Through the years with the controller, then financial executive.

• Author: Heffes, Ellen M.
• Position: Financial executive magazine @ 75

This is part of a series compiled by the editors that highlights some key developments in the internal and external environment for financial executives by looking back at articles published in past issues of the magazine. Featured here: 1934 (the first year), 1965, 1979, 1986 and 2001.

1934, November, The Controller "Business Men Called on to Stop Drift into Communism or Fascism, " by Dr. Charles W. Gerstenberg, chairman of the board of Prentice-Hall Inc., which was his speech at the Third Annual Meeting of the Controllers Institute of America.

"One thing that I think we can do is to say that everybody who draws a cent, whether from relief or in pay from the Government, shall not have the right to vote ... The rest of us will tell him that he is our servant, and that we are going to make the rules that he will obey. That is the way we do it in business, and why not do it that way in government? There are certain counteracting forces there that you can see will compensate one or another and help the situation along ...

"What we need today, gentlemen, are men with intellects, men with the zeal of the brain trusters; but above all, and with them, we need men who are prudent and know when they face a situation such as you and I face that they must act or be acted upon. Face it and act."

1965, November, Financial Executive: "Officers and Directors--Sitting Ducks?" by Stanley L. Wallace, vice president, Johnson & Higgins, international insurance brokers.

"Probably no director of any corporation of any size is unaware of the existence of the current S.E.C. and stockholder actions against certain directors of Texas Gulf Sulphur. The papers have covered this unfortunate situation rather well, yet, the extent of the potential personal liability of a director or officer arising out of his activities as such is still probably not fully realized.

"Directors can be jointly and severally liable in most states. This could make a pauper out of a man overnight. And maybe his only sin was to take some committee's or some other director's word for something and vote 'aye.' Or maybe he never even knew of the event which created the liability he suddenly has to face. Maybe it was a matter of omission, perhaps a failure to supervise."

"There are plenty of cases where judgments have been obtained against directors and officers. There are unquestionably many more which have been quietly settled. Since, in the normal course, no report of these settlements is...