Jasper County Democrat, Volume 9, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 July 1906 — FIGHT FOR DOMINANCE [ARTICLE]

FIGHT FOR DOMINANCE

Latest Development of thp Mutual Life Insurance Company Dispute. ILICTIOB OF THUSTIXB IS XKAB Four Men Decline Nomination by the Management Peabody and Untermyer Are at Loggerhead*. New York, July 19.—Four of the members of the international policyholders’ committee of the Mutual apd New York Life Insurance companies, who were included in the new board of trustees nominated by the Mutual Life Insurance company trustees as an “administration ticket,” have declined to permit the use of their names In this connection. On their behalf a protest was forwarded to Otto Kelsey, state superintendent of insurance at Albany, by Samuel Untermyer, counsel to the policyholders’ organization. Despite this protest it was stated by counsel for the Mutual that the trustees have a right under the law to nominate whomsoever they choose, and that requests for withdrawal cannot be considered once the nominations are announced. Men Who Refuse io Serve. The four members of the policyholders’ committee affected are Judge Geo. Gray, of Delaware; General Benjamin F. Tracy, of this city; Colonel Alfred M. Shook, of Tennessee, and Harlow N. Hlglnbotham, of Chicago. All of these gentlemen sent telegrams to Untermyerdeclaring they were nominated without being consulted and without their consent. Acting for the policyholders’ organization Untermyer also sent a protest to Albany against the manner In which the lists of policyholders in the various Insurance companies have been filed. He says the companies have failed to give the proper addresses in many Instances and have been guilty of “wilful evasion.” Points of Untermyer’s Protest. Untermyer's protest says in part as to the lists of policyholders filed by the insurance companies: “They are a wilful evasion intended to disfranchise a large proportion of the policyholders, and to secure unfair advantages to the administration ticket in the impending election. Section 94 of the insurance law’, as amended by the last general assembly, distinctly requires the lists to contain the last known postoffice addresses of all policyholders. That phrase has a recognized meaning in legal construction. It means that the street and street number as well as the name of the postoffice shall be given. A list giving the addresses of numerous ‘John Smiths’ as New York is a palpable violation of the law. The addresses of a very large proportion of the names ot policyholders in large cities are thus given without street or street numbers.”

ROAST FOR UNTERMYER President Peabody Says That He Is After Control Himself. When Peabody, president of the Mutual Life Insurance company, was ■hown Untermyer’s protests, he said: “I am not surprised, but I am afraid the gentleman has let the cat out of the bag. Perhaps his solicitude that there shall lie a good board is not so great as his solicitude lest the control of affairs shall pass out of bis hands. I certainly shall not go to him for instruction upon the subject of the proprieties. We believed that Judge Gray, General Tracy. Colonel Shook and Mr. Higinbotham, notwithstanding their criticism upon our administration, were men well fitted for trustees. • • • “The truth is that Mr. Untermyer, In my Judgment, is not altogether the disinterested public benefactor h e would have the policyholders understand. He made up a list of gentlemen of excellent character, calling them by the high-sounding name of the ‘international policyholders' committee’ and asked them to meet in New York. It is absurd to say that they were delegated to this work by the policyholders. No one could, by any possibility, have reached the policyholders in such numbers as to secure any proper mandate from them. “We know perfectly well that their commission came direct from Mr. Untermyer, who personally solicited them to accept places on the so-called committee. The 'gentlemen upon the committee uihiaubtedly were moved by high purposes, and felt that they were doing their duty; but when I tell you that of their twenty-eight members who constituted the committee not more than eight were policyholders in the Mutual Life Insurance company It Is clear that they are subject to the charge of attending to some one else's business.