fen INTERNATIONAL FALLS PRESS ^AGE FOUR CREDIT ALLY W FALLS ':M:- MODERN COMMERCE A AND BORDER BUDGET Head of 6redit Men's Organization* DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS Tells of,Dangers Whp It It Misdi H. J. MINER, Editor and Manager rectal btcred 11m, at the Post Offlce af Internatloaal Fa Minn., aa Secoad-Claaa Matter Holds That All Business Men Should Familiarize Themselves With General IN SUBSCRIPTION RATES: U. S.f $2.00 FOREIGN, $2.50 PER YEAR Principles. I ~.'u Northwestern Advertising Representatives BY H. TREGOE. "The Minnesota Select List (Treasurer National Association of 215 South Cth Street 799 Exchange Bank Credit Men.) Minneapolis' Si. Paul' Editor's Note—J. H. Tregoe is the Foreign Advertising Representative I ing to present programs we will in a THE AMERICAN PRESS ASSOCIATION 1 treasurer -of the National Association few years have an excellent/system of Credit Men. This fact alone indicates his knowledges of the principles of highwaiys. The use of automobiles TRANSPORTATION AND ITS upon which all our modern industrial for passenger traffic long ago reached PROBLEM. and commercial life is based. He has a point where it seriously cut into wasted few words in his article. Men the railroad passenger traffic. We Minnesota Governor Finds Answer in dealing in finance, production, or any may, however, lool? for a much greater Waterways and Motor Truck to form of activity wherein credit plays use of trucks for short hauls. Much a part* will- find his ideas of value, Railway Question. while to the layman it should appeal of their business is "new business" on the basis of being an authoritative but they will also take away from Points Out Economic Loss to World statement tending toward general the railroads much of the short 'haul in failure of Roads to Move Crops knowledges. traffic which has never been very When Ripe. profitabl to the roads but which has The industrial system of the world had much to do with congestion in BY J. A. O. PREUS, GOVERNOR All For One, One For All" would go crashing into chaos tomorrow terminals. tt OF MINNESOTA. if credit were destroyed. Our Waterways. The actual cash transactions of the In the use of waterways we have Editor's Note.—J. A. O. Preus, is Based on the Immortal Novel "Three Musketeers world today are small in comparasion gone backward rather than forward. governor of a great state whose with its credit transactions. Wipe This is partly because our railroads By Alexander Dumas wealth has long been dependent upon out credit and its issues and our money—except have been so efficient. No other its transportaion facilities. Its gold and silver—would be country in the world has railroads greatest products were wheat and worthless, our manufacturing plants which can be compared with ours. wood and the# former is still its most would be forced to close, our stores to Nor is there any civilized, commercial valuable out. Transportation, swift shut up, our railroads cease to run, nation making so little use1 of waterways and sure, has always been a dominant industry, business, manufacturing, do Europe's as we True, contour need in the state and its leading citizens production, would. be halted, there has given her better access to in all walks of life have devoted would be no "jobs/* no incomes, and the ocean- than we have, but she has much thought to the problem. Governor in place of system would reign anarchy. also gone much farther than we in Preus is no exeption as the developing streams and canals. following shew? rj: Credit is not a tangible asset. It is We have wasted hundreds of millions a spiritual thing more delicate than a 4- of dollars on our inland waterways. breath and yet strong enough to govern The transportation pr&blem has become No one in particular is to a world's work. It was endan-' the most important and at times blame. The main reason is that we gered in the World's War and the the most accute problem before the have gone on without any definite mere appearance of danger has been American people Previous to the plan, or where there was a plan, it enough to upset the economic balance nineteenth century, people got alorpg was carried out, if at all, only picemeal. of our country today. without any general transportation The public at large cannot realize systems. They lived where they could In the case of the Panama^ canal, the immensity of the credit system, get fuel, food and building material government however, our had a definite and how Jndispensable it has become at close range. Clothing was mostly plan, complete and went in and to commerce. Running back in history homespun. Commerce, such as existed, finished the job in a business-like to the days when living was simple by ship or caravan, was largely in way. The whole country has benefited and human needs few, "the exchange luxuries. There was no general exchange and no one questions the wisdom of commodity for commodity, of everyday necessities such of the expenditure. The states on the which we term barter, was sufficient as exist today. coast, east, south and west, however, to gratify the wants of men. Under" Under such circumstances a region are receiving the greater benefits such method there was. no commerce which was rich in some special and states in the north central group, as we think of it and social advancement resources but which, lacked in others, like Minnesota, get comparatively little was slow. With the increase could never hope for rapid development. benefit from the canal. of human wants and as society became The fertile plains of the central True, we have the Great Lakes, but more complex, the exchange of commodity states could produce food to support they are not open to the sea. When for commodity was insufficient millions of people, but those people we start a cargo from Duluth to Europe to satisfy men's needs, and needs ar^ could not reach the degree of comfort we must pay for a portage usually satisfied. In substiution for and culture which they enjoy today across New York state which costs barter, therefore, forms of money began without railroads to bring in an as much or more than the combined to be introduced as mediums of abundance of fuel, lumber, machinery cost of water transportation down the exchange. In the period of handcraft, and other necessites. lakes and across the Atlantic. when articlees of di*ess and for the In like manner the coal regions of Here Is a Remedy. satisfaction of peoples', wants were Pennsylvania, the cotton fields of the To remedy thi,s it is now proposed produced in homes, money as comtrasted South, the Lake Superior iron districts, that the United States join with Canada SA with credit was- sufficient for the orchard valleys of California, in opening up the St. Lawrence the conduct of business. 1? was not the copper country of Montana, river. The U. S. Army engineers sufficient, however, to stimulate commerce and dozens of other regoins would be have reported that for about $270,000,000 and bring it into a period, of intensiveness. limited to a small fraction of their docks and dams can be built With the industrial revolution, present output. which will permit all ocean going The Greatest Era. when power was substituted vessels except the largest leviathans for handicraft in the production of The greatest era of railroad development to come up to our lake* ports. Canada commodities and steam beecam^.the came during the twenty-five offers to pay half the cost,' making motive power for the transportation year period following the Civil War, the cost to us a little more than onefourth of these commodities from the point when a network of lines was built all of what we spent on the Panama of production to the point of distribution, over the continent. canal. The army engineers believe money was insufficient as a A group of sixteen central and that the horse power developed medium of exchange and there came western states, of which Minnesota is at the dams to be built will not only into its place the credit system to one, supplies 75 per cent of the wheat take care of the cost of operation supply the needs of the period. This 65 per cent of the corn, 100 per cent but will in time pay for the entire cost system characterized by great flexibility of the flax, 85 per cent of the iron of construction These power benefits developed rapidly to" serve human ore. 74 per cent of the zinc, and more Canada offers to share with us. needs. than half of the beef, pork, butter, The states which will benefit mo-.t Ancient System. 1 cheese, eggs, potatoes and beet sugar are those which receive the lesser From, the earliest days credit in produced in the United Stajes. benefits from the Panama, canal. That some form was granted in the relations The question now is: Shall we increase make things fair all around. would of men. As a great -commercial our producton of these things, We believe, however, that the entire system, however, it dated from the industrial as the demand increases, and exchange country except the private will benefit, them for things which can be revolution and based upon it interests now profit from which world commerce has becfome so extensive produced more easily and profitably Scene from tansfer of freight across New the and so complex, that credit elsewhere? Or shall we slow up and York. Soo has tonnage The Canal a begin producing articles which we is the real ally of commerce and without of seventy to ninety millions a year, DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS/»"THE THREE MUSKETEER?" it trading of men with one another now import? We can do the latter if while the Panama canal excteded 10000,000 it becomes necessary, but we prefer on a large scale and the huge for the first time in 1920. to do the former if we may. Our futur facilities for transportating commodities With the way open to sea, traffic the course depends upon our transportation would languish and dwindle away. on the Great Lakes will be doubled Cost Over One Million Dollars—Took 13 Months to facilities. The real nature of credits-being not or trebled. Werannot doubt that this The Rail Problem. material but spiritual, has gone beyond great agricultural and industrial region, It has been estimated that $4,000,000,000 the grasp of the casual thinker which includes Arnica's second, Produce. 12 Reels, Even Surpassing "The Birth would be needed to supply the and because of ignorance 'as to its fourth and fifth largest cities, tracks, terminals and rolling stock nature and uses, mishaps have come will send down through the St. Lawrence which would enable the railroads to upon our commerce. We are Jtoday a tonnage much greater than of a Nation" in Length. Two and One-Half Hours handle expeditiously an amount of suffering a depression because commercial Panama's. These states are entitled traffic such as they had to handle in credit was over extended and to a route direct to the ocean. 1917 to 1919. Before investors will put to uses for which it is neither designed There are several other waterway of Solid Entertainment contribute money to railroad building, nor intended for credit cannot projects which are worthy of consideration. it will be necessary to increase the be manufactured the printing presses Each should be investigated, earnings of the railroads. But there of Russia m^r turn out paper rubles and costs weighed against benefits. is a point beyond which freight and by the trillions, 1ut there is no human Wherever it can be shown that benefits passenger rates cannot be increased power in Russia that can force the exchange GRAND THEATRE exceed the cost, the work should without destroying the business. That of its flat money for commodities be expedited. Expenditures for piecemeal has become quite plain during the last at its face value. Credit is founded and haphazard waterway improvements a quarter. year and on real value and is never better nor should be stopped. What then must we do? We ^Sinnot worse than its underlying value. When get along without the railroads. We the governments of the belligerent FARMER 3 IN 1. International Falls, Minnesota must see that their earnings are sufficient nations borrowed billions oftheir people to enable them to maintain a for the purchase of President Harding at Farm Conference war munitions 3 Days-Starting Wed., Feb. 15th high standard* of efficiency, but we :—"The need of better financial and to keep their men "in, the field, must develop supplemental transportation facilities for the farmer must be apparent they were asking a form of credit systems if we want to continue on the most casual consideration extremely dangerous in' character for our agricultural and commercial development. it inevitably meant credit inflation. of the profound divergence between This must come along methods of financing agriculture There was .no underlying value, the two lines: Better highways and One Show Each Evening at 8:15 Sharp. Matinee Thursday and and other industries. The farmer redemption of these credit obligations greater use of automobiles and trucks who owns his farm is capitalist, was to rest on the taxing powers of Friday 2:30 P. M. Admission, Evening, 30 cents and 50 cents for short hauls 'and greater use of executive and laborer all in one. As the nations and these powers as we waterways for long-hauls and bulky capitalist he earns the smaller return now know are subject to and affected Matinee 25 and 50c ***£:. "Reserved Seats 75c articles. i'f on his investment. As executive he by social and political changes^ Most of the states have made a is little paid, and a§ laborer he is Credit. When the promoters, of an industry 'start along the rigHt lines in highway greatly underpaid in comparison^ to building, and if they, continue^accon^ ^(Continued on Lasf Page labor in other occupations.'*