The Sun.
London, England, 1854-11-23 00:00:00

TIZE FINANCES OP RUSSIA.

(From the Pays.)
In addition to the political questions so ardently
raised by the Eastern conflict, and to the emo-
tioos and anxiety which result from the sanguinary
struggle undertaken against the ambition of Russia
in the name of European right, public opinion is
naturally preoccupied with the financial situation
of the States engaged in the present war. We pro-
pose to ourselves to examine the resources, which
their own riches and their admirable systems of
credit place at the disposal of the Western powers.
It will be easy for us to prove that these resources
are immense and inexhaustible, and that modern
civilisation will no more want money than they
will soldiers to repress and reduce to weakness the
Muscovite policy. In the first place, however, we
will show what is the state of the finances of Rus-
sia, and the pecuniary force with which she will
support the struggle that she has provoked. There
interesting
work, just appeared on this subject an
work, evidently written under the immediate inspi-
ration of the Government of St. Petersburg and
signed by M. L. Tegoborski. The object or this
work is to prove the excellent situation of the Rus-
sian finances, and the power which it gives tothe
policy of the Czar, and- nevertheless we could not
wish for any better proof of the dangers which
threaten the Russian Empire and the financial
abyss which the war has already dug under its feet.
Russia from the avowal of M. Tegobroski himself
has a floating debt of five milliard; of francs. We
often feel alarm in France, a rich, productive, and
manufacturing country, where the science and the
mechanism of credit have made such remarkable
progress, at the existence of a floating debt of from
600 to 700 millions, and at the crisis which would
be caused if the reimbursement of this capital were
to be suddenly called for. Russia, a country poor
and with little development in a manufacturing
point of view, and where, according to M. Tego-
borski the receipts of the treasury did not exceed
651 millions of francs in 1839, and 900 millions in
1853 (*)) may, in any political or financial crisis,
find herself under the immediate effect of a demand
for the reimbursement of five milliards. How is
this enormous floating debt constituted ? The Rus-
sian Government has put in practice the monstrous
social theory, by putting into the hands of the
State all the material elements of society ; in
making it the director-general of everything con-
nected with credit, circulation, labour, property,
production, and consumption. The Government
of the Czar is not only the absolute master of a po-
pulation of serfs and vassals, but is also the gene-
ral banker of Russia. It is into its bands and into
its coffers that, at an interest agreed upon, are de-
pdnited sums more or less important, and which
are to be restored at the demand of the depositor.
It is thus that it has accumulated in the Treasury
of the state the milliards which public confidence,
seconded by the maintenance of peace, and even by
the prestige of Russia, has deposited in the Impe-
rial Treasury. These enormous sums, which far
exceeded the wants of the Treasury and the ex-
penses of the different branches of the service, have
created another danger not less serious. In order
to find a use for this mass of money for which inte-
rest was to be paid, the Czar has lent to landed
property what he has received from private saving.
The State, which is the depository of the money
of its subjects, has employed it in forming banks
for the landed interests, the condition of existence
of which is to lend at long dates. The consequence
of this is that a considerable part of the sums,
which constitute the floating debt, is invested in
mortgages, the overact() duration of which cannot
be reckoned at less than from 15 to 20 years. It
is not difficult to comprehend all the dangers of
this system, by which the Government makes it-
self the debtor for a considerable sum, the pay-
ment of which may be immediately demanded
whilst it is creditor for sums which are only payable
at very distant periods. M. Tegoborski admits that
this is, in fact, a state of things contrary to the
most elementary principles of circulation and of
credit, but his optimism makes him blind to the
dangers which inevitably result from it. He
nevertheless avows that since the Ist of January,
1854, the sums drawn out have exceeded the
amount of the new deposits by 5,959,229 roubles,
or about 24 millions of francs. This, in fact,
could not be otherwise. The fortune of a State
which, after all, is only the accumulation
of private fortunes, cqunot long maintain
itself at the same level, when that State,
blockaded on all sides, sees all its commercial and
industrial relations broken up with countries which
are for it either the producers or the .consumers.
No one can deny the state of embarrassment which
now exists in all ranks of Russian commerce ; the
mystery with which the empire of the Czars has
been always surrounded is not so deep or so mute,
that the report of the bankruptcies which have
during the last twelve months taken place in Russia
have not resounded throughout the whole of Eu-
rope. However insignificant M. Tegoborski may
wish to make the movement of Russian imports and
exports, it is too considera'de for its entire suppre,-
Sion not to lead to a crisis. M. Tegoborski does not
reckon at less than six millions of francs the amount
annually engaged in the commerce and manufac-
tur2s of his country. Is it possible that a state of
war, and the paralysis which it gives to all business,
does not inflict a terrible blow to this immense
movement of operations ? Private fortunes, as well
as the national riches, must therefore feel embar-
rassments, the consequence of which will necessa-
rily be demands for reimbursement more or less
numerous on the enormous floating debt of Russia,
or at all events the discontinuance of the deposits
which feed that debt. Is it prudent, therefore, to
affirm that a State, in face of such a gigantic amount
of liabilities, is in the most detestable condition of
credit, and on the road to vast financial disasters ?
The danger for Russia has already been of long
date ; and her situation must have been frequently
serious and embarrassing when, while constituting
this enormous floating debt of five milliards, she
has been constantly compelled to have recourse to
the system of loans. Now even this means of credit
is shut against her. Russia only a short time since
attempted a new loan, but every one knows that
ilia financial operation, which the bankers of Berlin
would not take at 83, with a premium of 17 per
cent., has failed in a great measure before the in-
difference of capitalists and the reprobation of pub-
lic opinion. Every one is aware that the prohibi-
tion, even by the neutral states, of quoting that
loan in their money markets, would have been suf-
ficient to have rendered it abortive, even if it had
not fallen of itself in consequence of the discredit of
Russia. And nevertheless the wants of the Russian
empire go on increasing with ifs expenses, with the
prolongation of the state of war, and with the dis-
asters which the struggle has already caused to the
pride and the power of the Czar ? M. Tegoborski
states the number of soldiers which Russia has to
keep at 900,000, and the expenses of that army at
about 400 millions. The state of war, however,
imposes sacrifices much more considerable than that
of peace, and if up to this time Russia has found in
the maintenance of her enormous effective force an
incessant source of deficits, it must be admitted that
these deficits will not henceforth become smaller or
less formidable. Where, then, will Russia find re-
sources ? In her revenues ? Her receipts have
necessarily diminished now that her commerce is
destroyed, her ports closed, her consumption
'weakened, and her internal prosperity
compro-
mised. In a loan ? The markets of the whole of Eu-
rope are prohibited to her, and it is not her own sub-
jects who can lend her, since we have shown that
she is exposed on her territory to the demands for
reimbursement from all the creditors of her float-
ing debt. In voluntary donations ? That has
been attempted, and the resources of that. plan are
estimated by M. Tegoborski at 200 millions, but
the author carefully abstains from telling us what
was the real amount obtained from the national
subscription, about which the Russian journals
made such a noise. From this general state of
things it therefore results that Russia is evidently
on the eve of a great financial crisis. That crisis
the Government itself will precipitate. Excluded
from European credit as it now is, it will exhaust
all the resources of its people and of its territory in
order to support the imprudent challenge which it
given to our civilised society, and the expedi-
ents to which it will
resort will render the danger
still more terrible.
of the Stateto Mistrust will drive the credi-
torsdemand reimbursement, and in
face of a liabilitztoef five milliards, the Treasury will
have no other alternative but bankruptcy, or paper
money, that
bankruptcyoia disguise which is equally
fatal to the credit f
an empire. It is therefore
with a deep feeling of
alarm that the Russian eco-
nomists must look at thecontinuation of the war,
the
for that war will be
materials ruin of their
destruction country, as it has been thethe
of its moral
ie
influence in the world and disgrace of the
Sovereign who has provoked it;l amidst the unauti-
mous protestations of Europe, and in
the
contempt
of the sacred principle s of the law of nations.

—s'.
* 'We _live this amount on the authority
biiity of the author of the work in Tiestion respon
althouoli the
enormous increase of 3(1 per cent. in fuurteen years :ppe:trs
to us completely improbable.