“Have you done all this in collaboration with the bankers?” I asked him.
“No,” he said. “They have a plan of their own. My next job is to make them accept this in place of theirs. That’s why I’ve been in such a sweat to get it done.”
“What inducement can you offer them?”
“Mine is the better plan,” he said. “It stands on its merits.”
“What will you get out of it?” I asked.
He looked very wise.
“That’s the crow in the pie, Coxey.” He got up, stretched, walked about a bit, and stood in front of me, saying: “I’ll get a place on the board of directors. I’ll be one of ten men in a Board Room. Everything else follows from that.”
ii
A railroad has its own bankers, just as you have your own dentist or doctor. They sit on the board of directors as financial experts. They carry out the company’s fiscal policies, they sell its securities to the public for a commission, they lend it money while it is solvent, and when it is insolvent they constitute themselves a protective committee for the security holders and get all the stocks and bonds deposited in their hands under a trust agreement. Then in due time they announce a plan of reorganization.