There is not one moral, but many, to be drawn from the Decline of the New Haven and the Fall of Mellen. That history offers texts for many sermons. It illustrates the Evils of Monopoly, the Curse of Bigness, the Futility of Lying, and the Pitfalls of Law-Breaking. But perhaps the most impressive lesson that it should teach to investors is the failure of banker-management.

Banker Control

For years J. P. Morgan & Co. were the fiscal agents of the New Haven. For years Mr. Morgan was the director of the Company. He gave to that property probably closer personal attention than to any other of his many interests. Stockholders' meetings are rarely interesting or important; and few indeed must have been the occasions when Mr. Morgan attended any stockholders' meeting of other companies in which he was a director. But it was his habit, when in America, to be present at meetings of the New Haven. In 1907, when the policy of monopolistic expansion was first challenged, and again at the meeting in 1909 (after Massachusetts had unwisely accorded its sanction to the Boston & Maine merger), Mr. Morgan himself moved the large increases of stock which were unanimously voted. Of course, he attended the important directors' meetings. His will was law. President Mellen indicated this in his statement before Interstate Commerce Commissioner Prouty, while discussing the New York, Westchester & Boston - the railroad without a terminal in New York, which cost the New Haven $1,500,000 a mile to acquire, and was then costing it, in operating deficits and interest charges, $100,000 a month to run:

"I am in a very embarrassing position, Mr. Commissioner, regarding the New York, Westchester & Boston. I have never been enthusiastic or at all optimistic of its being a good investment for our company in the present, or in the immediate future; but people in whom I had greater confidence than I have in myself thought it was wise and desirable; I yielded my judgment; indeed, I don't know that it would have made much difference whether I yielded or not."