President Roosevelt's fighting speech at the banquet in Washington to celebrate Jackson Day throws the gauntlet down to big business in no mistakeable manner. He very definitely means business, and those powerful interests which he claims are obstructing the return of the United States to normality wilt soon be on their defence. His war on the holding companies, as indicated "in the Public Utility Act of 1098, has been a bitter one. and the @eath sentence on such companies which that Act contains is about to be put into opera-By its provisions the Securities and Ex-'Commission. is authorized as from January 1, 1988 ta past death sentence on these companies "as soon as practicable," and while the Commission favours evolutionary rather than revolutionary processes. as shown in its Pacific Gas & Electric decision, the President out for war to the bitter end. Mr. Roosevelt draws a sharp distinction between the utilities companies and the holding concerns, and points out that whereas investors in the former rarely lost their money, thousands had lost through buying holding company securities. He is probably correct in rebutting the charge that he is making war on all business. but merely seeking to correct minority abuses and his pointed reference to the very minute tall which is wagging the huge dog clearly shows in which direction he is concentrating his attention, The editor of "Barron's," the Important American financial weekly, characteristically describes the plight of the utility holding companies os "somewhat like that of man upon whom a death sentence has been passed, but who gets knifed quietly before the Sentence is carried out" Further developments may be expected when the Federal Communications. Commission produces its report. to on the long. and laborious Investigation of the affairs of the American Telephone and Telegraph. -Co. which expected will be issued in a very short while.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.