A MONEY TRUST

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 223, 8 February 1913, Page 2 (Supplement)

A MONEY TRUST

WOIIOAX'S CIMvVP INTU'EWK OK AMEUK'AX I'IXAXCE. S:i 11 Francisco. December 2.5. There is ii meat deal of money in the United Stairs. Xatnrally. there has to bo. with nearly a. hundred million people, earning and spending and saving. Whether or not it is possible for any person or group of persons to control this wealth, and, if so. who the controllers are. is a problem that is being investigated villi marked energy by the so-called "money trust," committee of I'ongress. .1. I'ierpont Morgan, the tallest poppy of Ihem all in the financial world, has spent two days on the. witness stand under the probe of tlie inquisitive, committeemen and their lawyers. Other lesser lights have contributed their views. William Rockefeller has succeeded in evading the committee's pioeess servers, who in six months have [ not been able to find liim.

I Certainly, the public is learning some I startling facts from ibe public enquiry. Not since the exposure of the life insurance companies seven years ago lias there been so much light directed into the innermost recesses of "high lUianee." As one newspaper puts it, the investigation ■'is doing the public at Last one good turn in showiilir up the grand larceny met hods of the Wall Street brokers who act as agents of prominent and notorious generals and captains of finance." The i'ar-reach in':' inlluencc of I he linn of J. I'. Morgan and Company in the financial and 'indiisl rial alVairs of this country is the one fact that lias been most prominent! v brought out; and, indeed, that linn 'exercises a power and authority that Hie llolh-chiUs never attained to in European finance. It has been shown (O the committee by -xpert testimony that through •■interlocking directorates," by which linn members of -f. P. Morgan rind Company and .seventeen other financial institutions hold directorates in corporations- -from hank* to railroads—-rc-ources and capitalism in the. neighborhood of £:"i,.-(IO.(iliO.()lHI is under the control of the Morgan group of financiers. Of course, in the last analysis J. P. Morgan and. Co. is d. Pierpont Morgan himself. Through this system of representation on the directorates of many concerns, Morgan has a. hand in the direction of the all'airs of 41 hanks and trust com- ' panics, eleven insurance companies, -31 railroad systems, two express companies, one. steamship company, and 2S producing and trading corporations. When d. P. Morgan, as the very embodiment of financial operations on a stupendous scale, took tho witness stand, lie was accompanied and surrounded by about fifteen lawyers and experts, with whom be consulted during bis examination by Samuel Untermyer, the committee's counsel. Nevertheless, he answered willingly, and his nonchalance in referring to mere millions of dollars more than once raised a laugh in the committee room. Asked as to his holdings of stock in one bank, he replied, "Not very much —about a million dollars." lie seemed surprised at the ripple of laughter that followed, but joined in it. The financier is no very hearty believer in competition, lie frankly admitted. "I'd rather have combination than competition," he said. T like a little competition, but I like combination better. Control is tho important thing: hut no man could monopolise money. One man might got control of railroads, or merchandise, but never money or credit."

Morgan was very emphatic as to the impossibility of such a thing as a money trist. With a bang of his fist ,011 the arm of his chair, ho said: —. "There can bo no money trust. All the banks and all the money in Christendom could not control money. The question of control is persenal as to money and credit." Many men had great credit who had no money, he said.

"Is it not because it is believed that they have money back of them?" asked Mr. Untermyer.

"Xo, sir, it is just because people believe in the man," replied Morgan. "I have known a man to come into my office and I have given him a cheque for a million dollars when I knew he had not a cent in the world."

The vast influence exercised by the money power in controlling industry was shown by Morgan's admisison that practically he alone named the directors of the United States Steel Corporation, which is the official name of the Steel Trust. No man became a director until : Morgan had approved of him, and no one has even gone on the hoard against the financier's protest. As a matter of course, the house of J. Pierpont Morgan are the bankers for the Steel Trust. The witness thought it probable, hut .didn't remember, that he had selected E. IT. <!ary for chairman of the Finance Committee of the Steel Corporation, and admitted that it was left to him to determine the figures at which subsidiary companies should come into the combine. "I do not know it, sir," he replied, when asked if he did not have vast power in the financial world. Mr. TJnteimyer asked in surprise: ' ; You do not feel your power at all." And Morgan answered: "'Xo, T do not feel it at all." And then, shortly after in his testimony, he said he had "a small holding" in the National City Banking Company. Looking it up, he admitted this "small holding" was worth about six million dollars.

The findings of the "money trust" committee will be the basis of important fiscal legislation to be introduced in Congress next year. The plan of a Federal National Bank, so widely discussed a year ago, seems to have been abandoned.