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About Morning Oregonian. (Portland, Or.) 1861-1937 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 13, 1912)
PORTLAND. OREGON. FRIDAY DECEMBER 13, 1912. PRICE FIVE CENTS. VOL. LII-XO- 16,242. CUSTOMERS' STOCK BABY BOY IS BORN 2,000,000 EGGS FIND BUYERS IN' WAITING HOME RULE BILL READY FOR VOTE WEST INFLEXIBLE; FOUR MUST HANG IN TAXI, 12-12-12 COLLATERAL MINISTRY GETS OVATION AS OX DATE OF DATES SINCLAIR HOUSEKEEPERS' LEAGUE CON COMMONS ADJOURNS. IIETK ARRIVES. TINUES CAMPAIGN. BOWLEGS iiO WORSE RULES FOR PARCEL POST COMPLETED System to Be Effective on New Year's. MADE 0 1EES Witness Tells How Brokers Get Money. HEDGING ORDERS DEFENDED So Long as Commissions Are . Paid, All Is Regular. ACTIVE MARKET "CREATED' Former Jtembcr of yew York Stock Exchange Governors Admits Rival Could Furnish Balm by Raising Rates. WASHINGTON, Dec. 12. The high ways and byways of finance as trav ersed by operators on the New York Stock Exchange were mapped out be fore the House banking and currency committee today in Its "money trust' inquiry. Frank K. Sturgis, of the brokerage firm of Strong. Sturgis & Co., former president, and a member of the board of governors of the Stock Exchange, told the committee about the ways of the "street." The examination of Mr. Sturgis by Samuel Untermyer, counsel for the com mittee, was filled with technical ques- tloDS and involved digressions. Mr. Sturgis at times Insisted on long ex planations In answering questions and once flatly declined to answer. His counsel, John G. Mllburn, interfered to preserve the dignity of the occasion. Business Increases Rapidly. The testimony of Mr. Sturgis brought out the following points: "The membership of the Stock Ex change has' not been increased since 1869, when it was fixed at 1100. Since then the business done and the stocks listed on the exchange have increased about SO times over." Mr. Sturgis said an increase In mem bership was unnecessary. In a dozen recent failures, he admitted. Stock Ex change houses bad carried with them stock owned In part by the partners, but hypothecated by the brokers for more than the real ownership of the broker. In such esses the proceeds of the sale of the bankrupt broker's seat on the exchange goes, it was explained, not to the customers, but to his credi tors Inside the Exchange. Mr. Sturgis thought this was fair and Just. Customers' Collateral Used. Stock Exchange brokers usually use the stock owned in part by their customers as collateral to support their own loans, Mr. Sturgis said, re hypothecating the securities for a greater amount than is represented in the debt of the customer on the stock. He added that the governors of the Exchange would welcome any sugges tion that would put a Btop to the practice. Mr. Sturgis insisted the Stock Ex change could not prevent manipula tion of the market by pools and syndi cates He said they could not go be hind a transaction to discover a buyer or seller's motives. On this point Mr. Sturgis and counsel for the committee Wad a spirited argu ment. "Is It llgitimate ' f or a member of the Exchange to give an order to sell a certain amount of stock to one broker and an order to buy the same amount of the same stock to another broker?" asked Mr. Untermyer. Commission Is Chlel Point. "So long as there is no collusion and the commissions are paid It is not illegitimate." said Mr. Sturgis. "The Important point is that the broker's commission . be paid? asked the lawyer. "Yes. that Is it." "You know the object of that sort of a transaction Is to raise or depress the prico of the stock?" "The object is to create an active market." "A market that appears to be active, you mean?" "Yes." Mr. Untermyer sought in-vain to get from Mr. Sturgis his view of the posi tion of the trading public in such a transaction with the stock at a ficti tious figure, and finally objected to the form of the witness' answers. "You are asking me a moral ques tion, and I'm answering a Stock Ex change question." said Mr. Sturgis with a smile, and the committee laughed. The witness Insisted that the trans actions wen) beyond the power of the Exchange to discipline, so long as the commissions were paid. The relation of the New York Stock f.xchange and the Consolidated Stock Exchange came in for a share of Mr. Sturgis' attention, following the ex amination of half a dozen members of the Consolidated , Exchange, who de clared, the Stock Exchange rules forr bade Its members to do any business with the Consolidated Brokers or any one connected with the Consolidated Exchange. "You Just wanted to punish the Con solidated." suggested Mr. Untermyer. "No, we wanted to protect ourselves." "The Consolidated charges Just one half as much for commissions for doing the public's business as you do?" "Yes." "Hasn't that something to do with the ill feeling?" "Well, no. I don't think so." "If the Consolidated doubled Its com. Concluded oa Face 6.) Train Halts Early Morning Dash for Hospital and Stork Alights An other Birth on Steamboat. Born in a taxi on the 12th day of the 12th month of the 12th year of the century. What a story for little baby boy Sinclair to tell In after days. Tet that Is actually what happened, for yes terday morning at 7 o'clock from the window of a taxlcab this sturdy son of Mr. and Mrs John "W. Sinclair first saw the light of day. Just when speed and a clear road were vitally essential for the occupants of the car, on the way to a hospital, there lazily rumbled along the track a heavy freight train, blocking the taxi's progress and to the mother in her anxiety, the train seemed almost to halt and waver midway across the highway. Then. a. little further on a fruit wagon, its driver still partly In the arms of Morpheus, delayed the fateful Journey of the cab by its per ambulations, and so the child was born, not In a cot in the Immanuel Hospital, but in surroundings far more romantic. Once before Dr. Clayton Seamann, who was attending Mrs. Sinclair, saw the stork come flying rapidly, though that was when it brought a little girl to her mother on a steamboat. The proud father who Is an employe of the City Water Department, at Bull Run, was delighted to hear that bothj the mother and the child are "doing fine." TRIAL MARRIAGE FAILURE Mitar Krainovicb Says Woman lft With Another Man. An unsuccessful trial marriage of two months" duration was reported to County Clerk rnelds yesterday by Mitar Kralnovich, who on December 29, 1910, obtained a license entitling him to wed Dora Jobanoblch. In response to a letter demanding to know why no return, showing the ceremony per formed had reached the County Clerk's office, Krainovich came in yesterday and explained that he had decided not to be married until he had ascertained whether he and the woman could get along well together. At the end of two months, he said, she had left with an other man, taking the license with her. Under the impression that the first license had expired by limitation F. C. Ramsdell,' It developed yesterday, took out two licenses to wed Josie M. Black the first on April IB, 1912, and) the sec ond on June 19. 1912. He received s letter asking why no return had been made on the April 15 license and visited the County Clerk's office yes terday to explain the situation. Rams dell would not state why the ceremony had not been performed In April. GALES DISABLE STEAMER YVaterhouse Vessel Ockley, Part of Cargo Gone, Limps Into Port. SEATTLE, Wash, Dec. 12. A cable gram received tonight by Frank Water- house & Co.. said the British steamship Ockley, which was carrying a cargo of flour, lumber and general freight from Portland, for Hongkong and Manila, put 1n at Muroran, Japan yesterday in a disabled condition. The Ockley sailed from Seattle Nbvember 3. having come here from the Columbia River to coal. The Ockley's deckload of lumber was gone, four lifeboats were crushed and the steam steering gear was damaged. Delay in the arrival of the freighter in the Orient had caused apprehension lest she had been lost at sea. Included in her cargo were 5800 tons of flour, 1200 tons of box snooks, 400, 000 feet of lumber, 225 tons of oats, 70 tons of salmon and a consignment of fish loaded at Bellingham. The Ockley is the second vessel of the Waterhouse fjfet to suffer damage in recent storms" Sn the Pacific The British steamship Lord Curzon arrived at Yokohama, November 20 in a dis abled condition, 16 days overdue. W. P. OLDS IS PRESIDENT Portland Man Chosen to Head North PncUic Unitarian Conference. SPOKANE, Wash., Dec. 12. The North Pacific Unitarian Conference at Its annual meeting today elected the following officers: W. P.' Olds, Portland, President; C. L. Hamilton, Salem. Or., first vice president; Professor Edwin Start, Uni versity of Washington, second vice president; Rev. W. S. Elliott, Jr Port land, corresponding secretary, and Rev, S. A. Maedonald, Hood River, re cording secretary. r. M. Surruriorler, of Lyndon, w ash., and Walter Matson, of Vancouver, Wash., were elected directors. COUNCILMEN PLAY SANTA City Fathers as Body Pay Assess ments on "Widow's Property. As a Christmas present and one ur gently needed, the City Council will send a receipt in full to Mrs. S. A. Jor- genson. a widow, for all of her street assessments In Oakhurst Addition. This was voted unanimously yesterday at a special seslon: Mrs. Jorgenson has six small chil dren dependent upon her and is unable to support them and meet which, to her, are heavy assessments on the prop erty, 'when the case was stated to the Councllmen they agreed to pay It out of the general fund and to send her the receipts for Christmas. Which Is Greater Men ace Is Debated. JOHN HAYS HAMMOND JUDGE Members of Congress Argue at National Press Club. RESULT DECLARED DRAW Sulzer and Stanley Trace All Evils of Unman Race to Bowlegs and Penrose and Goro Denounce Knock-Knees as Atrocious. WASHINGTON, Dec 12. Whether bowlegs are a greater menace to navi gation than knockknees is still an open question, in spite of arguments made before the National Press Club tonight by Representative Sulzer, Governor-elect of New York, and Repre sentative Stanley, of Kentucky, In con demnation of bowlegs and Senators Penrose and Gore in vigorous denun ciation, of knockknees. Referee John Hays Hammond de cided that neither offered serious ob struction and read a cablegram from the International Board of Navigation In Berlin to bear h'm out. Before the debate began Mr. Ham mond forced the contestants to rise and shake hands, "to show there was no hard feeling." , Representative Sulzer attributed to bowlegs virtually all the diseases known to medical science, "from corns to consumption." He declared that history could show no bowlegged hero, while Moses, Socrates, Hannibal and scores of others "interfered" in their knees. He closed by quoting: A man knockneed Is a friend Indeed. Senator Penrose insisted there was no place in creation for the knock kneed. A man so afflicted, he declared, on going home from' his club in the early hours would be in a state of collapse in the road, while the bow legged man would be bowling merrily homeward. "The bowlegged condition," he said, "is due to a remnant of our physical trait when we lived In trees and climbed up them. The consequenoe Is that the bowleg is full of the vigor of the gorilla or of the primitive man." Representative Stanley followed with a sweeping denunciation of bow legs. Senator Gore assailed the framers of the Constitution because they had not grappled with the knockkneed ques tion "face to face and feet to feet." He admitted the problem was a knotty one, but added that the American peo ple had settled It politically "by send ing both the knockkneed Republican elephant and the bowlegged bull moose up Salt Creek as obstructions to navigation." Philadelphia "Women Find Supply . Unlimited at Low Price and Call for More Distributers." PHILADELPHIA, Dec 12. More than 2,000,000 eggs were retailed at 24 cents a dozen by the Housekeepers League today -in- the campaign to reduce the cost of living, started here yesterday. Six thousand cases of SO dozen each were distributed to settlement houses, stores and private dwellings and were all eagerly bought. Mrs. Deere, president of the league. Issued tonight a call for additional vol unteers to aid in selling the eggs and for more automobiles to distribute them. The quantity is said to be prac tically inexhaustible and she proposes to continue rbe campaign "until the re tail dealers who have been maintaining high prices have been taught a thor ough lesson." ' ' Retailers made a general reduction In their charges for storage eggs today, but few were as low as the prices set by the Housekeepers' -League. POSTAL BILLCUT DOWN Measure Reported to House Now Carries $278,489,781. WASHINGTON, Dec. 12. The Post office appropriation bill, aggregating $278,489,781, -Including 1750,000 for parcel post equipment and $25,000 for the parcel post commission, was re ported to the House today. The total is a decrease of $3,301,727 from last year's estimates. The Postoffice Department submitted increased estimates partly attributable to the expenses of the parcel post to be installed under the present law and to the postal . savings bank. The esti mate was reduced by the committee on the ground that .the estimates as to these projects are largely specula tive. Despite the Postmaster-General's re port of a small surplus for the fiscal year ended June 30, 1911, the post offic committee reported that there was a deficit of about $627,000 instead of a surplus o' $219,000 for that year. Similarly, according to the committee. the accounts chargeable to this year may make a change in the Postmaster- General's audited postal deficit of $1,745,523 for the fiscal year of 1912. I ' PORTLAND MEN TO BUILD Dr. E. G. Watts and Ray Pritchard Plan Rubber Factory at Stanfield. A plant for the manufacture of do mestic rubber goods and druggists sundries will be built immediately at Stanfield. in Umatilla - County, by Portland Interests, which have been incorporated as the Oregon Rubber Company. Dr. E. G. Watts and Ray Pritchard -are the principal stock holders. ,,' A site containing two acres was given the company by the residents of Stanfield. A contract already has been let for the construction 6f the factory. The building will be of brick construction, with ground area 50x100 feet. The company expects to be ready 'to turn out Its products early next year. About 15 men will be given employ ment. The company is now drilling a well on the site and arrangements are being made to supply Stanfield with water for domestic purposes. SANTAYES, AND YOU'D BETTER GET READY FOR FARM PRODUCTS INCLUDED Limit Is Six. Feet in Length ' and Girth Combined. INSURANCE PROVIDED FOR Added Fee of Ten Cents Will Entitle Owner to Recover Value of Package, . if Ijost, Within Limit of $50. WASHINGTON. Dec 12. Regulations to cover the workings of the new par cel post syBtem, which is to go Into operation on January 1. were made pub lic by Postmaster-General Hitcncocn today. The new system will be effective throughout the entire postal service at the same time. Every precaution will be taken by the Postoflce Department to have the malls moved with the usual dispatch and all postmasters, superin tendents and inspectors have been di rected to familiarize themselves and their subordinates with every phase of the new system. Farm Products nclmleti. Regulations provide that parcels of merchandise. Including farm and fac tory products (but not books and print ed matter) of almost every description up to 11 pounds In weight and measur ing as much as six feet in length and girth combined, except those calculated to do injury to the mails In transit, may be mailed at any postoffice for delivery to any address in the country. Delivery will be made to the homes of people living on rural or star routes as well as to those living in cities and towns where there is delivery by car rier. Where there is no delivery by carrier, the parcels will go to the post- offices. . . , Maximum Rate 13 Cents. The postage rate for the first zone. that Is, within the distances not ex ceeding 50 miles, will be 5 cents for the first pound and 3 cents or each aaoi tlonal pound. The rates increase for each successive one of the eight zones into which the country is divided, the maximum rate being 12 cents a pound, which will car ry a parcel across the continent or even to Alaska and the Philippines. For a fee of 10 cents a parcel may be Insured and if the parcel is' lost In the malls an Indemnity to the amount of its value, "not to exceed $50, will be paid. The law provides for the use of dis tinctive postage stamps and there is now being distributed to postmasters for use in the parcels post system a set of stamps of 12" denominations. Parcels post maps, with acocmpanying guides, are to be sold to the publio at their cost, 73 cents. ' A BIGGER ONE. Government Adheres to Programme, Including Welsh Disestablish, xnent and Ballot Reform. LONDON, Dec. 12. The committee stage of the home rule bill was com pleted In the House of Commons late today amid exciting demonstrations and counter demonstrations. The House then adjourned. Premier Asquith and his ministers received an ovation as they left the Chamber. The home rule bill passed Its first reading in the House of Commons April 16 by a vote of 360 to 2S6. Its second reading was passed May 9 by 372 to 271. The bill was then referred to committee of the whole house, but as home rule and Welsh disestablishment are being taken concurrently, the com mittee stage of the home rule bill was not reached until June 11. The Unionist amendmentsr which have been the sub Ject of long debate, covered 345 pages of the parliamentary paper. The bill received a setback on No vember 12, when In the debate on the financial provisions, the Unionists de feated the government In a snap dlvi sion by a majority of 22. After riotous scenes in parliament an amicable ar rangement was reached. The House, on the motion of the Premier, nega tived its original financial resolution, the amendment of which by Sir Fred erick Banbury led to the trouble,- and another resolution was substituted for it. The net result was to delay the progress of the home rule bill for ten days.', The government Intends to pass through the House of Commons before parliament rises prior to March 30 three Important bills home rule, the disestablishment of the Church of Wales and the reform of the franchise, the principal clause of which alms at putting an end to plural voting. POLICE ALARM IS STUDIED New System. Is Proposed to Notify Officer of Trouble. A complicated police alarm system. whereby It will be possible to find a patrolman in any part of the city when he is needed Is the latest innovation proposed for the Portland Police De partment. The plan was brought up at a meeting yesterday of the police com mittee of the Executive xioard, but no action was taken. The plan Is to have the system ar ranged so that lights will be stationed at convenient places on each patrol man's beat. In . case of a report of a robbery In a certain district the desk sergeant on duty at the Police Station, upon hearing of the trouble, would turn on the light on the patrolman's beat nearest to the scene of the rob bery or other trouble. If the patrol man does not telephone in within a few minutes a gong on his beat will be set to ringing and will be continued until the policeman calls the station by tele phone. The system as proposed would cost approximately $25,000. The police commlttefe yesterday, heard testimony In the case of Patrolman Staack and ordered the policeman dis missed from the service. He was ac cused of being asleep on his beat. BOYS PAID IN CAMPAIGN Hgu Wages Declared to Hare Been Indirect Bribe of aFthers. STEUBENVILLE, O., Dec 12. Addi tional indictments are to be returned by the grand Jury tomorrow in connec tion with the investigation into al leged violations of the corrupt prac tices act at the recent election. The Inquisition closed late today with the examination of a score of high school boys. They bad received $5 a day for passing circulars in the in terest of various candidates. It was believed $1 would have been sufficient remnueration and it was alleged the boys were employed to influence the votes of fathers and older. brothers. Attorney-General Hogan said this feature of the case was not a serious in fraction of the law. JACOB KAMMN0W DYING Veteran Steamship 3Ian Here May i Uivc but Few Hours. Jacob Kamm, the veteran steamship man, who. founded the business of which the O.-W.' R. & N. Company is the direct successor, is dying at his home on Fourteenth and Main streets and may live only a few hours. He was 89 years old yesterday. Mr. Kamm owns property in Port land and San Francisco with an ag gregate value of $3,000,0' 0, and until he was taken ill on December 1 con tinued in active charge of his prop erty. He had been an Invalid for five years, following an accident, and con ducted his work-from his home. His wife and four grandchildren are his only heirs. BARBERS DECLARE TRUCE Nonunion Sliops Agree With Others in Spokane to Enforce Rates. SPOKANE, Wash.. Dec. 12. (Spe cial.) The price-cutting war of the master barbers of Spokane was official ly ended Wednesday night when 90 per cent of the master barbers employing union journeymen and all of the non union shops, .against which the flglit was waged, signed an agreement to enforce the scale of prices in effect. " All barber shops will be closed at 8 P. M. and will allow half a day off on J1 holidays. Taylor's Sentence Is Commuted. 50 WOMEN PRESENT APPEAL Dramatic Scenes Enacted in Executive Chamber. MINISTERS ARE CRITICISED Governor Declares His Ambition Is to Abolish Capital Punishment. Believes Executions Will Aid .If in Accomplishment. SALEM. On. Dec. 13." (Special.) "I intend to do tomorrow what I be lieve will bring about abolition pf capital punishment most speedily. It those men do not go to the gallows to morrow capital punishment will not be abolished in this state during our lives." With this declaration today Gover nor West dashed the hopes of a dele gation of BO, from Portland, mostly women, who had come to make a plea for the lives of four condemned men who are to be hanged tomorrow. The Governor told the petitioners that he had commuted the sentence of John W. Taylor, sentenced to bo executed for the murder of A. H. Perry, in Harney County. Dramatic Scene Enacted. Before the meeting was over there were scenes of hysteria among some of tho women. With tears streaming down her face and her arms out stretched, Frances C. R. Grothjean, an artist of Portland, recenly from Ger many, . ran across the room -to the Governor, fell on her knees before him and prayed with emotion to spare the lives of the condemned men. Tears sprang Into the eyes of the women and many of them sobbed aud ibly as this dramatic scene was be-, lng enacted. The Governor attempt ed to soothe her as best he could, while other . women mingled their pleas with hers. Apparently, from what the execu tive said today, there seems to be lit tle hope for the men, other than Tay lor, who are awaiting the hangman's noose tomorrow. Minister First Speaker. The pleas made today were of wide range. The meeting was In charge of Dr. Nina E. Wood. The first speaker. Rev. Dora Baker, declared that she had come to present the spiritual side of the question, rather than the ma terial side; that the question has been looked at entirely from the temporal and physical angle and that nearly all the talk has been of taking away the men's lives, "when," she declared, "It should be a question of saving their souls, "God gave them their life and no one should take It away but God," continued the speaker. "These men have gone through the form of giving their lives to God, but they have nev er reached the full experience of hav ing been washed in the blood of Jesus. If we execute a man in his sin we forever cut off his chance of getting right with God and we plunge his soul into eternal darkness." Paper Prepared by C. E. S. Wood. Mrs. La Reine Helen Baker read a paper that had been prepared by C. E. S. Wood, Mr. Wood being unable to be present. In this paper he called at tention to the fact that but half, or less than half of the electorate had . been given an opportunity to express Itself on the question of capital pun ishment and he urged the. Governor to give the newly qualified electors an opportunity to vote upon it before reaching his final decision. He de clared that It would be an everlasting disgrace to the state should these men hang. Samuel E. Webb, business psycholo gist, spoke in behalf of Mrs. Henry Waldo Coe, who also was unable to be present. He said that Mrs. Coe made the plea, too, as an ardent suf frage worker, that the women be giv en a chance to express themselves on this question. ' Labor Has Representative. Alfred D. Cridge, appearing on be half of organized labor, asserted that justice is not given to those who come before the courts without the neces sary financial backing. He declared that when a man Is hanged It is due more to his poverty than because of his crime. He declared that, many a guilty man is freed by a Jury that re fuses to extend the extreme punish ment for a capital offense. Mrs. Lydia Irons, appearing as a mother, said that she felt the criminal should not be produced for the sake of hanging him. She expressed an opin ion that the fight made against the move to abolish capital punishment was a political one because the Gov ernor, its main champion, is a Demo crat. Governor Denies Prejudice. "Whatever has been said in the newspapers of Portland, or elsovhcre, has had no Influence on me whatso ever," was Governor West's answer to this assertion. Julius W. Knispel argued that we are (Concluded on Tago 7.)