Portage sentinel. [volume] (Ravenna, Ohio) 1845-1854, 1853-08-17
Whig Financiering---Why the taxes
f. are nigh.

are AMk&Ms
The whig leaders ask the people at the comiig
election again to entrust the State Government
into their hands as the only party capable of MAT,
aging its affairs. This comes we'll from a part4
the blunders and dishonesty of whose leadni
men have 80 largely increased the State debt, and
whose fnanciering at one time so shook the cred-,
1t OF the State, that ALFRED KELLEY, leading
whlg, then one of the Canal Fund Commission
ers' made money by bonus which he received
Tor going the security of the great State of Ohio
debtedness.
AS sample of whig inanciering we will give
few facts from the record In 1870 the wings
rode into power on the hard cider hurra. and ALT.
KELLEY, GUsTAvUs SWAN, N. H. SwAYNE,. alb
of this city, and all leading wings succeeded 10
the financial management of the State as Com
missioners of the Canal Fund. The credit ofthe
State was then good-her interest had been
punctualy paid, and her stocks and credit stood
as high as any in the market. By their manage
mentor msmaLagement-they sold State stocks,
amounting to 81 l,023,800 at rates running from
10 to 5o3 cents on the dollar and by which oper-
alton the State lost, the large sum of FOUR HUN
DRED AND THIRTY-TWO THOUSAND
FIVE HUNDRED AND ONE DOLLARS
AND TWELVE CENTS, which large amount
is added to the State debt, without the state re-
ceiving any benefit therefor, and is to be paid by
the taxes of cheated people, whose only fault
was their misfortune in having whig rulers. IL
was at this time, when the Barngs, and other
English stock jobbers had so swindled the State,
and bought her stocks at but little over one half
the amount called for on their face, that another
creditor of Ohio, justly alarmed for fear the State
would repudiate, got Mr. Alfred Kelley, one of the
Commissioners, who had thus sacrificed the State
credit and the money Of the people, for a consid-
Grafton in money, to go the security Of Ohio that
the semi-annual interest on her State debt would
be paid, and the result was, that while the peo-
pie of Ohio lost near SoNE HALF MILLION
DOLLARS, Mr.. Kelley pocketed his bonus and
thus made money by the operation.
The people of Ohio, indignant at the outrage,
and fearing still greater losses by these whig
leaders, hurled that party from power and the
credit of Ohio again rose, and under Democratic
rule it stood, as it now stands and as il always
should stand, as good as that of any State in the
Union.
Again whiggery got power: The people were
taxed heavily to provide means to pay off the
State debt as it became due, and to provide means
to pay the interest. The money for the former
purpose was placed in the State Treasury, there
to remain until sacredly applied to the object for
which it raised. This did not suit whig FL
nanciers and the Board of Fund Commissioners,
consisting of E. N. Sill, as acting, and A. A.
Bliss and John Woods, as advisory members Of
the Board of Canal Fund Commissioners, not Oh
ly without authority but in direct violation of law
loaned ONE HUNDRED THOUSAND DOL
LARS of the peoples money thus raised by tax
| alton, to a rotten insurance company in Colum-
bus. So secret was the matter kept, that moth
ing was known oft until the Democracy in 1851
carried the State and swept out the whig officers
and then, this whig insurance company exploded
and thus the one hundred thousand dollars, thus
loaned was lost, and unless it Gun be recovered
| from the Fund Commissioners and their surities,
(and we are glad to hear that suit to recover il
has been commenced by the Attorney Generally
| it will be total loss.
Here then are two samples ofwhig Financier-
ing by which FIVE HUNDRED AND Thur
! TY-TWO THOUSAND FIVE HUNDRED
AND ONE DOLLARS AND TWELVE
CENTS has been lost to the Treasury of the
State, and all of which has to be made up by tsx-
es drawn from the pockets of the Farmers, Me-
chanics, and other citizens.
The whig leaders abuse the Tax law and
roundly assert that the taxes are too high--thag
they are oppressive on the people. Grant that
they are higher than they ought to be-grant thet
they are oppressive, it is the Democracy, not the
whiy who have right to complain, for If whg
Financiers had not squandered the money of the
| pcople-had they not loaned it to insolvent In.
surance companies, there would have been no
necessity for such high taxes, for then this FIVE
HUNDRED AND THITRY-Two THOUSAND DOLLARS
would have remained in the State Treasury or
have been applied to the payment of the State
debt, and the Taxes of the people would have
been Iessened that amount.
When the leaders of the whg party prate to
the Democracy about high taxes, remind them or
the fnanciering of Messrs. KELLEY, SWAN and
SwAYNE, and of the loans made without authori.
ty of law by Messrs. SILL. WooDs and Bliss,
and tell them that increased taxation was nec-
essary consequence of the squandering of the
peoples money by the whig leaders. When they
ask the people to change their present faithful
servants and to put wings in their place, that
they may re-enact the scenes of l84I, and 40,
tell them, as the Peruvian patriot told the Span
ish invaders, that s'we seek no change, and least
of all, such change as this would give us."-OkiO
Slate Democrat.