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LIVING A DOUBLE FINANCIAL LIFE Proved Too Much in the Long Run For the Day and Night Bank Of St. Louis (Associated Press) St. Louis, Jan. 6.-The Night and Day Bank, with deposits of three million dollars, did not open for business today. The state bank examiner said examiners had been auditing the books for several days and found an apparent discreprancy of more than one hundred thousand dollars. The employes are said to have not appeared at the bank since Wednesday.
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GENERAL f thanks Marshal Foch sent a lett to President Rea of the Pennsylvania Railroad for directing his railroad tour of America and Canada. George A. Eng, acting chief enforcement agent in Detroit, declared an end will be put to liquor traffic if the names of customers of bootleggers are published. A "treaty of peace" between the city of Detroit and the Detroit United Railway, agreed to recently by plenipotentiaries of each, shortly will give Detroit the distinction of having the most extensive municipally-owned street car system in the world. Pennsylvania Railroad will place orders for the construction of twenty additional all-steel dining cars of the largest and most modern type. Seaboard-Bay, a subsidiary to the Seaboard Air Line Railroad, applied to the Interstate Commerce Commission for a loan of $4,679,892. The American delegates to the conference for the Limitation of Armaments are wondering what will become of the Franco-Japanese treaty, which is not so sweeping an alliance as the Anglo-Japanese compact, but pledges a certain amount of co-operation in the Far East. The Night and Day Bank of St. Louis suspended. A discrepancy of more than $100,000 reported found in accounts by examiners. Governor General Wood of the Philippines advised Igorrote chiefs, with whom he conferred at Baguio, to stop eating dogs and substitute sheep and goats. Samuel Untermyer, council to the Lockwood Committee in New York City, told the committee at hearing that the General Electric Company has a "complete monopoly" over the production of electric light bulbs in the country According to report from Rome, there is little danger of a general financial crisis in Italy, despite the closing of the Banca de Sconto. Pennsylvania crude oil was reduced 50 cents a barrel to $3.50, it was announced by the Joseph Seep Purchasing Agency, known as a Standard Oil affiliation. A majority of 11,316 physicians in nineteen states, replying to a questionnaire sent out by the American Medical Association, assert that they do not regard beer, wine or whisky as necessary therapeutic agents in the practice of medicine.
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The indictment of the diret. tors of the suspended Night and Day Bank of Rt. Louis on the charge that they allowed the bank to receive deposits after it was known to have begonde in. solvent- penal offense under the law-has doubtless created sensation in banking circles generaly. There is little probabili. ity, however, that the prosecut ing officers really purpose to make the directors suffer the prescribed penalty for their in fraction of the banking law, or that a jury could be found to convict them under it. All these directors are men of the highest moral character as well as social standing and it cannot under any circumstance be assumed that any of them had a guilty knowledge of the insolvency of the bank they directed before its actual suspension. The pur pose of the indictment, to our mind, is to call all bank director ates in the state to the sense of their duty as prescribed by the law, that has the object of preventing the misuse of a bank's funds by any of its executive of ticers. In the case of the Night and Day Bank as in that of the late Peoples Bank of De Soto and a number of others that have occurred in the state within a recent period, the bank was under mined by an executive officer in whom the members of the board of directors of the institution had absolute confidence and whose periodic report of its solvency they passed upon without question or examination as to its reliability. They felt they could not do otherwise or offer the implication that they did not trust the reliability of the state ment. And that is the rock up on which banks are wreckeda feeling of delicacy in applying the duty the statutes impose on bank directors. Just how this difficulty may be overcome is not easily determined. Perhaps an amendment to the state banking law making it compulsory for bank directorates to give the adairs of their respective institu sione personal examination at reasonably frequent intervais might prove to be of benefit, seeir g that the force of inspec tors employed by the depart ment of the State Bank Com missioner is inadequate to give such frequent reviews. Mean while. while bank failures are always to be deplored and their occurrance must urge further steps towards still greater bank ing safety than we already enjoy. we have cause for congratulation in the fact that it is the rule rather than the exception that our banks are conducted by careful and conscientious men, and that where one bank has failed a thousand give us secure depositories for our money. ihh -
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Capital is a friend, of the people. It is capital, not bread doctrinaire disquisition, that puts and butter on the tables of the people, in clothing on their backs, furniture their homes and sunshine in their hearts. Soviet Russia now realizes this. The governor insists that North Carolina has established a splendid but record in the growing of crops, gardens. He wants the famlly have every food that he wants to is required Milk, to make a balanced ration. vegetables and fruit are required. What did the recent "clean-ups" clean up, anyway? The more you learn the more you know. Latest strike news: Health department says we must all keep our feet dry and warm during this moist spell. A congressional committee is going to ask Harding to let the government "buy up" all the liquor supplies in the country. They seem to forget that Uncle Sam hasn't but fifty billion "ghekels" to his credit. Well, the Night and Day Bank in St. Louis and its officers and directors have discovered that Almighty God is no "respecter of persons" just as Governor Small (small) of Illinois has discovered that he is a rather "small potato" after all. The Night and Day Bank in St. "defunet" and left the of said bank Louis depositors has gone "out officers in the cold." In other words, the and directors of said bank have "looted" and "gutted" it completely, At any rate, so it appears. been the indicted officers and directors have grand jury and under bonds for their heavy by the appearance placed in court and to give a strict accountability for their "deeds done in the body" -according to Scripture, and the banking laws of the great state of Missouri. . The accountability of bank officers inescapable-the! financial acunder the law over moral countability is accountability and and beyond bank- their anything defined by law. The ing business is no "mystery." Apparently neither law nor prudence was followed in the Night and "looted" Day bank. by The bank, it seems, was its had officers been withdrawn and directors. from with Great its the funds sums certhat any "profits" tainty for private speculations, made would any accrue to individuals while "losses" incurred would be imposed on the bank. How was it possible for this to be done without knowledge of at least the executive officers? This bank, it is said, also accepted deposits while in an insolvent condition. The whole business management of said bank looks "rotten," to say the least. Stated in business terms, the patent fact is that Soviet Russia is paralyzed by an unbearable "overhead charge." Its administrative "unity" requires the maintenance of a police-power that much: the productive system bear the pocosts cannot too "weight" of the litical or protective system. Now comes the news that 42 per cent of the banking power of the South was lodged in banks which have not become members of our Federal Reserve System, and in the West 30 per cent of the banking power was not included in the system, while in the Pacific states 36 per cent of the strength remained outside of the system. All of this banking power should come into the Federal Reserve System without unnecessary delay. not only for the purpose of strengthening the system. but for the purpose of uniformity and protection of all members of our federal reserve banking system and for the purpose of facilitating and expediting their banking business everywhere. Now if the Federal Reserve Board will administer the system as intended in the law (free from all "dictation" from Wall street influences), our federal reserve system is and always will be the best constructive banking system ever devised and ordained by the subtle intellect of man and will forever put an end to all "artificial" panies in these United States of America. Now as to the soldier bonus, it appears that the great and increasing volume of money thus put escapes securities and unfairly into tax-exempt its just burden of taxation renders it
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$750,000 Bank Thief Enjoys Liberty as Attorneys Argue (Special to The Daily Worker) ST. LOUIS, Mar. 26.-A. O. Meininger, cashier of the looted Night and Day Bank, charged with embezzling $750,000 of the bank's funds, convicted on one indictment and sentenced to five years in prison, cannot be tried on any of the remaining 47 indictments against him until the state supreme court has passed upon his appeal from the sentence, according to a decision just handed down by the supreme court. This may take years. The looted bank closed Jan. 6, 1922, financially ruining a large number of working people, savings depositors in the institution. The local Socialist party, and several labor bodies were among the losers when the bank closed its doors. None of the indicted officials have yet been locked up. H. H. Hoehnschild, president of the bank, had 16 indictments quashed on legal technicalities. Legal minds see many loopholes in the- law thru which Meininger might escape punishment entirely, in the event the supreme court reverses the lower court verdict. In any event, the case is expected to enjoy several years of peaceful slumber on the appeal. Unfortunate depositors in the bank have received payments of 50 per cent on their losses. More stringent state banking laws are being urged as a result of the fiasco of the Night and Day bank. Join the "I want to make THE
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LAV VS. JUSTICE The action of Circuit Attorney Sidener, of St. Louis, in dismissing action against the officers and directors of the defunct Night and Day bank, which failed in St. Louis some three years ago, has caused considerable criticism. The men under indictment were men of high standing in St. Louis, but this ought not to excuse them if they were negligent or criminal in handling other people's money. Too many directors of banks are named for other reasons than for ability to direct. The banking laws require directors and officers and each has his duties and responsibilities; and if they allow the cashier to run the bank, merely signing such reports as the cashier prepares, they are criminally negligent if the cashier makes off with the funds, as was done in this case, where the loss ran into more than a million of dollars. The mere fact that this was possible shows a presumptive negligence of the officers, and they should be held for any loss to depositors from their negligence or ignorance, as the case might be. Certainly the depositors should not be forced to lose their savings merely because one of the officers was a crook and several others too negligent or too ignorant to perform their duties to the bank. One can hardly dismiss the suspicion that if these officers whoses cases were dismissed had been men of modest means and of mediocre attainments their cases might not have been dismissed. Al] men are supposed to be equal in the eyes of the law, and if this is not true, the law ceases to be respected as such. Justice can af. ford only one pair of scales.