of business was bound to stop with our joining
the war; or, at any rate, to be much diminished.

The best indication of the state of feeling of the financial community
is usually the New York Stock Exchange. Well, every time a ship with
Americans on board was sunk by a German submarine in the period
preceding our entrance into the war, the stock market shivered and
prices declined.

When, a little over a year ago, Secretary Lansing declared that we
were "on the verge of war," a tremendous smash in prices took place on
the Stock Exchange. That does not look, does it, as if rich men were
particularly eager to bring on war or cheered by the prospect of
having war?

But, it is said, the big financiers of New York were afraid that the
money loaned by them to the Allied nations might be lost if these
nations were defeated, and therefore they manoeuvred to get America
into the war in order to save their investments. A moment's reflection
will show the utter absurdity of that charge.

American bankers have loaned to the Allied nations--almost entirely to
the two strongest and wealthiest among them, France and
England--about two billions of dollars since the war started in 1914.

These two billions of dollars of Allied bonds are not held, however,
in the coffers of Eastern bankers, but have been distributed
throughout the country and are being owned by thousands of banks and
other corporations and individuals.

Moreover, they form an insignificant portion of the total debts of the
Allied nations; they are offset a hundredfold by their total assets.
Even if those nations were to have lost the war it is utterly
inconceivable that they would ever have defaulted upon that particular
portion of their debt, because, being their _foreign_ debt, it has a
special standing and intrinsic security.

It is upon the punctual payment of its foreign obligations that a
nation's credit in the markets of the world largely depends, and
the maintenance of their world credit was and is absolutely vital
to England and France. Furthermore, the greater portion of these
obligations is secured by the deposit of collateral in the shape
of American railroad and other bonds, etc., which are more than
sufficient in value to cover the debt.

But let us assume for argument's sake that the Allies had been
defeated and had defaulted, for the time being, upon these foreign
debts; let us assume that the entire amount of Allied bonds placed in
America ha