Слике страница
PDF
ePub

Act or become an influence in increasing the period of disability following industrial accidents.

(5.) The Act should fully safeguard the employe against the employer's insolvency, but the employer should not be confined to state insurance in accomplishing this result.

The committee have in mind that there is nothing in the present Law of the State of New Jersey, or in the bill proposed by the Commission of the State of Pennsylvania, which essentially conflicts with the declarations noted above, and believe that if a law can be passed in the State of New York embodying the same principles, it will be an important influence in securing uniformity in other states which have not now legislated on the subject.

The committee recommend that it be authorized to watch any bills on this subject which may be introduced in the New York Legislature during the next session, and to express opposition as to any features of such bills as are opposed to any of the principles stated above.

[blocks in formation]

THE PRESIDENT.-Some time ago the resignation of MR. GEORGE P. BRETT, as Chairman and member of the Committee on Commercial Education, was received and accepted with regret. I now appoint MR. THEODORE F. MILLER, as a member and as the Chairman of that Committee in place of MR. BRETT. MR. MILLER is particularly well qualified to act with regard to all educational matters, and fortunately he is able to give to the onerous work of the Committee a considerable portion of his time for the near future.

THE NELSON BILL.

MR. RING. It has been suggested that it might be well for the Committee on Foreign Commerce and the Revenue Laws to be authorized to appear before the Senate Committee when there is a hearing on the NELSON Bill in regard to which our Committee made a report to day. I would ask for authority if we find it necessary to go.

The authority was granted by an unanimous vote.

The Chamber then adjourned.

Monthly Meeting, Thursday, February 6, 1913.

A regular monthly meeting of the Chamber of Commerce was held in the Hall of the Chamber on Thursday, February 6, 1913, at half-past twelve o'clock, P. M.

[blocks in formation]

And three hundred and twenty-three other members.

The reading of the minutes of the meeting held January 2d was omitted.

REPORTS OF STANDING COMMITTEES.

JAMES G. CANNON, Chairman of the Executive Committee reported the following named candidates for membership and recommended their election:

FOR RESIDENT MEMBERS.

HOWARD C. BROKAW,
CHARLES F. DARLINGTON,
HENRY C. FOLGER, JR.,
ARTHUR M. HARRIS,
CHARLES W. KRAUSHAAR,
EDWIN A. RICHARD,
ROY W. WINGATE,

CHAS. G. WITHERSPOON,
FARNHAM YARDLEY,

WILLIAM ZIEGLER, JR..

Nominated by

JOHN H. ARMSTRONG,
JAMES TALCOTT,
NOAH C. ROGERS,
JAMES W. DEGRAFF.
ABRAM M. HYATT,
HENRY A. CAESAR.
JAMES N. BROWN,
CHARLES H. SMITH,
LOUIS WINDMULLER,
WILLIAM C. DEMOREST.

Seconded by

WILLIAM H. PORTER. SERENO S. PRATT. SERENO S. PRATT. WILLIAM H. PORTER. WILLIAM G. CONKLIN. A. BARTON HEPBURN. JAMES S. ALEXANDER. WALTER MCDOUGALL. EDWARD D. PAGE. GEORGE T. WILSON.

LOWELL LINCOLN and CHARLES T. GWYNNE being appointed tellers a ballot was taken, resulting in the election of these candidates.

By direction of the President the following letters were read by the Secretary:

LETTER FROM MRS. WHITELAW REID.

451 MADISON AVENUE.

DEAR MR. PRATT:

January 15, 1913.

I am sorry not to have acknowledged earlier your letter transmitting the resolution passed by the Chamber on January 2d. It was a notable tribute to my dear husband's memory from his old associates, who had shown him so many honors in his lifetime.

Will, you please tell the Chamber of my deep gratitude and thank them for their sympathy.

I am sincerely yours,
(Signed)

ELIZABETH MILLS REID."

LETTER FROM HONORABLE OSCAR S. STRAUS.

DEAR SIR:

"5 WEST 76TH STREET.

NEW YORK, January 7, 1913.

MR. SERENO S. PRATT, Secretary of the Chamber, has forwarded to me the resolutions, passed by the Chamber on January 2d, tendering to me and to the other members, composing the Board of Arbitration between the fifty-two railroads east of the Mississippi and the locomotive engineers the thanks of the Chamber.

I desire to express to you and through you to the members of the Chamber, my high appreciation for the commendation of the work it was my privilege as one of the members of the Board of Arbitration, to render to the general public in peacefully adjusting what appeared to us to be one of the most important industrial disputes that has arisen in this country. The entire matter had our most careful and deliberate study and consideration in the hope that we might not only adjust the then pending dispute but point out in a definite way a plan and method that would be applicable to all public service corporations in the future. How far or to what extent the conclusions we arrived at and the recommendations we have made may tend towards such a realization, the future alone will determine.

It is highly gratifying to me, and I am sure I can say the same for my colleagues, to receive from the Chamber of Commerce so distinguished a mark of its appreciation for the services we were designated to render, by the high officials who selected us as the board to pass upon this important controversy.

With the assurance of my highest esteem,

JOHN CLAFLIN, ESQUIRE,

Very truly yours,

(Signed)

OSCAR S. STRAUS,"

President, Chamber of Commerce

of the State of New York.

TRADE OPPORTUNITIES IN THE LEVANT.

THE PRESIDENT.-We are fortunate in having with us to-day the HON. GEORGE H. MOSES who until recently was American Minister to Greece, where he had an opportunity of studying the trade situation in the Levant. He has been kind enough to come here prepared to tell us something about the opportunities that offer in the Levant to American commerce.

I have the pleasure of presenting MR. MOSES to the Chamber. [Applause.]

ADDRESS OF THE HONORABLE GEORGE H. MOSES.

MR. MOSES.-Mr. President and gentlemen of the Chamber of Commerce of the State of New York :

The Levant is more or less of an elastic term. I suppose that as Americans we might say as DOOLEY said of the Philippines "We do know whether it is islands or canned goods." [Laughter.] Speaking broadly, I term the Levant that stretch of country running east from Trieste to Constantinople. In that territory there are at least eight millions of people having all the wants and desires of human kind elsewhere. Among them there are few factories. They are largely an agricultural people. Nearly all that they eat, however, has to be imported, and everything that they wear and use they have to import. Duties are high and prices are extortionate, but we would compete upon equal terms with all the rest of the world in that respect.

The trade opportunities for this country in the Levant are that we can sell them everything if we properly go after the business. In all that country there is no village of three hundred people or more where there is not somebody who has been in the United States, and who has made his ten thousand crowns, which make him comparatively rich at home, after he has returned. Therefore, the advertising for American products is already there. Yet I venture to say that there are very few villages of three hundred or more in that territory where any kind of an American product would be found unless it is something which has been taken back from here by these returning emigrants. Therefore the whole market is open to us.

Something however has already been done there. I never took the stereotyped view of the diplomat's duty. I believed it was as much my business as minister to look after the commercial interests of the country I represented as it was for me to attend a state dinner at the palace. When I went to the Levant I found we were selling practically nothing a little leather, and I think that is all. To-day we happen to be furnishing the two government monopolies in Greece with everything that they require; namely, the monopolies in kerosene and in sugar. In connection with the supply of sugar in the

Levant I have to say that I worked for six months without getting any kind of a response from anybody in this country, until I made a strong complaint to a distinguished ex-President of yours, MR. HEP: BURN, who promptly took hold of it and produced a response, the result of which is that I think in three years time America will be selling all the sugar which is used from the Piraeus east to Constantinople, and in Egypt. I will attempt to place before you for consideration a few of the principal existing opportunities for the extension of American commerce in the Levant.

First of all that part of the world is a cotton using country, and I doubt if we are selling any cotton textiles there to amount to anything. We are shipping raw cotton to England where it is being manufactured; thence it is sent to the Piraeus and trans-shipped to the near East. It has always seemed to me that we could quite as readily make up that raw cotton here and send out the finished textile from here and gain the profit. All of that is rendered the more easy because in the matter of freight rates Europe has no advantage over

us.

The freight rates from Liverpool to the Piraeus are substantially the same as the quoted rates from New York to the Piraeus. We have the advantage of securing a lower rate than the quoted rate because there are three direct lines of steamers now plying between the Piraean ports and New York, which come over here full of emigrants and a few of the agricultural products of those countries, and which go back practically empty. Therefore, in my opinion we could get a much better rate than the Liverpool-Piraean rate. It is my opinion that a very large market could be easily developed in the Levant for cotton and cotton textiles.

Agricultural machinery is also needed over there, but it should be of a type constituted for small draught animals. Most of the American farm machinery now sent over there is too heavy for the animals of the country to use, and the result is that the Greek peasant even within so short a distance from Athens as two hours drive in a carriage may be found plowing his field with a crooked stick exactly as he did in the days of HOMER, whereas he would be very glad, if there were a depot or distributing point nearby from which he could be furnished with a light draught plow, to buy an American implement. Tools that are used by mechanics are most primitive over there, and it seems to me that that market could be developed very rapidly and profitably. Leather goods could be sold, particularly belting, because that is a country which is now developing a good deal of hydro-electrical engineering, and they are buying their belting in central Europe. subject to all the difficulties of trans-shipment at some of these Levantine ports after it has been sent out by rail from the factory, whereas we would have a direct communication.

There are many public works over there which will soon be developed. As soon as the Balkan war is ended, and in my opinion it can last but a few weeks longer, there will be great exploitation in that part of the world. The port of Salonica will be greatly developed and many docks will have to be built; a connecting link will

« ПретходнаНастави »