Nashville patriot. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1858-1860, 1858-10-04
SPEECH OF MIR. BELL.
IL THE SENATE. MAY 26. 1853.


IL not more. gold was shipped from the At
lantic ports to England and other countries
than was received from California; or, if il
was observed, that it never caused them to
doubt whether the currency of the country
could be maintained in a sound condition
under such a continued drain of the precious
metals, aud especially when it was evident
that the internal traffic and business of the
country, from their uncommon activity, re-
uuired an increased circulation. The Senator's
doctrine is that gold and silver are but COM
modities. no way distinguished as articles of
trade from any others. He forgets, or will
give no weight TO the fact. that these COM
modities, from their peculiar qualities, have
been adopted as a common medium or STAN
dard of value by which all other commodities
are measured and exchange. and that these
metals, or competent portion of them, as
instruments or agents in effecting the eX-
changes of the products of labor and giving
activity TO internal trade and industry. are
lust as important as the circulation of the
blood is to the human system. Money is the
life-bl0od OF all trade and industrial employ
ments and when in any country the money
j. composed in part of paper or bank notes,
az experience shows that it may safely be
when not in excess. it becomes still more i'm
poTtant to watch the movement OF the preci-
Gus metals. If the flow is inward there is
never any danger. If they become redun-
dant portion of them soon find their way
abroad, and thus the equilibrium is restored.
But when. in any country, as in this. large
portion of the money or circulating medium
consists Of bank notes, and the flow of gold
and silver Outwards is largely in excess of the
influx and so continues for length of time,
it may he regarded as an infallible sign that
the paper circulation is redundant. The cur
rency of the country is then deprecated rela-
tivety to the currcnces of other countries
a .,
commodities. go where they command the
hi chest prizes. But the Senator from Vir-
OF MA denies that this lOng-cOntinued outward
flow of gold from this country was any thing
remarkable, or furnished any reason for be-
lieving that there was an excess of paper
money in circulation, or that there was any
danger of IA revul>iOn, although for the last
seven years from 1851 to 1857, there was an
average annual export Of gold and silver
amounting TO one-lifth of our exports and
slowing an excess, in the seven years. of the
@ port Of gold ana silver over the import Of
[ te same metals, amounting. as before stated,
T. $3.50 $50 900. 1t Is bat too evident that
neither the Senator from Virginia, nor the
Secretary of the Treasury. nor their predcces-
sors in office, did see these signs of an APP
preaching commercial catastrophe in time to
arrest it, but ought they not to have seen and
needed those signs? Ought they not to have
studied and proiitcd by them? And will it do
for those who are entrusted with the control
of the Government 10 say that they are in
nocent and in no way responsible for this
great evil which has befallen the country be-
cause they did not see and understand what
il was their business TO see and understand?
If the rapid and continued drain of the pre-
cious metals did not strike them as Il matter
of any importance, was there nothing in the
unusual and extraordinary increase of the
foreign trade of the county to warn them
that Ovcr-trading and speculation were pre-
vailing to dangerous extent, and that a re-
vulsion was involving the destruction of COM
mercial credit and a serious arrangement of
the business operations of the country?
In 1917, the year after the passage of the
tariff act Of 1916, the total amount of the
imports was SAG, 543 63S; and in the year
1857 they rose to $3.50, S9O,l4l showing an
increase ofimported merchandise in ten years
of more than one hundred per cent. In the
ten years preceding lS47 the increase was
only S6,00O,0O0; but in the ten years from
1876 TO 1857 in the increase amounted to
awaken inquiry or excite distrust in the sol
idity of prosperity which thus appeared so
far to surpass all former experience and
example?
have been stating the increase of our i'm
ports in the last ten years upon the assump-
ton that the tables of our exports, made up
at the Treasury RON the custom-house returns,
are correct. If the imports were really no
greater in amount than there reported, the
increase therein exhibited of 5000 600, 900 in
the consumption of foreign goods by the peo-
pie of this country in so short period as len
years would be sufficiently astonishing, If,
indeed. they were paid for well as con-
sumed; but if should show the Senate, as
am confident that shall be able to do before
take nv seat, that the tables OF imports
sent us from the Treasury Department are
deceptive and wholly unreliable: that instead
of $3.50. 900 900 reported to have been i'm
ported in 1851. the actual amount must have
been at last $500 000. 600 and that ratable
q ldition ought to be made to the figures repre-
scnting the imports in each of the last ten
years; and when to this statement we add the
fact that. in the last ten years, the exports
and imports, as reported i'll the tables COM
piled at the Treasury, have about balanced
each other in their gross amounts, but that
one-sixth part of the exports in the last seven
wears has been coin and bullion, the increased
consumption of foreign merchandise in the
last ten years will appear TO be still more
astonishing; and that such an unequal trade
could have been maintained for "A period of
ten years is really marvellous. Why, sir, it
rivals in extravaganza some OF the stories in
the entertainments of the Arabian Nights;
and it il only less marvel that none of the
public gentlemen addicted 10 the study of
suCl uueSLlOnS SnOnlu not nave IOrSseen the
catastrophe which did finally come.
Ii has been said, by way OF apology for
those whose duty and position required that
they should have proposed some preventive
measure in time to have avoided the late
revulsion that nobody anticipated or could
hive foreseen such an interruption to the pros
porous condition Of the country.
Allow me- sir, in answer 10 this very eX-
traordinaiy assertion, To read II passage or
4. .N 4 ,tI..rt
n journal of great authority upon all ques-
tions OF trade and finance, Published 81 Janu-
ary, 1857, and which reaches this cuautry
usually in about fortnight alter the pub
lication and which must presume is taken
at the Treasury Department.:
Turning from the finance accounts TO the
trade returns, they present. as we have al
ready SAID, results altogether unprecedented
in the history vi this or any other country;
and we frankly admit thai it is impossible TO
contemplate them without feeling some mis-
giving as To the continuance of an expansion
30 sudden and SO remarkable. An increase
in our exports 10 the extent of go 000. 900
i'm a single year is fact for which the most
sanguine could not be prepared. 1t is true
that, ut the commencement of the year, we
concluded a great war, and entered upon u
period ut peace. But IL must be borne in
mind that the war was not OF character
which interfered much with our foreign trade,
and that in point of fact, our exports, while
they had not Increased YET did not suffer any
material diminulion during It's continuance.
There were not therefore, as has sometimes
been the case at the conclusion Of Il war,
great markets to supply, which had become
exhausted Of stocks"
Judging, therefore, only by the events Of
the past year, it would be difficult TO conceivs
any combination OF circumstances more
..,n,i.;ay for fhr Vt.uf ID come. Past me-
rience has. however, shown that periods o.
sudden expansion AID OF remarkable pros
perity. even though unaccompanied by any
rbvious sp.culutive character, are general