New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1851-03-11
~ The Chicago Tribune seems indi

nant at our remark that
"The way Illinois and other Western States
have treated their creditors would disgrace bro
ken gambler"
On this our Chicago namesake talks
largely of "the unsullied honor, the unim-
peachable integrity of the People of" said
Illinois, as evinced in their conduct toward
their public creditors, &c, &C., and guess,
es that we have obtained our information
with respect to them from English bond
holders and the like. We beg leave to as
sure the c. T. that such is not the fact, and
to put the case square before its eyes. The
material facts, as we understand them, are
these:
|. Illinois borrowed some Fifteen Mil
lions of Dollars from time to time to prose-
cute certain works of Internal Improve
ment, promising to pay the specified inter
est thereon annually or oftener, and the
principal at set times from ten to thirty
years ahead.
?. Illinois has failed to do as she thus
promised, whereby her creditors have suf-
fered grievous loss and injury, having been
deprived of the interest on which many of
them depended for subsistence, and great
share of them having been constrained to
sell the Bonds at sacrifice of from forty to
sixty per cent; of their cost.
These are the essential facts. The
conduct of Illinois in the premises is what
we consider reputation and rascality;
while our Chicago namesake pronOunces it
integrity and honor There is no ac-
counting for tastes; but we are glad our
means of living are not at the mercy of the
integrity and honor of our Chicago critic.
We are quite familiar with the ex-
cuse that Illinois couldn't pay, but we
despise it and its utterers. At no time
since she first failed has the Property of
Illinois been worth less than five times her
Public Debt; and every dollars worth of
property in the State was holden in honor
and good faith for that debt-not merely
its payment at some indefinite time, but its
payment precisely when due. If five per
cent. on all the property in the State would
not suffice for this purpose, the impost
should have BEEN promptly Increased to
ten or even twenty per cent. The credit
ors who have been wronged and robbed by
the wretched course pursued can never be
made good, even though every farthing of
the principal and stipulated interest should
be paid at some future day.
The interest might and should have been
paid in full as fast as it accrued. One-half
the Tobacco and Alcoholic Liquors annual
ly consumed in the State would have paid
the utte1most farthing at all times. One
half the time wasted in bar-rooms, bowl
ing. alleys, at turkey-shOots, &c. would
have sufficed to earn the means of paying
it. Any individual who owned as much
property as there is in Illinois and owed
debts no greater than hers, would have
been deemed infamous had he permitted
the interest on these debts to go for years
unpaid and finally half-paying them in a
peculiarly shabby, higgling, shilly-shally
way, would be regarded by the whole
world as a scoundrel, and we see no reason
why State should not be held to like
accountability. At all events, zoe do nst
mean to be meal -mouthed in the premises.
The People of Illinois have pursued a
course calculated to corrupt the minds and
uDfx the principles of their children. and
every penny they may save from their
creditors thereby will cost them more than
dollars in future laxity of morals and inf
deity to engagements. They ought to re-
pent and retrace their steps, and they can
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