The Sun.
London, England, 1866-09-08 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

TIMES.—A document which we publish elsewhere
represents a most important step in the progress of
European civilisation. It is a Monetary Conven-
tion between France, Belgium, Switzerland, and
Italy, and it amounts in effect to an announcement
that in the course of two or three years the coinage
of half continental Europe will be absolutely
identical. The Convention appears equivalent to
an argument on the part of Belgium, Italy, and
Switzerland to assimilate their coinage, with the ex-
ception of copper money, to the French system.
'I he gold coinage will consist of pieces of five, ten,
twenty, fifty, and one hundred francs. The highest
silver standard will be the five-franc piece, and the
smaller coins will be two francs, one frank, fifty
centimes, and twenty centimes. The silver coinage,
therefore, will descend to the value of twopence,
and the maintenance of a distinct copper coinage
will consequently be of very little importance. The
range of the coinage will be, in fact, extremely con-
venient. The 100-franc piece will be a convenient
form for carrying sums of money, and will answer
all the more considerable necessities of the traveller,
while none but the most insignificant transactions
would require a coin of smaller value than the 20-
centime piece. It is to be observed also that the
coinage of these four countries will not only be as-
similated, but the money of each country will be a
legal tender in all the others. The four Govein-
ments agree that their Treasuries shall accept all the
gold and silver coinage of the contracting States ;
they will mutually exchange the amounts of their
respective coinages which may accumulate in each
other's hands from time to time ; they will commu-
nicate to each other annually the total amount and
the relative position of their issues, together with all
the arrangements and all the administrative docu-
ments relating to coinages. In a word, these four
countries, stretching right across the most impor-
tant part of Europe, will be as much united for all
purposes of monetary exchange as the different parts
of these islands. The old coinage is to bewithdrawn
from circulation, and, with some exceptions, this is
to be accomplished before the Ist of January, 1869;
so that this reform will be in practical operation in
less than two years and a half. Events have moved
so fast that it is difficult to realise the immense ad-
vance represented by this Convention. The time,
indeed, is not long past when every canton in Swit-
zerland had a different monetary standard, and the
coinage of France within quite a modern period was
excessively inconvenient. The present French coin-
age is a model of convenience, and it is no wonder
that it has been taken as the standard in the present
Convention. The napoleon has already become a re-
cognized medium of exchange in the contracting
countries, and the Convention does but legitimatize
and complete a process which the force of circum-
stances had commenced. Accordingly, in chang-
ing from Belgium to France or from France to
Switzerland the traveller has for some years been
put to but slight inconvenience. But it is in Italy
that this Convention implies the most remarkable
revolution. Seven or eight years ago, before the
events of 1859, the various coinages in that
country were enough to drive the traveller to
distraction, and must have been an intolerable
obstacle to commercial intercourse. Every petty
State and Duchy had its own money, and refused
to acknowledge the coinage of its neighbours. Pass-
, ing from Piedmont through Lombardy, Modena,
Parma, the States of the Church, Tuscany, and
Naples, the traveller would at each step have had
to employ a different system of calculation ; nor can
we suppose that the old coinages have as yet been
entirely absorbed. By this Convention, however, in
a few years' time a complete uniformity will be pro-
duced over the whole of Italy. The States of the
Church, if they are then under a separate Govern-
ment, will be the sole exception. In four or five
years' time, it is said, the traveller will be able .to
pass from Calais to Brindisi without changing car-
riages ; but long before then he will be abl to jour-
ney from the north to the extreme south of Europe
without once changing his money or making the
slightest alteration in his calculations. The boon
which such a reform will confer upon travellers is
obvious. The necessity of constant exchanges is
not only a great annoyance, but is the occasion of
considerable loss, and in the condition of Europe
50 years ago the story is scarcely an exaggeration
that a traveller, starting with a sovereign and ex-
changing it at each successive frontier, found it at
length reduced by this process alone to. the value of
a farthing. But increased convenience to travellers
means increased intercourse, and it is impossible to
exaggerate the benefits to the countries themselves
which must accrue from such a Convention. A uni-
form and simple coinage has the same effect in its
way as a railway on a uniform gauge. Its introduc-
tion is an operation of precisely the same character.
The gold and silver pieces are the metal rails of
mercantile intercourse and of mutual transactions,
and they serve as effectually as the iron rails
to facilitate exchange, the levelling of values,
and the comprehension of mutual interests. The
mere mechanical convenience in mercantile trans-
actions must be incalculable. In large concerns the
constant transfer of accounts from one standard to
another must of itself involve an enormous amount
of labour, which will now be to a large extent
abolished. A difference, indeed, still remains in
weights and measures ; but when several countries
have the same coinage they have least one standard
in common, and the one most frequently used. A
Monetary Convention of this sort is not exactly a
Zollverein or Commercial Treaty, but it must pro-
duce in some respects very similar effects. These
four countries for the future will in some important
points trade with each other with more facility than
with other countries, and the inevitable consequence
will be that their mutual transactions will be greatly
augmented. We have observed that this Conven-
tion still leaves unaltered the present divergence in
weights and measures ; but within the same coun-
tries it cannot but be a step towards a similar agree-
ment in these points also. Indeed, the preamble to
the Convention expressly states that one of the
objects contemplated was " to contribute to the pro-
gress of uniformity in weights and measures" as well
as in currency. The attraction which has proved so
powerful in the one instance cannot but, sooner or
later, be equally efficacious in others, and we may
reasonably expect in time to see a complete uni-
formity in weights, measures, and currency through-
out the whole of what, after the Emperor Napo-
leon, we may call " the Latin races" of the Con-
tinent. If Spain ever possesses any metals to
coin, and has any use for weights and measures, it
will obviously be for her interest to join the Con-
vention, and the whole of Western Europe will then
be assimilated. We may reasonably hope that a
similar process will now take effect among the
German races. Germany some years ago, with all
its little petty principalities, was even worse than
Italy. The Zollverein introduced a great improve-
ment, but up to the present moment there have
still existed three or four principal systems of coin-
age, either totally distinct from each other, or ren-
dered all the more puzzling by an apparent resem-
blance. Tile incorporation of Northern Germany
with Prussia will, no doubt, be followed by the
adoption of the Prussian coinage at least as far as
the line of the Main; and if the Southern States
would agree upon the same coinage with Austria,
the European system would be as simple as we can
reasonably expect. A universal adoption of the
same system is neither to be expected nor, perhaps,
desired. The assimilation, for example, of our own
coinage, weights, and measures to the French sys-
tem would not bring us advantages sufficient to
compensate for the immense inconvenience of the
change. So long as there are a few distinct and
well-adjusted systems we shall have all that we can
desire. It is very remarkable how rapidly Europe
is tending to this simplification. The intricacy and
confusion of but a few years ago are becoming
rapidly fused into.a few widely-spread languages, a
few large kingdoms, and a few comprehensive sys-
tems of currency and of measures. Every change,
moreover, in this direction renders further changes
of the same sort inevitable. The instinct of union
is resistless, and daily gathers strength as it pro-
, ceeds. Commercial treaties and the constant pro-
gress of free trade are but results of the same instinct,
and all work together to the same end. We con-
gratulate the four Governments who have signed
this Convention upon having furnished so good a
precedent, and we trust the example may be speedily
• imitated.

THE " ANGLO - AMERICAN TIMES." - When
the great political events which followed the
Four Years' War in. America are told by the
historian, scenes which to us—who now seeing
through a glass darkly, lose their full significance—
may yet in history's pages mark epochs, and stand as
the pillars of turning-points. Such a scene, which
the historian may one day delight, to detail, oc-
curred on Saturday afternoon, August 18th, 1866.
In the East Room of the White house stood Presi-
dent Johnson, and by his side General Grant.
Before him was a crowd of distinguished American
citizens, Delegates from the Convention, pro-
nounced by the President to be the most important
that had ever assembled in the United States since
1787. From the hands of Reverdy Johnson the
President had received a copy of the proceedings
of that Convention, and he was replying in studied
terms to the complimentary address of which that
gentleman was the spokesman: The President's
manner was earnest and emphatic. His words had
a terrible significance. He was delivering one of
the most extraordinary speeches ever made by a
great ruler to a great nation. A crisis had
wasdarr thatived,
and the leading and most prominent figure
of Andrew Johnson. He stood in that room, and
through the delegates spoke to. the Great Republic,
explaining and defending ins measures, and de-

flouncing the strong and factious opposition di-
rected against him. " His efforts," he said, " had
" always been directed to the Restoration of tee
" Union, and when he thought he had succeeded a
" new disturbing element arose from a body which
4i assumes to be the Congress of the United States,
but is in fact a Congress of only a part of the
" States. This Congress pretended to be for the
" Union, when its every step tended to perpetuate
" disunion and make a disruption of the States in-
" evitable. Its legislation, instead of promoting:
it reconciliation, had partaken of the character of
" penalties, retaliation, and revenge. Such had
" been its course, while he had reverenced
" and supported the Constitution. He had been
" charged with being despotic and tyrannical, when
" every act of his life had been opposed to despotism
" and tyranny. Such charges against him were
only intended to deceive and hide the public,
and were made by Congress merely to cover their
'' own acts. All he wished was that the public
should justly understand the nature of thdc
struggle now going on in America, and he
' full faith in their support. Tyranny could be
more readily exercised by the many than by one
man, and he had seen a Congress gradually ea'
croaching upon the Constitution, violating day
' after day the fundamental principles of the hie'
vernment, acting as if there were no limit by .o's
' laws to the scope of its power, and endeavouring,
although in a minority, to exercise powers,
if permitted, would end in despotism or monarch/
itself. Because he dared oppose this he had bee"
denounced in the severest terms. Slander, vitu-
peration of the bitterest character, had made their
way through the press. His race was almost rim;
he had nothing more to gain, for he had mounted
to the top of the ladder of preferment under
American Institutions. If he wished authority?
or desired to perpetuate his power, it would baud
been easy for him to hold and wield that place
in his hands by the Freedmen's Bureau Bill.
With the army it placed at his discretion he could
have remained at the capital of the nation, an
with 50 or 60 millions of dollars of appropriationcs
at his disposal ; with the machinery to be worked
by his own hands, with his satraps and depen-
dents in every town and village, and with the
_ . - in

Civil Rights : Bill following as an auxiliary

connection with the other appliances of the G'.°-
vernment, he could have proclaimed himself The'
tator. But he desired to place all power in t11,(1
hands of the people, and upon them he relieu•
' He disregarded the taunts and jeers of Congress
and of a subsidised calumniating press. He ac
" knowledged no superior but God, the author no
his existence, and the people of the United States.
Such was the unreserved and outspoken statement
the President of the United States—a declaration
of open war against the Legislative Body_elected bYt
the people ; and the still more extraordinary statemell;
W
that he could, had he willed it, have made age,
Dictator, and placed himself above the law, but that
he had been, and always intended to be, guided 111,
the Constitution. The President is here reporteu
to have said that it would have been easy for hun
have overthrown the Constitution of the Unite,
States—that the question had been one of virtu;
alone on his part. We cannot but regard this statemenu
as unfortunate, both imprudent in declaration
and an exaggeration in fact. That he and Congrer.
were at open war are facts which no one atternP.'
to disguise ; but that the supreme power rested 111
the hands of Congress is undeniable. The DIV;
DENT has no power of adjourning or dissolving t 1.3
body, but that body has the power of impeachiLlg
and deposing him. The President spoke as if ,u 4.1,
orders, though illegal, would have been
obeyed. The great question whether the country
supports the President or Congress has yet to WI
decided. One or the other must give way ,
England this question would be speedily decided t
the dead-lock had occurred here. Parliarnell
would be dissolved and an appeal made to the Pe
ple, and that appeal would settle the difficulty with-
out further controversy. In America, however,
appeal can only be worked out by the slow pro
of years. The present Congress must meet ."0
December next, and there can be little alteran%
effected in the Ifouse of Representatives. Net
year the 40th Congress will commence its existeny
•but only enter on its Session in December, 18
The efforts, therefore, of the New Party 011 t;
not tell on that body at once. In the Sens' f.
the difficulties of effecting a change are still grente'h
It can only be accomplished by working througa
the Legislatures of the different States who se
u„
the Senators to Washington. As the Senators are
elected for four years, the process must
slow and difficult. The battle, then, must 178
fought out between the President and
present Republican Congress. But the NeA
Organisation has one trump card.
the
great political revolution may occur in „,0,.
Northern States. The mass of the people maY
come penetrated with the truth of the principles 13„e
forth by the Philadelphia Convention, reposll
faith in the honesty of the party ; and if the 00,
raises its voice in favour of the President's polier
the opposition of Congress must cease. The tell,;
dency of public opinion in the Union will be eager!sif
watched from this side, pending the settlemeni%
this matter of overwhelming importance. "
earnestly hope that the nation will speak out, °le
way or the other. When keenly aroused the pen,Per
are the best judges of the position, and whale le
may be English comment on the decision, wetithe
little doubt that the voice of the nation will be
voice of wisdom, justice, concession, and mode,
ration.