"Meanwhile, we cannot ignore the political situation in this Presidential year, and the disturbing and depressing effect of the recent message of President Roosevelt to Congress, with its' onslaught on Wall street, followed by the unjust bitter attack of Mr. Bryan on Stock Exchange speculation, which he denounced as gambling. Wall Street was thus ground between the upper and neither millstones of the Republican and the Democratic parties; it was fired on from both sides with hot shot, grape and canister, without any good reason.
Speculation in stocks, as conducted through Stock Exchange brokers, is no more gambling than speculation in real estate or ordinary merchandise. All trade is more or less speculative because it involves risks. If it did not involve risk there would not be so many mercantile failures as there are every year, yet no one calls trade gambling...The present anti-speculation crusade is accompanies by many delusions and very imperfect ideas concerning the conditions of equities and business operations. Who is to decide which are speculative transactions and which are not? Even marriage is called a lottery.
It is quite impossible and thoroughly stupid to try to eliminate speculation, for it is an essential element in all business transactions, except those for cash. If business were reduced to the latter basis, it would soon become injuriously restricted and more exposed to corners and violent fluctuations than ever...
As to legitimate or illegitimate speculation, who is to decide between the two, and where is the line to be drawn? Who would be bold enough to investigate the intentions of buyers or sellers? Only the most drastic kind of force could compel divergence of such secrets, and is it possible to establish any such system of espionage in this country? No Government investigation will ever ascertain the real value of our railroads so well as the higgling and bargaining between buyers and sellers, which is alike the moving spirit of commerce and the arbiter of values on all Stock Exchanges the world over.
Speculation is liable to be carried to excess, and abuses in speculative methods undoubtedly exist; but these are better corrected by a strong and elevated public opinion than through any legal measures based upon political claptrap. There is a flood of nonsense in this campaign against speculation, anti-option, etc. which does not find believers here or in other parts of the country. It consists largely of political humbug, and is nothing more than one of the usual methods by which crafty politicians play upon the ignorance and prejudice of the masses for their own advantage. After the elections this mania will probably pass away, to be then recognized as one of the psychological features usually following a panic. Previous instances of this sort of agitation were the granger and populist movement, which exhibited many of the present symptoms of political insanity...
Because a few individuals play golf to harmful excess, would any sane person suppress so wholesome a sport? Yet that is precisely the policy of many of the reformers of the present day. Too frequently these reform movements savor of ignorance. Their purpose is frequently admirable; but the country sadly needs more sanity in their application...It pleases a certain class of ignorant and misguided people to hear Wall Street denounced and maligned on every opportunity."
Henry Clews, 1908 |
