view of the “show institutions” mentioned in the Protocols. The American public is becoming accustomed to these “show institutions”—proposals which promise everything and then fade away into nothingness. It is one of the most effective methods of destroying the morale of a people.
When Mr. Baruch saw the heads of the two copper families, he says he found them willing to think of nothing but giving copper to the government—money was of no consideration whatever.
- Mr. Baruch—“They said that so far as the United States Government itself was concerned they would give Uncle Sam all the copper he wanted for his preparedness campaign * * * at any price that was decided upon. In order to arrive at some price we took the average price for 10 years which was about 16 2-3 cents; and that is how the price happened to be arrived at. At the time that they said this, copper was selling somewhere around 32 and 35 cents a pound.”
There, then, was a magnanimous thing! The government was to be given copper at half the market price. But did the government get it at this price? Wait—the story is a good one.
This unheard-of sacrifice of profits for pariotism was extensively advertised. The secretary of the Council of National Defense wrote a stirring story for one of the best magazines, in which he said:
- “Mr. Baruch first announced his presence in the tremendous task of mobilizing American industry by procuring 45,000,000 pounds of copper for the army and navy at about half the current market price, saving the government in the neighborhood of $10,000,000.”
Mr. Baruch himself, in his testimony, expanded with the generosity of it all. In an apparent mood of “help yourself to all you want” he said:
- “On inquiry we found that * * * the army and navy * * * wanted only 45,000,000 pounds, which used to be a lot of copper before we got to dealing in astronomical figures; and they were given all the opportunity to consider what they wanted. They could just as well have had 450,000,000 pounds as 45,000,000 pounds, because there was an open offer.”
