ESTABLISHMENT  OF  THE  SYSTEM  13

The  fear  of  such  competition  appears  to  have
been  the  chief  cause  of  the  almost  unanimous  opposition ­
  on  the  part  of  the  members  of  the  banking ­
  fraternity  to  all  postal  savings  bank  proposals. ­
  Senator  Cummins  of  Iowa  said  in  the
Senate:  “The  banks  of  the  United  States  are
opposed  unanimously  to  the  institution  of  a  postal ­
  savings  system.  ...  I  venture  the  assertion
that  during  the  nearly  two  years  that  I  have  been
a  member  of  this  body  ...  I  have  received  the
protests  of  nearly  every  bank  in  my  State  against
any  such  scheme,  and  those  protests  have  usually
been  accompanied  by  a  very  large  number  of  petitions, ­
  secured,  I  have  no  doubt,  through  the  industry ­
  and  energy  of  the  bank  officers.” 21
The  American  Bankers  Association,  through
the  Postal  Savings  Bank  Committee  of  its  Savings ­
  Bank  Section,  carried  on  for  nearly  three
years  an  active  propaganda  against  postal  savings ­
  bank  legislation,  maintaining  an  active  opposition ­
  at  Washington, 22  and  distributing  over
the  country  an  immense  amount  of  literature. 23
p.  354.  Cf.  also  William  Lewins,  History  of  Savings
Banks,  pp.  322  et  seq.
21  Cong.  Rec.,  June  20,  1910,  pp.  8811-8812.
22  Cf.  Chronicle,  American  Bankers  Association  Convention ­
  Supplement,  1909,  pp.  207,  208  and  211.
23  The  following  is  an  illustration  of  the  character  of  the
campaign  which  the  Committee  on  Postal  Savings  Banks
conducted.  On  November  24,  1908,  when  the  Carter  Postal