The Washington union. [volume] (City of Washington [D.C.]) 1857-1859, 1857-10-23

OF the people for interference in their behalf
They have had their dance, and lot them pay
the piper The banks have run in debt for more
than they can pay they have broken their faith
with the public, and the only way they can pay
their old debts is by contracting ones Those
who have awaited themselves of bank acoommoda-
tons to CRAFTY their vanity their appetites their
thirst for gain, in similar position. They
were their own masters their action was voluntary
they have spent their money they have had their
day and in every other condition Of life should
bear the responsibility of their own conduct They
have right to fold their arms and call on Hercules
to come to their relief They have lost nothing, for
great portion of them had nothing to lose and if
at this moment themselves in distress it is nothing
to the injuries they have inflicted millions of in
nocent sufferers.
In all similar reactions and revulsons it is the
people at large who the victims. 1t is the la
boring classes the poor and needy, that invariably
become the resduary legatees Of this harvest of
desolation. They reap the fruits of the seed the
prodiga has sown. By far the larger portion of the
notes of suspended bank are invariably found in
the hands Of those who have not borrowed Them but
have given their labor in exchange. The knowing
the first to smell the symptoms Of mortality
in rickety bank, and get rid of its notes as
soon as possible. The shopkeeper passes them
off in change to his customers who again pay
them away to their servants and laborers and there
they stick. BY this time one will take them in
exchange for the poor mans necessities, and they
either fall dead on his hands he is obliged to part
with them at fearful depreciation. But it may be
slred yh 10 sofa fexy IN Ia nrar
compared to that Of millionaire who loses what he
possessed, and is stripped of feathers borrowed
from otherss We will tell them what it is. 1t is the
loss of the savings of perhaps months of toll the loss
Of that which is indispensable to the comforts of his
wife and chldren-the loss Of bread. This, though
mere trife in the eyes of the mere politician who
estimates by the standard of their political nu
ence, is rather serious affair to the million.
We maintain, therefore, that the only justifable
ground for Legislature interfering between the
banks and the people is the relief of the latter
This has been entirely neglected in the late relief
law, as it is termed of Pennsylvania. 1t is evidently
law exclusively for the relief of the banks and
their Debtors and not for their creditors. There is
not single provision for the benefit of the great
mass of sufferers, the bill-holders, the mechanics
and laborers who exceed the bank officers bank d.
rectors, and bank debtors thousand to one. IRey
the real creditors of the banks and the real su
ferers by their suspension They have given value
received in the labor of their hands and the of
their brow for every dollar this filthy trash mscalled
money, which is now left on their hands, to be sold
at any depreciation for specie to be paid away for
necessaries whose prices enhanced by the same
hat he far ho;r
labor, and consequently their wages, enhances the
price of every necessary of life.
Nothing has been done for these millions There
is stay of proceedings at law for them no year
of grace. No judge viii certify that they are able
to pay their debts They must pay up, be turned
adrift to starve. Some of most phlanthropic
contemporaries, we perceive, are recommending the
British system Of poor-houses and other charitable
institutions for these disinherited outcasts of legs
lative bounty. After being plundered of their hard
earnings to the amount of millions, they to be
munerated by becoming paupers-a device that re-
minds of the pous Welsh parson who stole pig
and quoted his conscience by giving away the tail
in charity. If such is adopted, it is hoped
the banks will be liberal We repeat, nothing has
been done for these millions They are not the
proper objects of relief' 1t is the bank directors
and stockholders, and bank debtors; the gentlemen
borrowers who have eaten their cake, and now want
it back again; the splendid paupers, who, after
having their frolic out, call on others to pay the
reckoning. 1t is the spendthrift debtor, not the
honest creditor, who is the select object Of legisa-
tive sympathy; the powerful money corporations,
who can make and unmake legislators, in whose be-
half penal laws suspended repealed at the
moment of the last gasp of Legislative existence and
door opened for new abuses and new violations of
pubio.fath Of what value or force is the provis- |
ion that the banks of Pennsylvania shall resume
specie payments in April next After the repeal of
the law infcting forfeiture for an offence they
have already committed, what is to prevent them
from repetition The same corrupt influence which |
released them from the first penalty will be sufficient
to shield them from the second and thus they may |
go ON ad minimum violating the law with perfect i'm
punity. Past experience has pretty clearly demon
strated that all laws restraining banks and corpora
tions are in great measure nugatory. Their COM
bned influence over Legislation is too great to admit
Of laws which might possibly effecta radical cure of
the defects Of the system; and if they passed.
the same influence would prevent their being carried
into execution.
But there other decisive objections to this re-