Home Ownership Assures Safe Government.

When the United States of America was founded its citizens were property and home owners; they loved their homes, they loved the soil and they fought for this love.

The Constitution and our form of Government were designed to be administered by property owners, by people who live in and own homes. So long as the majority of the people of this country are property owners, just so long will the present and the past principles of our Government be observed.

But progress is not being made in that direction today. People are getting away from the ownership of homes. This was clearly brought out by Herbert Hoover in Chicago recently. In an address before the National Association of Real Estate Boards, Mr. Hoover said: "In 1910 we averaged about 110 families for each 100 homes and in 1920 about 117 families. This indicates a shortage of nearly 1,500,000 homes even on the 1910 standard. An equally disturbing fact is that the tentative figures from the forthcoming census indicate that the total number of homes owned by the occupiers has steadily decreased, and nearly 60 per cent of our population are living as tenants, a larger ratio than many other countries. If we are to build up the stability and the happiness of our people, this is just the reverse of what should happen. Nothing is worse than an increased tenantry and landlordism in the country." If the trend away from home ownership continues, in two decades 75 per cent of the people will not be home owners, according to Mr. Hoover. Then we shall have a Government of people who are not home owners.

The average individual is strongly influenced by his mode of life, by his environment, and it does not seem at all unlikely that if the proportion of non-home owners becomes so great that legislation is enacted at the behest of the majority of voters, it will be inimical to private property rights. To large industrial companies and to those having private property-to every business man and every home-owning citizen-the menace of such a condition will be plainly evident.

Promoting home ownership is a problem for the Government, for the average citizen and for every business enterprise which bases its existence and prosperity on our form of Government. It is necessary that the idea of home ownership be sold to the people of this nation. Every effort must be made to stimulate interest in and a desire to acquire a home. In his address to the realtors in Chicago Mr. Hoover said:

"If we make a study of the suggested remedies for the situation we find they fall into two general groups: First, those that may be worked out by individuals or local community action; and, second, those involving the assistance of the Federal Government. As to the latter, I wish to say definitely that the Federal Government has no notion whatever of going into the housing business, either directly or indirectly. It will not fix prices nor wages.

There are, however, three fields in which the Government can be of important assistance.

"First, the Government must as a matter of primary duty drive out of business every combination that attempts to restrain trade; second, the Government to some degree directly or indirectly controls or obstructs the flow of credits, and it therefore has a responsibility toward this part of the problem; third, the Government can and should interest itself in dissemination of information, in scientific study of certain problems in materials and methods, and in co-operation with the industries to achieve voluntary reduction in wastes, that the costs of homes may be decreased.

"In the matter of credit the Government has considerable responsibility and must take constructive action to remove obstacles to which it is a party. I do not think you will disagree with me in the statement that the tax-free security has materially diverted capital that would otherwise be available for the building industry, and has resulted in increasing interest rates to home builders."

Probably the greatest problem is that of financing home building. It is of major importance that plenty of money be made available for home building and for financing those who desire to become property owners. In this connection, Mr. Hoover has joined those advocating the proposed amendment to the Federal Reserve Act making a larger part of the savings deposits of national banks available for building purposes. There is opportunity for a great increase in this respect, leaving an ample proportion of liquid funds. Mr. Hoover also suggests that it would be a constructive measure so to change the law that 40 or 50 per cent of the deposits in postal savings banks can be diverted to home building.

It must be remembered that the stimulation of home ownership is the problem of every citizen and institution that believes in and is desirous of perpetuating our present form of Government. "A nation of majority rule should be a nation of majority ownership," to quote Mr. Hoover again.-American Lumberman.

A Convincing Argument.

The existing housing situation ought to be enough to convince any one of the value of owning his own home, for it is the man who does not own his home who is digging deep down into his pockets for big rents these days, and he has been doing so for the past three years, with but little hope of a future letup in sight as yet.

The man who buys a home through the building and loan association pays his rent and secures a home of his own at the same time. The man who just pays rent pays his rent and secures a nice collection of rent receipts-and that's about all he has to show for it in the end.-Jersey City Journal.

A Union of Homes.

The Home is making progress. It will keep on from conquest to conquest until this old nation is a mighty and magnificent union of homes, inhabited by happy children and contented parents, presenting to a hungry world a wonderful example of the tried. blessings of Peace and Prosperity. The great, all-absorbing need of the world today is Peace-peace of body, peace of mind, peace of soul. The homes of America and the world are crying out for a chance-a chance to so stand united the world around that the common enemy of mankind will be impotent when the next effort is made to curse humanity with war.

Realizing this world condition, it would seem as though every statesman, every editor, every preacher, every teacher, every leader and molder of thought, would sacrifice every selfish interest to usher in the golden age of Peace.

It is a high calling that brings men and women in this great endeavor. Many businesses have their duties, their burdens, their responsibilities and rewards, but it is rare that any business is exalted in the high sense that is true of the savings and loan business. With all of the doubts and discouragements, the toooften meager financial returns, the inability to build up a business in which there is a personal proprietary interest, it is yet a wonderful privilege to be considered honest and efficient enough to be part and parcel of the great movement dedicated to the one great purpose of domiciling America in real homes. If our statesmen, in the hurry of their law-making days, could only see the importance of this work, they would minimize their departments of destruction and their secretaries of war and navy and make room for the Department of Home and the Secretary of Universal Peace.

But let not these ideals become an impudent boast, but let them blossom in your hearts as a glorious hope, supported by a stubborn faith, that in the fullness of time you and your comrades of many states and your successors in after years will finally work out the manifest destiny of America, and crown our patriotism by bringing every American family into the expanding chorus and all shout together the motto of our national organization, “The American Home, the Safeguard of American Liberties."-Walter F. McDowell, Tacoma, Wash.

$58,000,000 in Housing Construction.

Fifty-eight million dollars have been loaned by the Metropolitan Insurance Company throughout the United States to build homes and apartments.

The Chicago Trust Company, handling the loans for the Metropolitan Company in Illinois, Wisconsin and Northern Indiana, announces that in that territory $3,400,000 of the fund has been spread sufficiently to build 1,040 homes and apartments, while new buildings are now going up at the rate of 30 a month. These houses have been erected in 66 cities.

Code of Building and Loan Ethics.

By CHAS. H. TUCKER, Long Beach, Calif.

So far as I have been able to ascertain neither the State Leagues nor the United States League have a code of correct business practice, and as those who are Rotarians know, there is a committee in International Rotary now at work hoping to present at the International Conference of Rotary, to be held in Los Angeles, Cal., in June of this year, a code of ethics from each business classification represented in Rotary. It is not, of course, the intention of the Rotary Club to furnish to every line of business and to every profession such a code, but rather to stimulate the production of a practicable set of rules from within.

As a member of the committee it has been my privilege to see several excellent codes, but these have chiefly been produced in those lines of business not under the direct supervision and control of a department or commission under the state government. In other words, it seems to have been conceded that our clients are protected by the commonwealth and we in competition one with another are justified in conducting our business, within the law, without the slightest regard for Mr. Competitor.

We know of the inspiration derived from attending local group meetings and the conventions of the State League and a few have been privileged to gain the broader viewpoint of the United States League. Would there not be further inspiration to all of us under a code concretely setting forth our objects, aims and ambitions and our pledge one to another that profit alone is not the chief fundamental but that an additional element in service to mankind enters into every transaction of the office, and that in its broadest sense service may be accorded to competitor as well as customer?

I know of no group of men, take them by and large, more earnestly alive to the needs of the community than our building and loan people, but sometimes we permit the ambition to see dividends and surplus funds crowd back the desire to see about us a community of folks who are getting the good things out of life to which they are entitled.

The best paying business is not always the best business and when I say this do not imagine that I advocate a policy of loaning where there is other than absolute assurance of repayment. My reference is strictly to percentage of profit and all the profit that accrues is not paid over the counter in interest.

A lender may become embarrassed as well as a borrower and a variation from the strict letter of a rule in a settlement with him may bring business to that individual in a better light.

And on the other hand, live up to your rules for your own protection and the protection of your competitor. We have all heard from a potential customer what Mr. Competitor is willing. to concede, and as we gave in how silently we "blessed" the other fellow for his unethical methods. Mayhap he didn't, and

we were led into unethical practice by an individual who had no code of his own, whose chief ambition is to talk the other fellow out of profit, not that he may in turn share with someone else, no, rather that he may make twice as much, yours and his own as well.

This all seems very reasonable to me and I should like to see a code of correct business practice submitted for adoption at the next state League meeting and news of such action passed on to the United States League gathering.

It will be the amplification of the Golden Rule and the result will mean greater good to a greater number.

Juvenile Savings.

GEORGE E. GRAFT, San Jose, Cal.

Juvenile Savings is one of the most important subjects confronting the building and loan associations today. If we succeed in educating the youth in the habit of economy and saving, the future success of building and loan associations is assured.

The younger generation is the most fertile field in which to operate, for if the saving habit is not formed early in life, it is seldom acquired, to any great extent, later.

It is a source of great personal pleasure to me to be the means of starting some young person on the road to success. Every few days someone comes to me and says that he or she has accumulated sufficient funds in our association to defray the expenses of a college education; to equip an office on the completion of their college course; to start a small business of their own; or to buy a lot on which to build their home. Just such little conversations as this is what makes the building and loan business worth while.

We all accept investments of larger sums because we need the money to help build more homes, but the large number of small investors that come in with their savings regularly each month and the large number of small borrowers who pay their interest and reduce the principal of their loans each month are most desirable.

Building and loan associations were primarily organized for the purpose of handling just this class of business, and I feel that the more closely we adhere to the original building and loan principles, the more popular we will become with the masses.

A Few Cullings from Secretary Hersch's Kansas League Bulletin.

This is the last Bulletin to be sent to non-members during the year. They have been going to non-members as well as members, but from now on there will be discussions of the law, the different interpretations, the rulings and also comments on revising the law