Jasper County Democrat, Volume 19, Number 61, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 October 1916 — LEST WE FORGET [ARTICLE]

LEST WE FORGET

Once again we see that the Roosevelt panic of 1907 was much more terrible than many ipeople today realize. In his testimony the other day Mr. Roosevelt, ‘in speaking of the taking over by the steel trust of the Tennessee Coal & Iron company, which was permitted by him, said:

“The action occurred during the height of the panic of 1907. The prime interest of every citizen was that some measure be taken to stop the panic and restore confidence. In New York the situation was trembling on a hair as to whether every business would have to be shut up. One night I received notice that the next day Mr. Frick and Mr. Gary of the steel corporation would come to see me. I had received thousands of appeals to do something. * * * They said the situation was acute and that if something wasn’t done before the market opened the crash would come. I called in the newspaper men and told them of the action I had decided to take. The news was printed all over the country and the panic was stopped.” What a panic that was to be sure! There was, we are told, danger that in New York “every business would have to shut up.’’ That is worse than anything we have suffered from during the last year. For there has been no Tennessee Coal & Iron company merger, and yet “every business” in New York has not “shut up.” Naturally such a panic required a good deal of “stopping.” Hence it was necessary for the secretary of the treasury to deposit in or lend to fourteen New York banks $37,967,000, of which sum the banks agreed to lend $23,500,000 to brokers; they actually lent $lB,945,000. This also was for the purpose of “stopping the panic.” And, if we remember rightly, President Roosevelt congratulated Secretary Cortelyou on his success in "stopping the panic.’’ And now we are told, as often before, that it was necessary to allow the steel trust to gobble the Tennessee Coal & Iron company, again in order to “stop the panic.” That surely was “some panic.” We are not quite sure whether it was stopped by the coal and iron merger or by the turning over to the Morgan interests of millions of the government money to be lent at high rates. Possibly both influences were needed. If that is true, the Roosevelt license for the acquisition of the Tennessee Coal & Iron company was not, the sole influence that stopped the panic. At least “every business” in New York Was not forced to “shut up.” At that time, of course, the Dingley tariff was in full operation. Possibly if the federal reserve law had been in force the situation would not have been so bad. As it was “the situation was trembling on a hair lest every business would have to be shut •up.”—The Indianapolis News, May 1, 1915.