James Hamilton Lewis

“ This is a body which will stand squarely in defense of our country. We insist upon the indulgence and enjoyment of prosperity by its whole people and the patriotism of this Nation to denounce and punish all conspiracy against the people and the Nation of America. ”

“ President, is it possible that these eminent speculators throughout the country bide their time to depress the stocks of their own Nation and then to purchase them in, and then to raise the price to the highest possible mark; then seize the products of the farmer from the farm, the results of the manufactures from the factories, at the very lowest prices to which they have been depressed, and then lift them to the very highest prices that monopoly will induce, and so sell them to the great profit of the manipulators? ”

“ Here are the businessmen of this country anxious to join with the President, the President anxious to join with them, in complete communion and harmony. There is not the slightest dissatisfaction among those who are the real business. ”

“ Is it possible, I ask, that these speculators have conceived that if they can start a policy in this Government of making every human being feel that whatever stock he possesses is already tainted with utter failure and dishonor and every form of undertaking is likewise, if you please, decreed to its death, that from this result they can frighten the body which we know as the Securities Commission from any further enforcement of the law that compels the showing of a just amount of property behind a stock before it can be issued? ”

“ Is it possible these masters at last conceive again what they did in 1907 and 1914, and what we know they did in 1929—that by doing this they can have those who are possessed of anything dispose of it at any figure, and they can then issue new stock in the form of certificates with nothing to sustain it but water and audacity, and then sell those stocks to America under whatever guise they please, while their rottenness will rob the widows, cheat the poor, and leave the country bereft of its financial honor? ”

“ On this floor at this moment, daring to be something of a spokesman for my honorable colleagues on both sides of the Chamber, I announce the time has come when we here reveal these people and now declare to them that this Government will not yield to peculators in their offense nor to speculators in their crime. This is a Government of patriots who will sustain their country by every sacrifice. ”

“ What is the matter with America, and what is the matter with the people?
This morning from the press we read that the New York stock market—to take but a single barometer—has fallen precipitously for many weeks; that throughout the East uncertainty and general fear prevail; and that the belief prevails that this major recession has been caused to no small degree by the New Deal policies in general, and the tax laws of the Roosevelt administration in particular. ”

“ Our credit in finance today is greater than that of any other country on earth. Our standing before the world in credit is the very highest. Business in our land is prosperous, barring one or two instances, such, for example, as the decrease for a while in the demand for steel as building moves slowly and, if you please, something of a decadence in the -construction or selling of automobiles, caused by war, of nations decreasing export sales. ”

“ Tile vaults of the banks are stifled with money. Our national credit is so high that on but day before yesterday the bid for the bonds of the Nation in a new Treasury finance exceeded by 15 times the necessity. ”

“ It is announced that the finance of the banks is frustrated and the credit of the country assailed to echo through the world. The standing of our country is so diminished by accusation as to leave it unworthy of the confidence of an American. ”

“ At this time we behold, sir, seven great nations of the world tendering us their securities bearing from 5 to 7 percent, while the great commercial bodies all around us of an industrial nature—in many respects of the highest class—heretofore yielding splendid profits, tender their securities bearing from 5 to 7 percent. Yet our people demonstrate their confidence in the administration here in government ”

“ When those gentlemen, whoever they are, which have frightened the poor woman with a small security to have her sell it at a complete loss and robbed the estates of the little possessions which they may have from which income may have been afforded, and then the little-business man shall be compelled to get rid of what he possesses on the ground that what he has is a loss and then induced to enter doubtful investments again, this result will reproduce exactly the situation of 1929-30. ”

“ Will those people who are the creators of the desecration have been rewarded when they have brought disaster upon their own people, set dishonor upon their own Nation. and brought disgrace upon their own countrymen? ”

“ Those people are deceiving none who have intelligence. They will not be further allowed to mislead those of patriotism. The point is clear, the understanding is evident, that the dishonor behind it is one that has been clearly calculated to result in confusion and embarrassment. ”

“ There is no system which the mind can devise and now pronounce that there could have been an induction of that nature to the undirected mind that such could have expressed itself in harmony of words except that their minds were completely dominated by suggestion or direction from some superior, subterranean, and controlling force. ”

“ It is said that this belief has become so general that for the first time since 1930 there appears to be a majority in Congress disposed against the administration and in behalf of the businessman. How can anyone be for the businessman and not be for the President? The President has constantly announced his advocacy of the business of the businessman. ”