Suppose all the insurance companies have been doing business on the same scale, and have tied up billions of the people's money in such schemes as New Hampshire Traction, and the people, learning these facts, should demand their savings to the extent of the $9,000,000,000 which they have deposited in banks and trust companies, what would happen? What would happen to the undigested securities, the insurance companies, the people's savings, and the policies such as "Buffalo" says he has purchased for the benefit of his family?
This statement precipitated a perfect flood of letters and queries, growing more urgent as the month wore on. It was impossible to answer all of them. I contented myself with replying to the letter of a prominent Philadelphia church-man, a policy-holder in the New York Life, who wrote as follows:
Philadelphia, September 23, 1904.
Mr. Thomas W. Lawson,
Boston, Mass.
My Dear Sir: I have just finished reading the current article on "Frenzied Finance," and like "Buffalo" I am astounded at your statements regarding the "New York Life." I, too, have a policy in that company and have been led to believe that I was not only insured in the best and most conservative company, but that I had a first-class and perfectly safe investment as well. This particular company claims that not a dollar of its assets is invested in stocks of any kind, and yet, to quote from your article:
"The insurance companies use the billions the people have placed with them to buy or create banks and trust companies, the stocks of which are a large part of their assets."
Either you are manifestly unfair or else the company is guilty of deliberate falsehood for the purpose of deceiving the public.
As a policy-holder and prospective sharer in the surplus of the "New York Life," I am much interested in knowing whether its statements in regard to its investments are to be relied upon.
Will you take just a moment to answer the following question? Is the "New York Life" telling a falsehood when it states that not a dollar of its assets is invested in stocks of any kind?