Introduction 
xxi 
New York, who made $100,000,000 available to 
the market at high rates. For this accommodation 
Mr. Mitchell was severely criticized by Senator 
Carter Glass, a co-author of the Federal Reserve 
Act, and by other financial authorities. President 
Hazlewood, of the American Bankers’ Association, 
in his annual address before that body, September 1, 
had complained about the high stock market and 
the enormous total of brokers’ loans, so that the 
bankers passed a resolution condemning the situ- 
ation as dangerous and asking for a thoroughgoing 
investigation of brokers’ loans. 
Here is a picture that portended and predicted the 
disaster that came. In the rapidly mounting aggre- 
gate of margin accounts the unsoundness of the situ- 
ation stands revealed. From it many have hastily 
concluded that the new plateau of stock prices was 
wholly unwarranted and merely the result of insane 
speculation. 
But there is another side of the picture. Of 
course, a judge is not fitted to pronounce judgment 
until he has heard both sides. There is the story of 
the Irish justice of the peace who heard one side of 
the case which was so convincingly presented that he 
said: “Stop. My decision is made.” Whereat the 
opposing attorney cried, “Your Honor, you have not 
yet heard my side.” To this the learned judge an- 
swered: “I don’t want to hear the other side. It 
might have a tindency to confuse the court. The 
case is perfectly clear to me now.” 
However confusing it may be to study this intri-