croaking about
high rents, living, and dull times: and go
to work, each and every one, cease buy
ing anything away from home that can be
obtained here, never let a dollar leave
that can be retained, and have confidence
in ourselves and each other.


Why make ourselves poor by sending
to the North for what we can and ought
to obtain at home9 Do they send to US
for anything they are able to produce
themselves2 Could the best fire insur-
ance company in the South do any busi-
ness in Boston2


1t would be absurd to attempt it even
In Cincinnati.


Some may think the foreign insurance
companies stronger than the home institu-
tions. / would refer such 10 the ''Home
Insurance Company" of New Haven,
with its bossted capital Of Clean million
dollars. When it broke the other day, how
much of the one million dollars did Ten
nessee haye2 Just twenty thousand dol
lars in the hands of the Comptroller.
That is all any foreign insurance cam-
pany in our CITY holds for the benefit of
the insured in our State, no matter what
their reported capital-just $50 000
Whereas, the home institutions have
their entire capital here, all within reach
of the insured. ~


Memphis has awakened to her
error in this particular. She has
in successful operation seven
home insurance companies, with assets
of nearly two million dollars, all of which
is kept in circulation in that city.


The fruits of this are beginning to be
seen. Two of them, with their surplus