Thoughts of going long were set aside in favor of getting along. Many big securities firms could have resumed trading last week because they have lots of surviving employees, facilities dispersed outside Manhattan and extensive computerized backup systems. But many smaller firms were harder hit because they were located in only one place. They would have been at a horrible disadvantage had trading reopened quickly, and their customers would have been hurt. That’s a major reason stock trading was canceled for the entire week.

The powers that be decided–wisely, I think–that it was unseemly, if not unsafe, to allow 75,000 stock-market workers to pour into downtown Manhattan at a time it was closed to allow thousands of emergency personnel to do salvage work, extract the dead and restore power, telephone and other services to the stricken area. That’s the kind of sensitivity and morality not often seen in financial markets. Correction: that have never been seen in financial markets.

The Nasdaq stock exchange, which was affected far less than the NYSE, didn’t open ahead of its arch rival. The exchanges battle bitterly for stock listings and trading volume. Because the Nasdaq is totally computerized–traders from all over the world deal with each other by computer–there is no central trading floor to be immobilized. The NYSE’s problem wasn’t its own facility, which chairman Richard Grasso says was unharmed. Rather, the devastation near the exchange’s building made the area unsafe, destroyed communications links and utilities and mass-transit facilities. Because almost half the NYSE’s trading volume takes place on its floor–the rest is done computer to computer–the exchange needs to have the trading floor operating. The Nasdaq could have taken advantage of the situation and reopened far sooner than the NYSE did. But everyone agreed to have all the markets open at the same time. The NYSE, in turn, cooperated with the Amex, which is owned by Nasdaq’s parent company. The Amex, like the NYSE, has a centralized trading floor, and its building is uninhabitable.

The Federal Reserve Board, which oversees the dollar, and the European Central Bank, which oversees the euro, cooperated, too. The Fed pumped about $100 billion into the U.S. financial system to calm the markets and provide liquidity, and swapped $50 billion of dollars for euros with the European bank so it had dollars to lend to European institutions. On Friday the Fed swapped $30 billion with the Bank of England for pounds, and $10 billion with the Bank of Canada for Canadian dollars. And the Fed and the ECB are likely to announce coordinated rate cuts.

One of the reasons all this cooperation took place is that Wall Street is a physical location, as well as a state of mind. The big fish and many of the small fry are located in Manhattan. Some of this, unfortunately, may change as a result of the attack. Something like 500 floors’ worth of office space have been destroyed or put out of action, and there’s nowhere near enough empty space in Manhattan to accommodate the survivors. The best efforts of New York City’s boosters and business-development types notwithstanding, many tenants will relocate outside New York City, and will never come back.

But human nature being what it is, self-interest cannot stay repressed for long, and Wall Street’s hypercompetitive players are likely to revert to type soon. Some politicians were unable to break character for even a week. Rep. Bill Thomas, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, said that a capital-gains tax cut–an item of faith in certain quarters–is just what the nation needs right now to help us recover. On a 1-to-10 scale of insensitivity and opportunism, this has to rate about a 12. Thomas said in an interview Friday that he was taken out of context and that he certainly isn’t trying to profit on human misery. A capital-gains cut, he said, is one of many things he’s mulling over to help strengthen a weakening economy, and that he doesn’t consider it a short-term recovery tool.

You will notice that I haven’t discussed the investment implications of this disaster. As the Book of Ecclesiastes says, “There is a time for every purpose under the heaven.” When they’re still pulling bodies out of buildings on Wall Street, it’s a time to mourn. It’s not a time to try to profiteer.