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REAL ESTATE B UILDERS 5)-»n®B Vol. CIL NEW YORK, DECEMBER 7, 1918 No. 2.Í Leading Business Men Take Up Peace Problems Under Direction of U. S. Chamber of Gommerce, Plan for Readjustment of Internal and Enlargement of Foreign Trade (Special to the Record and Guide) Atlantic City, December 5, 1918. READJUSTMENT not reconstruction is the desig- nation of the period upon which the United States is entering, adopted by the thotisands of repre- sentative business men assembled in convention here this week to study and solve post-war problems. At this writing it is not possible to more than indicate the course upon which this readjustment is to be carried out. But there have been some signiíĩcant pointers that a complete return to all the methods of doing business which were in operation before the war is not anticip- ated nor encouraged. The dominant idea, voiced by every speaker and echoed by the entire assemblage, is that a new era has been entered upon in which at Isst some of the conditions prevailing only two or three years ago have been materially altered and that these changed conditions, together with the knowledge ac- quired and the lessons learned during the war, will enforce difFerent standards in the conduct of business in the years to come. Never before has there been in this country such a gathering of leaders in the commercial world as the Chamber of Commerce of the United States has suc- ceeded in bringing together here for a four-day con- ference. There may have been as large assemblies in point of numbers but none before so thoroughly rep- resentative of every phase of business, and in which the delegates were of such commanding importance. .\tlantic City is famous for having been the meeting place of large bodies of men called together for the pur- pose of conference or action on various questions rang- ing from business to religion but usually restricted to one or a few lines of inquiry and resulting in compar- atively limited procedure. These occasions have usually been part business and part junket, with the latter fea- ture predominating. But it was evident the first day of this convention that the only thought in the mind of every man was to get to work upon the program outlined by the ofîicials of the Chamber of Commerce, and to effect, if possible, at the earliest moment, a broad gauge scheme for bring- ing back to normal conditions a business world that had been so seriously upset by the events of the last four years. While the convention was called by the Chamber of Commerce, it is not a meeting of that body. It's mem- bership is composed of the business men who formed themselves, in trade units, into War Service Commit- tees to assist the Government in handling its war prob- lems by expert advice and colaboration. There are 381 of these cominittees, and the Chamber of Com- merce, in planning the convention, divided them into 36 groups of related industries. Practically all of these War Service Committees are represented at the con- vention, thcre being between four and five thousand men in attendance who have the right to take part in its deliberations. Among the principal groups are those producing or manufacturing building materials, and these interests have formed the Federation of Build- ing Industries, which will hold meetings later in the week. Whether these War Service Committees will con- tinue to work on peace problems, or will be formed into an organization with central directing oíificials, or whether their future activities will be merged into and be controlled by the Chamber of Commerce, is as yet nndecided. But the latter plan is more likely, because the Chamber of Commerce has now in organization and membership become recognized as an essential and strong factor in the business establishment of the coun- try. If the War Service Committees decide to work within its organization, it can easiiy become extremely powerful. What makes this convention particularly notable is that the delegates are the really leading men in their respective lines. Presidents and Vice-Presidents and General Managers of Companies, the heads of firms, not the second or third rate employes of these concerns have come together because of their desire to know at first hand what the other men in their lines of business were thinking as to conditions brought abotit by the sudden cessation of hostilities and the no less sudden plunge of the world into an unprepared-for peace. It is not to be disguised that the prevailing feeling in the early hours of the convention was one of pessimism. This was due to the fear of impending labor troubles ; of the overhanging menace of large supplies of raw and nianufactured goods in the Government store houses, which might be dumped on the markets with demoralizing effect; of the uncertainty as to the terms under which cancellation of Government contracts would be effected ; of the lack of knowledge as to cost of products and materials when Governmental restrictions were removed and to many other unanswered ques- tions, which until they are solved, act as a bar to thc resuiiiption of business on the former basis. This feeling of pessimism was not allayed during thc hundreds of meetings held the first day of the conven- tion by the different groups of men. For one who had anything good to report there were a dozen who could argue and prove to his own satisfaction, and generally to that of his hearers, that never were things in such bad shape. These statements were gen- erally of local or personal conditions. In the aggregate it seemcd as if the whole country was on the verge of panic and ruin—with Bolshevism lurking in the back- ground. These meetings were held for the purpose of getting