HISTORICAL POTPOURRI

-“It was the same with those old birds in Greece and Rome as it is now. The only thing new in the world is the history you don’t know.’’ Harry S. Truman, quoted by Merle Miller in Plain Speaking, cited, The Reader’s Digest, October 1974.

-“It is a somewhat tired but still generally valid cliche that each generation will rewrite history to suit its own beliefs, discoveries and politics. That fact goes far toward explaining the evolution in the attitude of the historian, professional and amateur, towards the American businessman. It is safe to say, in fact, that no sym¬bolic figure in the history of our country has probably generated as much controversy in historical circles as the businessman.” C. Joseph Pusateri, Carroll Business Bulletin, Fall 1967, p. 9.

-“1974, in short, dramatically reinforces one’s understanding of the inscrutability of history. As we move into 1975, it might be well to keep this lesson in mind. History has a remarkable capac¬ity to outwit our best theories and to elude our most considered predictions. . . . We should not be depressed by the fact that history is inscrutable. Life would be far more depressing if futurology worked and our crystal balls were unclouded. So long as the future cannot be foretold, the possibility, at least, of human freedom is alive. The chance remains that individuals may make a difference and help shape their own future. There are doubtless irresistible tendencies in history, but they are inextricably mingled with accident, fortuity and contingency.” Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. “Thoughts for the Season,” The Wall Street Journal, December 27, 1974, p. 10.

—”Today is the Tomorrow you worried about Yesterday,” Anon.

—”The duty of the historian to respect his facts is not exhausted by the obligation to see that his facts are accurate. He must seek to bring into the picture all known or knowable facts relevant, in one sense or another, to the theme on which he is engaged and to the interpretation proposed.” Edward H. Carr, as quoted in Accountancy and Economic Development, A. J. H. Enthoven, North Holland Publishing Co., 1973, p. 9.

—”The past cannot supply us with the necessary models of action for the future. But a renewed awareness that the willingness of American industry to break with past precedents was crucial in the rapid and successful building of a national community of continental proportions can be as important as the insistence on seeing the results of achievement in planning for a new kind of expansion in the space age.” Margaret Mead, “Must Capitalism Crawl?” Harvard Business Review, November-December 1962.

—”Regarding the entity viewpoint, an English writer, Walter W. Snailum, in 1910 wrote as follows: ‘For the purposes of book¬keeping treat capital as a liability—treat it just as if it were a debt payable,’ The entity theory is also accepted nowadays by many accounting writers and teachers. Thus there is plenty of account¬ing theology to support Barnes’ position that ‘all costs of capital should be tax-deductible.’ ” Dean S. Eiteman, “Letters,” The Wall Street Journal, October 28, 1974, p. 9.

—”It is revolting to have no better reason for a rule of law than that . . . it was laid down in the time of Henry IV. It is still more revolting if the grounds upon which it was laid down have vanished long since and the rule simply persists from blind imita¬tion of the past.” Oliver Wendell Holmes, in The Common Law, as quoted by Robert Downes, Dean of Libraries, University of Illinois.

—”The message of Fogel and Engerman is that economic history can no longer be personalized fictions based on fragmentary evidence. Their evidence is clear—slavery worked smoothly and efficiently in a market economy. That does not make slavery good, but it does make our understanding of it different from what the traditional historians, the disguised novelists, have told us for the last 100 years.” Aaron B. Fuller, “Letters,” The Wall Street Journal, December 9, 1974, p. 23.

—”Readers seeking some consolation for Watergate and 89-cents a pound sugar might enjoy Otto L. Bettman’s The Good Old Days—They Were Terrible! Compiled and written by the founder of the celebrated Bettman Archive of Illustrations in New York, this picture and text volume portrays every nasty aspect of Ameri¬can life three or four generations ago, especially in cities. ‘In the good old days, the air was foul, the streets were filled with garbage, the politicians were corrupt, the mugger was every¬where and the milk was contaminated.”‘ Roger Ricklefs, “The Bookshelf,” The Wall Street Journal, December 10, 1974, p. 24.

—”The trouble with trying to rewrite history to suit your short term political advantage is that, in the long run it doesn’t work.” Carl Albert, Speaker of the House, as quoted in The Birmingham Post-Herald, December 21, 1973, p. A6.

—”Saul Levy felt that ‘it is apparent that from the British point of view, not only for the practitioners, but even for the students who hope to enter practice some day, a detailed familiarity with these cases (common law liability precedents) is indispensable equip¬ment.’ Since the mistakes of the past have a tendency to repeat themselves in the future, we should adopt a similar attitude toward our own available judicial material.” A. H. Adelberg, “A Review of Major Cases on Accountants’ Legal Liability,” The Georgia CPA, Volume 16, No. 1, Fall 1974, pp. 12-24.

—”A sense of historical perspective is evidence of maturity of pro-fessions as well as of individuals. No man can truly understand his own profession until he is capable of relating it to the past, the present and the future.” Alvin R. Jennings, Past President, AICPA, as quoted by Robert I. Dickey, The Accounting Review, July 1974, p. 647.

(Vol. 2, No. 1, p. 8, 1975)

—”This, the world of affairs, is the domain of the accountant. It is his mission to perceive it, to analyze it, to bring order to it, to portray it, and the more complex this world becomes, the more demanding become the tasks of the accountant. Thus there has been a direct historical relationship: public accounting as we know it today was born in the nineteenth century in response to needs generated by the Industrial Revolution, to the application of power to machines to which human skill and a measure of human intelligence had been transferred. These irresistible tech-nological forces quickly became the economic forces which created the factory system, demanded large aggregates of capital, increased commerce by orders of magnitude, and led to the creation of that singular legal entity the corporation.” R. H. Roy and J. H. MacNeill, Horizons for a Profession, AICPA, 1967, pp. 44-45.

—”It was Lord Acton, the British historian, who said, ‘All power tends to corrupt: absolute power corrupts absolutely.'” The Freeman, April 1975, p. 244.

—”The historian . . . is by nature a man of thoughtful and studious habits utterly incapable of appreciating the roaring energy of a soldier. . . . In peace the scholar flourishes, in war the soldier dies; so it comes about that we view our soldiers through the eyes of scholars and attribute to them scholarly virtues.” George S. Pat-ton, Jr., The Secret of Victory, 1926, as quoted in the Prologue to The Patton Papers, 1885-1940.

—”The OPEC oil cartel is developing small cracks.. . . To put things in perspective, it might be useful to take a stroll down the memory lane of cartels. They are nothing new. Adam Smith observed in 1776 that ‘People in the same trade seldom meet together even for merriment or diversion, but the conversation ends in a con¬spiracy against the public or in some contrivance to raise prices.’ History teaches us, also, that a cartel only works so long as demand is so insensitive to price that higher prices will increase the seller’s total revenue. . . . First, there was the salt cartel of 1301, then the Alum cartel of 1470. Winston Churchill even started one. None lasted forever.” A. Gary Shilling. “Lessons of History for OPEC,” The Wall Street Journal, March 10, 1975, p. 12.

—”Men are haunted by the irreversibility of history. Looking back at possible pivotal moments in human affairs we may wish that former options—if they were options—were open again. But in these hindsights, no matter how well informed, no matter how detailed, no matter how objective, we nevertheless simplify, select, and interpret what we know, while still there remain factors that we don’t know—which reminds us how much history is per-meated with opinion and how linked it is with art.” Edmund Fuller, “Hindsights on History’s Poker Game,” The Wall Street Journal, March 14, 1975.

—”If we falter, freedom is shaken everywhere. And I don’t say this because I am a jingoist or a chauvinist. I say it because I’ve been around a long time, because I read maps, because I read history and because I can count.” George Meany, President of AFL-CIO, “Notable & Quotable,” The Wall Street Journal, March 14, 1975.

—”There are certain periods in history when greater numbers of suckers are likely to be found. The period following the First World War when Charles Ponzi began his scheme was one such time. . . .” Bob Dunn, “The Ponzi Game,” Family Weekly, April 27, 1975, p. 4.

—”Old habits die hard, especially when they serve specific parties at concealed costs to others,” R. J. Chambers, Securities and Obscurities, Grower Press, Sydney, 1972, Preface.

—”I know a little about the past and I know next to nothing about the future—in contrast with some other members of my profes¬sion.” Arthur Burns, (sarcastically) to a Senate Committee, U.S. News & World Report, March 31, 1975, p. 4.

(Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 3, 1975)

—”In the history of man’s attempts to preserve integrity in the realm of financial transactions, some continuity in the insurance of such honesty can be seen from century to century. The passage of laws and the accretion of custom have aided; occasionally govern¬ment itself operated a medieval bank of exchange.

However, in that area of financial honesty concerned with protecting the un¬wary investor from the fraudulent activities of the dishonest stock¬broker or issuer of securities, no faintest semblance of orderly progression can be found. The actions and the experience of one century seemingly have no connection with the legislative flurries in a subsequent period and the observer is acutely aware of an utter lack of continuity. Only one thing remains in common in several centuries of legislative efforts to regulate the exploiter of the investor. Inevitably such attempts come only when the dis¬astrous results are seen in retrospect. Calamity must befall those who have ventured their funds before protective measures may be launched.” Ralph F. De Bedts, The New Deal’s SEC: The Forma¬tive Years, Columbia University Press, New York, 1964, p. 1.

—”Great figures of the past were engaged in essentially individual activity.” Today “it is institutional ‘teams’—not individual scien¬tists single-mindedly pursuing basic knowledge—who are ac-counting for most of the important research applications.” Loren C. Eisely, “If Human Race is to Survive into the Next Century. . .,’ U.S. News & World Report, March 3, 1975, p. 43.

—”Look at Jewish history. Unrelieved lamenting would be intoler¬able. So, for every 10 Jews beating their breasts, God designated one to be crazy and amuse the breast-beaters.’’ MeI Brooks, “Notable & Quotable,” The Wall Street Journal, April 4, 1975.

—”History is nowhere near as trendy as the current events and social studies courses that are often substituted for it. . . . The ability to see things from a historical perspective is an essential part of a liberal education, not because it provides foolproof in¬sight into contemporary problems, but because it usually offers enough clarity to temper judgments and cool passions.” “His¬tory Isn’t Bunk,” The Wall Street Journal, August 18, 1975, p. 8.

—”Sometimes we have to change the truth in order to remember it.” Santayana, as quoted in Time, July 28, 1975, p. 57.

—”Evidence from many stable areas indicates that sea level has risen slowly during the past 6,000 years, with. a total change of six meters. Since the same period is also important to the history of early man, the rise in sea level explains the widespread sub¬mergence of living sites and other human relics along coasts where ancient man lived.” Francis P. Shepard, as quoted in “Hunting History Offshore,” Exxon, USA, Second Quarter, 1975, p. 30.

(Vol. 2, No. 3, p. 4, 1975)