[Speech of Marion J. Verdery at the third annual banquet of the
Southern Society of New York, February 22, 1889. The President,
John C. Calhoun, presided, and in introducing Mr. Verdery, said:
"The next toast is 'The South in Wall Street.' What our friend Mr.
Verdery has to say in response to this toast I'm sure I don't know;
but if he proposes to tell us how there is any money for the South
in Wall Street--to give us a straight tip on the market--he may be
sure of a very attentive audience. Now, Mr. Verdery, if you will
tell us what to do to-morrow, we will all of us cheerfully give you
half of what we make--that is, of course, if you will guarantee us
against loss.".]
MR. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN:--When Colonel Fellows concluded his
speech and sat down next to me, after he had by his matchless oratory
electrified this audience and had immersed me in the flood of his
eloquence, both literally and figuratively, for in the graceful swing of
his gestures, he turned over a goblet of water in my lap [laughter], I
felt very much as the little boy did who had stood at the head of his
spelling-class for three weeks, and then was stumped by the word
kaleidoscope. He thought for a moment or two, and then seriously said,
"he didn't believe there was a boy on earth who could spell it." I did
not believe, after Colonel Fellows finished, that there was another man
on earth who could follow him. [Applause.]
Mr. Chairman, in the course of my experience I never knew of but one
absolutely straight tip in Wall Street. To that, you and this Society
are perfectly welcome. If you act on it, I will cheerfully guarantee you
against loss, without exacting that you shall divide with me the
profits. It is a point that the late Mr. Travers gave our friend Henry
Grady. [Laughter.] They had been to attend a national convention at
Chicago, and on returning were seriously disappointed because of the
failure to have nominated their chosen candidate. As they came across
the ferry in the gray light of the morning, Grady, who was seeking
consolation, said: "Mr. Travers, what is the best thing I can buy in
Wall Street?" The noted wit of the Stock Exchange replied: "The best
thing you can buy is a ticket back to Atlanta." [Laughter.]
Two old darkies, lounging on a street corner in Richmond, Va., one day,
were suddenly aroused by a runaway team that came dashing toward them at
breakneck speed. The driver, scared nearly to death, had abandoned his
reins, and was awkwardly climbing out of the wagon at the rear end. One
of the old negroes said: "Brer' Johnson, sure as you born man, de
runaway horse am powerful gran' and a monstrous fine sight to see."
Johnson shook his head doubtfully, and then replied, philosophically,
"Dat 'pends berry much, nigger, on whedder you be standin' on de corner
obsarvin' of him, or be gittin' ober de tail-board ob de waggin." And
likewise, it strikes me that any keen enjoyment to be gotten out of
after-dinner speaking is peculiarly contingent--"'pendin' berry much on
whedder you is standin' off lookin' on, or gittin' ober de tail-board of
de waggin." [Laughter.]
If Wall Street is all that spiteful cynics and ignorant fanatics say of
it--if we are to admit that it is a den of thieves, where only
falsehood, treachery, and iniquitous schemes are propagated; if there is
any ground for believing that all the exchanges are side-shows to hell
[laughter], and their members devils incarnate [laughter], I fail to
appreciate any advantage to the South in being there, and in no place
where her presence could not be counted a credit would I assist in
discovering her.
But if, on the other hand, we repudiate such wholesale abuse of the
place, and insist, for truth's sake, upon an acknowledgment of facts as
they exist, then the South can well afford to be found in Wall Street,
and if prominent there we may proudly salute her.
Wall Street is the throbbing heart of America's finance. It is a common
nursery for an infinite variety of enterprises, all over our land.
Innumerable manufactories, North, South, East, and West, have drawn
their capital from Wall Street. The industrial progress and material
development of our blessed Southland is being pushed forward vigorously
to-day by the monetary backing of Wall Street. The vast fields of the
fertile West, luxurious in the beauty and rich in the promise of
tasselled corn and bearded grain, are tilled and harvested by helpful
loans from Wall Street. Old railroads, run down in their physical
condition and thereby seriously impaired for public service, are
constantly being rehabilitated with Wall Street money, while eight out
of every ten new ones draw the means for their construction and
equipment from this same source of financial supply.
To all attacks recklessly made on the methods of Wall Street, it seems
to me there is ample answer in this one undeniable fact--the daily
business done there foots up in dollars and cents more than the total
trade of any whole State of the Union, except New York; and, although
the great bulk of transactions are made in the midst of intense
excitement, incident to rapid and sometimes violent fluctuation of
values, and, although gigantic trades are made binding by only a wink or
a nod, nine hundred and ninety-nine times out of a thousand, the
contracting parties stand rigidly by their bargains, prove they good or
bad. [Applause.] So much for the heroic integrity of the so-called bulls
and bears. Out in the broader realm of commercial vocation, and through
the wider fields of pastoral pursuit, it occurs to me this lesson might
be learned without any reduction of existing morality. [Applause.]
In Wall Street the brainiest financiers are congregated. Vigorous
energy, unremitting industry, clear judgment, and unswerving nerve are
absolutely essential to personal success. In the light of those
requirements, we venture to ask what place has the South taken.
Honorable Abram S. Hewitt in his speech before this Society one year
ago, said: "If by some inscrutable providence this list of gentlemen
[meaning members of the Southern Society] were suddenly returned to the
homes which I suppose will know them no longer, there would be in this
city what the quack medicine men call 'a sense of goneness,' and I think
we should have to send to the wise men of the East, Dr. Atkinson, for
example, to tell us how to supply the vacuum." Taking my cue from that
generous compliment, I venture to suggest that if the South should
suddenly withdraw from Wall Street, it would occasion such a contraction
of the currency in that district as would demand even a more liberal
policy than Secretary Fairchild has practised in purchasing Government
bonds. [Applause and laughter.] The aggregate wealth of Southerners in
Wall Street to-day is over $100,000,000 and the great bulk of that vast
amount has been accumulated within the last twenty years. That is to
say, "The South in Wall Street," has made at least $4,000,000 annually
since the war. Under all the circumstances, who will dispute the
magnificence of that showing? It must be remembered that the great
majority of Southern men on entering Wall Street were poor; so poor,
indeed, that they might almost have afforded to begin their career on
the terms that I once heard of a man in South Carolina proposing to some
little negroes. He told them if they would pick wild blackberries from
morning till night he would give them half they gathered. [Laughter.]
The Southerners of Wall Street, with but very few exceptions, entered
that great field of finance with but one consolation, and that was the
calm consciousness of being thoroughly protected against loss from the
simple fact that they had nothing to lose. [Applause and laughter.] A
hundred millions of dollars is no small pile when stacked up
beside--nothing. Of course we are not called upon to analyze this
fortune, nor do I mean to imply that it is evenly divided. Some of us it
must be admitted spoil the average dreadfully, but we all may get the
same satisfaction out of it that the childless man derived, who said
that he and his brother together had three boys and two girls.
[Laughter.]
The South is a power in Wall Street. She is identified with the
management of many leading financial institutions, and has also founded
private banking-houses and built up other prosperous business
establishments on her own account. It would be in bad taste to mention
names unless I had the roll of honor at hand and could read it off
without exception. The President of the Cotton Exchange and nearly forty
per cent. of its members are Southerners. One of the oldest and
strongest firms on the Produce Exchange is essentially Southern. That
private banking-house in Wall Street, which has stood longest without
any change in the personnel of its partnership, and which ranks to-day
with the most reputable and successful establishments of its kind, is
Southern in every branch of its membership. Seven of the National Banks
have Southern men for Presidents, and the list of Southern cashiers and
tellers is long and honorable. It was a Southern boy who, ten years ago,
counted himself lucky on getting the humble place of mail carrier in one
of the greatest banking houses of America. That very boy, when not long
since he resigned to enter business on his own account, was filling one
of the most responsible positions and drawing the third largest salary
in that same great establishment.
Another instance of signal success is told in this short story: Less
than six years ago a young Georgian tacked up a cheap little sign on the
door of a sky-lit room in the "Evening Post" building. To-day his is the
leading name of one of the most conspicuous houses in the Street, and
the rent of his present quarters is more per month than the first office
he occupied cost for a whole year. One of the most famous Southern
leaders in Wall Street to-day [John H. Inman] was so little known when
he first attracted attention there that many people assumed he must in
some way be connected with a certain great ocean steamship line, simply
because he bore the same name. To-day it is just as often supposed that
the steamship line is an offshoot from him, because it bears his name. A
great Italian painter once vitalized a canvas with the expression of his
poetic thought and called it "Aurora." In looking at that masterpiece of
art I have sometimes been reminded of this distinguished Southerner.
Immediately after the war the South was enveloped in darkness. Out of
that gloom this man emerged and came here to the East, where the sun
shines first in the morning. Judging him to-day by the record he has
made, we are warranted in saying that on coming here he adopted
Usefulness as his chariot, and that thereto he harnessed the spirited
steeds of Enterprise, Progress, and Development. To-day we see him
driving that triumphal car through the land of his birth, and making the
sunlight of prosperity to shine there. [Tremendous applause.] Sharing
with him the honors of their firm name is another Southerner, whose
career of usefulness and record of splendid success suffer nothing by
comparison. Two other Southern representatives, because of admirable
achievements and brilliant strokes of fortune, have recently gained
great distinction and won much applause in Wall Street. If I called
their names it would awake an echo in the temple of history, where an
illustrious ancestor is enshrined in immortal renown. [Applause and
cries of "Calhoun! Calhoun!"]
It is not only as financiers and railroad magnates that the South ranks
high in Wall Street, but Southern lawyers likewise have established
themselves in this dollar district, and to-day challenge attention and
deserve tribute. Under the brilliant leadership of two commanding
generals, the younger barristers are steadily winning wider reputation
and pressing forward in professional triumph.
One question, with its answer, and I shall have done: Are these
Southerners in Wall Street divorced in spirit and sympathy from their
old homes? [Cries of "No! No!"] You say "No." Let the record of their
deeds also make reply. One of them had done a thing so unique and
beautiful that I cannot refrain from alluding to it. It touches the
chord of humanity in every true heart and makes it vibrate with sacred
memories. In the cemetery of the little town of Hopkinsville, Ky., there
stands a splendid monument dedicated to "The Unknown Confederate Dead."
There is no inscription that even hints at who erected it. The builder
subordinated his personality to the glory of his purpose, and only the
consummate beauty of the memorial stands forth. The inspiration of his
impulse was only equalled by the modesty of his method. Truth, touched
by the tenderness and beauty of the tribute to those heroes who died
"for conscience sake," has revealed the author, and in him we recognize
a generous surviving comrade. [Applause, and cries of "Latham! Latham!
John Latham!"]
Turning from this epitome of sentiment, we are confronted by abundant
evidence of the substantial interest taken by Wall Street Southerners in
the material affairs of the South. What they have done to reclaim the
waste places and develop the resources of their native States is beyond
estimate. They have not only contributed liberally by personal
investment, but they have used every honorable endeavor to influence
other men to do likewise. Loyalty has stimulated their efforts. Their
hearts are in the present and prospective glory of the New South. They
are untiring in their furtherance of legitimate enterprises, and the
fruit of their labor is seen to-day in every Southern State where new
railroads are building, various manufacturing enterprises springing up,
and vast mining interests being developed. The steady flow of capital
into all those channels is greatly due to their influence. There is more
money drifting that way to-day than ever before, and the time will soon
come, if it is not already here, when the sentiment to which I have
responded will admit of transposition, and we can with as much propriety
toast "Wall Street in the South," as to-night we toast "The South in
Wall Street." [Great and long-continued applause.]