PASTOR DAVE’S MUSINGS FROM THE HEARTLAND

May 1, 2024

SEMI-ANNUAL STOCKHOLDER’S MEETING

In the Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe Mystery Prisoner’s Base Sarah Jafee is the owner of ten percent of the stock of Softdown, Incorporated, a manufacturer of towels.  She had inherited it from her father, Arthur Gillman who was instrumental in the phenomenal growth which the company experienced during his tenure.

When asked by Archie Goodwin why she had refused an offer by Priscilla Eads to become a director in the corporation, Sarah told him, “I don’t want to get mixed up in it in any way at all. … She (Priscilla) said I seemed to be perfectly willing to accept the dividend checks, and I said certainly I was and I hoped they would keep coming forever, and they probably wouldn’t if I started butting in.” (p. 86 Prisoner’s Base, The Rex Stout Library, Bantam Books, 1992)

Later at a conference in Wolfe’s office to discuss the murder of Priscilla Eads, Oliver Pitkin, the secretary and treasurer of Softdown, makes the following observation about Sarah Jafee’s unwillingness to have anything to do with the corporation.  “Mrs. Jafee, I’d like to ask you.  What have you ever done for the corporation?  Tell me a single thing, small or large.  Your average income in Softdown dividends for the past five years has been more than forty thousand dollars.  Have you earned one cent of it?”  “My father did the earning,” Sarah answers (p. 157 Prisoner’s Base)

Everyone reading this article is a stockholder in at least five corporations: township, school district, county, state, and national.  Some of you are also a part of a fifth corporation, a municipality.  Each of the corporations provides a variety of benefits – dividends – which are designed to improve the quality of our lives.

There are a number of ways in which each of us can participate in these corporations.  We can seek to be an elected official of one of them.  Each of the corporations has positions which need to be filled by competent, public spirited individuals.  Corporation officials and employees are always looking for input and suggestions.

An important way for us to exercise our responsibilities as stockholders in all of these governmental entities is by taking part in the selection and election of the corporation officials.  Here in Indiana most years this happens semi-annually.  This May the focus is upon selecting persons to run in the municipal elections this fall.

In its discussion of the Festival of Booths, the Book of Deuteronomy says concerning the offering to be made to God: “They shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed; all shall give as they are able, according to the blessing of the Lord your God that he has given you.” (Deut. 16:16c, 17)  From this text we can derive a general principle that a person should support the organizations to which they belong to the extent they are able as determined by the amount of their blessings.  Even though Sarah Jeffers was greatly blessed by Softdown, Incorporation, she was not only unwilling to participate in a proportional way in the affairs of the company, she was unwilling to do anything at all.

One way that all of us who are stockholders in the United States of America, the state of Indiana, or various counties, school districts, municipalities, or townships can participate is by voting in the corporation’s semi-annual elections.  This is something everyone can do, no matter their station in life, their position on the pecking order, or their economic or social status.

Next Tuesday don’t be a Sarah Jafee.  Let your vote be counted.

(This article was originally published May 1, 2011.  Comments may be sent to davidh15503@embarqmail.com.)