Salt Lake Tribune | 1908-01-11 | Page 12 | Blames Roosevelt for Money Flurry

BLAMES ROOSEVELT FOR IIEHLI1M Charles E. Watkins, a .Boston Financier and Mining Man, Expresses Views. EAST FEELS KINDLY TOWARD THE WEST Says Money Is Easy Now, at Reasonable Rate of Interest. Charles E. Watkins of Boston, Mass., ono of the most; influential mining operators op-erators in the Eastern States, arrived in Salt Lake, Friday night, from Boston. Bos-ton. He is accompanied hy several prospective investors and the party will leave Monday for his mining properties prop-erties in this State. Mr. Watkins is somewhat "ruffled" over President Roosevelt's course of procedure in the recent financial flurry and in tho events which preceded tho panic. "1 am voicing a good many opinions prevailing among the moneyed men of the Bast when T say t.hero can be little question but that President Roosevelt acted very hastily in many things' which preceded the money stringency strin-gency and in tho events subsequent to tho "panic," declared Mr. Watkins, Friday night. "Of course wc all love and respect our President. butvwo can not help but feel r.hat had he not been so quick to-jump into the thick of trouble trou-ble and sottlc it all In a minute and according to his own observation, things might have worked out different-. Ho is something of a meddler. West Not Responsible. "One thing about the flurry in tho East is that no one there holds the West responsible for the situation that has prevailed for the past two months or more. The East knows right where to put the blamo for the conditions, and the West has gained, if anything, in prestige by the manner in which tho country has come through the trouble. "1' have had no trouble raising all tho money I needed to work on my properties, and lately nt very fair rates of interest. "Wo are all confident back there that tho copper market will go up again. It depends now a good deal on tho policy of the national government, headed by President Roosevelt, us to what will happen. The President is being freely criticised in the East by men who, while they havo not suffered a great deal in the panic, have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars as a result of it. "I had a splendid trip over the mountains, with the trains running on time." With President Watkins is Wallace Wcstcrman, an Eastern attorney.