Financial Legislation in Principle and in History 21 



ing rate. For some reason he has advocated, in his latest propo- 

 sition, a uniform tax on all issues. 



The safety fund principle would appear to be in accord with 

 the political movement of the times. The tendency now is for 

 all interests to unite, each in its own domain, thus forming sep- 

 arate guilds or economic classes. The consolidation of the labor- 

 ing classes into national trade unions on the one hand, and of 

 almost numberless manufacturing interests into national and in- 

 ternational trusts, on the other hand, is an evidence of this spirit 

 of the age. That legislation should go along to help the banks 

 to combine into one national guild is not surprising, although 

 quite inconsistent with the protestations of the legislature that it 

 is deeply concerned to maintain competition which is understood 

 by it to mean "small businesses." The law recently passed by 

 the United States congress, 1 facilitating the union of banks in 

 different sections of the country, is quite along this line, and, in 

 this political sense, indicates a movement in advance, although 

 the requirement of deposit of the private notes' purchased with 

 the emergency circulation is retained. These local associations, 

 however, are trivial affairs, as they only have authority over the 

 emergency circulation, which is to be taxed 10 per cent per an- 

 num. Mr. Fowler has also proposed that the banks should as- 

 sume the redemption of the United States notes, and had pro- 

 vided a measure by which the latter should finally be paid off by 

 the banks without expense to the government. But this enlight- 

 ened provision has also been dropped. 



We must content ourselves with this brief sketch of legislation 

 on the subject of credit, designed less for information about the 

 various acts mentioned than to afford some notion of the extent 

 to which the organic conception of credit is getting a foothold. 

 History of banking legislation is only one phase of the history of 

 corporation legislation in general. Corporations were originally 

 chartered in order to secure the benefits that would accrue to a 

 large number of different persons of moderate means who might, 

 by laying thei/ capitals together, create a fund adequate to the 



1 Approved May 30, 190S. 



241 



