The Sun.
London, England, 1860-12-21 00:00:00

DISTR FINS 111, TRADE CAUSED BY
LOANS TO FOREIGN GOVERNMENTS.

Every attempt has been made upon each renewal
of the Bank Charter to push into circulation the
notes of that establishment, and to withdraw those
of other banks, or load them with burdensome
restrictions and prohibitions. Thus to uphold one
single monopoly, to the great prejudice of the
public, is unjust to other bankers and to the entire
nation—the effect of which is now showing itself
in trade generally. Banks that used to accommo-
date their clients are now so circumscribed that
they can only do so with difficulty, always taking
care that large men only are those upon whom
they look favourably. The hard- working, plodding
man stands no chance during these torturing pres-
sures that now so frequently take place. Having
no voice nor position, his miseries must be endured
in silence; to the usurious discounter he is driven
by the pressure which he formed no part in bring-
ing about. Who forms that desolating soul-
destroying pressure now occurring at every change
of the wind ? Who, but the dealers in gold, com-
posed of speculators of the Bank of England down
to all speculators in betting rings and on exchanges,
men who toil not by production, but exercise tricks
that can be practised upon those that do. Now,
traffic in money has become such a profitable trade
that its members are grown rich, thereby powerful
enough to insult the common sense of the com-
mercial body by sending gold away, in
order to make it more scarce at home,
by which it becomes more valuable to them
and less attainable by commerce. This exportation
of money upon foreign loans and Government secu-
rity is now the great bane of English commerce.
First of all, because it is not bearing its proper share
in taxation ; gold lent abroad by the English people
ought ever to be taxed wherever it goes by Great
Britain, otherwise taxation bears doubly hard upon
those remaining at home. The answer may by some
be made to this remark that the loaner rests in
England, therefore his profits are taxed in his
income and property tax. I must protest against
such a mode of argument, for money lent abroad in
loan to Governments ought to pay the self-same tax
that would attach to it were it to remain in Eng-
land. That same money remaining in England,
borrowed by a manufacturer, would pay a tax in
addition to the tax derived by the loaner; the
loanee would also pay a tax upon the profits of the
money borrowed ; this last tax is lost to England,
causing a double pressure of taxation upon those
who remain at home. This is taking a new view
of the consequences of foreign loans, and account-
ing for the difficulty English people now experi-
ence in paying their taxes, and also the increased
difficulty they have in paying their way at
all. Drained of their circulating medium
at home, by having it taken out of
its natural channel, England's suffering has
grown to be unendurable. Anxieties are by
this money exportation rendered an inflic-
tion, destroying soul and body, destroying the best
and most honest minds ; for the devil-may-care
speculator feels nothing, has no conscience, forms
not one of the producing power, but trips up those
who do, and whose minds are necessarily so absorbed
wholly about productions that they do not study
money laws, though they so directly concern them.
The distress of 1860 is frightful and sinful to the
State that seeks not to apply the remedy.
This remedy is at hand, and needs only a little
honesty and fair legislation. It can be made to
appear to be very intricate, but in reality it is not,
nor need it appear to be in the eyes of any man
of business.
The money laws simplified are not intricate, the
technicalities of jobbing in money has nothing to
do with money ; the man that really understands
the monetary system knows as little about its
jobbery as possible.
Money laws to be wholesome must favour the
producing power, not the speculating power, which
never ought to have been allowed an existence.
All other nations are making attempts to supply
their public with a currency and circulating
medium, but Great Britain ; this unfortunate
island, so rich in wealth, is most neglected in her
home circulation ; the result is fearfully felt in
England at the present mament. The tortures of
Neapolitan dungeons were not more agonising than
is that horrid pressure on the brain caused by the
sudden and frequent tightness in the money market
brought about by the tricks in the money loaners
and speculators. It is a sin of the worst descrip-
tion, for it leaves the honest industrious man worse
off by his industry, worse off by his attempts to be
honest; for while money tricksters have the
making of their own laws by which they impose
upon industry, there is no help nor hope for fair
enterprise.
The remedy is, first, to tax all the money lent
abroad—the tax to be paid by the borrowers so long
as the money shall be retained by them, at the same
rate that Great Britain pays, viz., 10d. per an-
num. Freetraders will call out, this is Protection
Yes, I answer ; but against what ? •It is Protection
against the ruin that must fall upon English com-
merce without it.
It also forms a provision for that extension of
banking operations that must render England the
greatest nation in the world, without loss to her
domestic operations.
Great Britain will thus render all nations tribu-
tary to the vast empire from which they derive their
monetary resources.
It is unjust, indeed, to punish home commerce by
withdrawing from it that which it laboured so hard
to obtain, and having obtained, has a right to a
voice in retaining.
Bankers must always be allowed good profits, and
trade must ever uphold a respectable body of men

as bankers. They necessarily must be responsible
and wealthy men ; but before Great Britain should
extend her influence wider over the face of the
globe, paramount to her extension is the just prin-
ciple of action on which all things should be based.
Her greatness should only be commensurate with
her fairness universally, because warfare and ex-
pense are ever the consequence of unjust oppression,
sooner, or later, undermined by unsound laws.
Its greatness apart from this can never be upheld ;
while also history shows us that a nation never has
had peaceful permanence where it has not had
justice.

Bankers might say, why it is impossible—foreign

loans never can be taxed; individuals have a right
to lend their own money the same as merchants
have a right to export merchandise ; but I answer
that the merchandise and the medium by which
you measure the value of that merchandise are two
distinct values. By sending merchandise away
from England we do not increase the value of it,
because we have an indefinite power of production
by virtue of the money. The more we export, the
more we can make for further exportation. Not
so with money and gold bars. The money metals
are chosen because of their invariability of supply,
thereby giving a fixity of measurement of value.
Gold cannot be manufactured to an indifferent
extent ; a slow supply only furnishes the bullionists
with their specie. The difference is as great as
distinctions can make them between money definite
and manufactories indefinite.

Beyond this argument there is another of greater
importance: by exporting money on loans the nation
is minus that plus which the foreign state has
received. England, therefore, short of the very
amount gone abroad, suffers first by the want of it,
after that by the departure of that money which
while remaining in England would have yielded
an amount of taxation to the State which the re-

maining capital left has to pay.
Again, it may be said that England is taxed
upon her capital, therefore the loaner holds his

capital denomination, if not his money, and is

taxed upon his income therefrom.
This is true; but this would be the case were the
money lent at home, the capital denomination would

be the same, bat another at home would be

paying his income tax at home which he derived

from the loan at home ; this second income tax

is lost to the State, and, perchance, a third and a
fourth. Money multiplying by money made at
home causes more than a second payment of in
_ _ .

come tax from our sum of money loaned during

the year.

The capital twice turned over pp twice toe

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