Litchfield enquirer., 1837-04-27
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 The INeao- Orleans FGiLures.-We have beer much surprised in looking at the various g. mounts for which the several houses in New, Orleans had stopped payment. It is repre-. scented that Herman, Briggs SI Co. stop for six millions and half of dollars; Thomas Bar ret &J Co. are indebted to the amount fthree millions and half; Samuel Herman & sons about three millions Brander, McKenna & Wright over three millions and half 1; Buchanan, Hager & Co. half million; Bier & Steever half a million, besides many sus- pending for amounts under $l5O,OO0. It IS evident that these heavy responsibilities were incurred for the purchase of cotton and other produce, and it is said large amounts were paid to Planters for their crops eUen before the secl wGs planted. We now have the cue to the immense banking capital authorized by the State of Louisiana, not called for by the regular operation of trade, but required to meet what may be called the monopoly of the cotton speculation. As long as the prices of cotton could be kept high in England, and consumption could be kept on the increase, the speculation was good one: but that mo- ment when the currency was deranged, mo- ney became scarce, exchanges high, and or ders for goods limited, cotton fell very natu- rally, and then bankruptcy ensued among the M01tOpOLlStS.
 Wherever banking capital is authorized by State, not for the general good, but to meet the liabilities of a few extensive houses, the result must be bankruptcy the moment cloud darkens the horizon. It is supposed that for the last twelve years, thirty millions of banking capital authorized by the Legis- lature for the use of the community general ly, have been absorbed by the monopolists of cotton alone, and have been time after time thrown out under the plea of a scarcity of money, when, in fact, the amount required to sustain few houses closed the door on the moderate trader. We in this city have been the severest sufferers from this system. The blow that unexpectedly prostrated the Josephs and other houses here came from New-Orleans and the Southern cities; and who could doubt that houses controlling twenty five millions of capital, and monopo' lizing nearly all the cotton shipped from those ports, could not be entrusted to the amount of a million and half? Men may talk of imprudence and expansion of houses in New York; but transacting as much fair business as this city really does, our firms have been gradually drawn into the Exchange business in acceptance and emittances-confding, as they were authorized to do, in the immense capital yielded by the Southern houes-not, as the result shows, of actual capital thrown into trade, but fictitious capital, money bor- rowed from Banks for speculative purposes, which, on the fall of cotton the borrowers are unable to pay hence they suspend, and in- volve others in every section ofthe Union.
 Deeply as these endorsements are to be regretted, they nevertheless exhibit an un- safe system, which, in avoiding hereafter, will have good tendency. The whole commit nifty must suffer, more or less, and when the storm clears off, business men must be con- to steer through all these difficulties without a compass