Pomeroy weekly telegraph. [volume] (Pomeroy, Meigs County, Ohio) 1860-1866, 1862-03-21

it this bill goes into effect, Will be this:
! it will enable the contractors who can
not now get their pay from the Govern
ment, to get it and to pay it over to their
debtors. They in their turn will be anx-
ious to get some >.oae to take it, and
money will seem for the time to be
abundant, and trade will seem to be
active. All parties, however, viii find
that the Government has wronged some
body out of the difference between the
par and the present value of the stocks
of the United States, and they will sub
nit to that operation simply because
they cannot help themselves. And
what wiilthey ds.nexsa.- They mill-bide
their time. The Government is obliged
to get supplies, and the contractors will
put their supplies up to the amount
they have lost, and ten or fifteen per
cent. more They will say that the next
time they deal with Uncle Sam they
will take care to get all that they are
entitled to, and the Government will
have to pay all that they have lost, and
percentage for future indemnity.
But among the people, Mr.. Chairman,
what will be the effect? What will be
the effect in Ohio, in Kentucky, and in
all the States2 The first shock will be
that the moral sense of the country will
be outraged. Your friends and neigh
bors will not at first be mad to believe
that it is right, when they have agreed
to pay hundred to get clear receipt
for eighty five, or ninety, or ninety FIVE.
And tell you, it is not safe for leg
is!ative body to undertake to teach the
people laxity of morals. Our Govern
ment within the last four or five, years
have clandestinely taught lessons of cor
ruption, wide enough and we'll enough
understood, to corrupt public morals as
far, at least, as the extreme point of
fsafety; and when we get together here,
and in solemn Legislative act say that
wrong shall be right, the virus of dis
honesty will extend to limits you cannot
very we'll calculate. for one will have
no part or parcel in legislative act of
that sort.
The next thing, Mr.. Chairman, to
which would call the attention of the
com mittee is this: That confusion and
uncertainty will extend in relation to
the value of all exchangeable articles,
and you will never know how much you
have; how much what you have is worth,
or anything certain about it, simply be-
cause you have no standard; because the
standard Of deprecated paper currency
changes from day to day, and from hour
to hour: and all the legislation of the
Congress of the United States, even if is
lis powerful as my friend and colleague,
MIR. Bingham. who made q speech
yesterday, said it was--aHd have no
doubt of it--cannot make paper cur
rency anything but what it is.
There are some things, Mr.. ChaIrman5
which cannot be done. Imitation of
prices, although it might not be rapid,
and although the country might not be
ruined at once, and although we might
not find ourselves in that Serbonian bog
lin which whole armies have sunk at
once, We will get there soon enough
Initiation Of prices will be the result;
and when iuhation of prices begins, ex-
ports decrease and imports increase e.
Agricultural interests will be injured to
an incalcuiable exteut, aud the next
great result will be upon us, which is
the export Of gold out Of the country to
pay debts abroad for excessive importa-
tions, superinduced by the imitation of
prices here. We shall not then be able
to say as we can now, "the farming pro-
ductions of the West have been sent
, abroad to such an extent that even gold
has been brought back to pay the bal
) ance of trade in our favor. ,c
f In 1886 we imported wheat into this
country, not because we did not grow il
) as well as now, but because prices be-
t came so inflated that we all speculated
in western lands and town lots and be-
came perfectly wild, and the farmers Of
, Europe supplied the citizeus Of New
| York with wheat to make -four Of
WI hat has been dcue will be done again
; In the end, the Governments will be
vastly the loser by the imitation oi
prices, because 1t Mas TO buy such an
; immense amount of supplies; and the
contractor will bold in his hand, moi
r the legislative power, but the practiea
power to say, here is my property, auo
2 you shall have it at such a price, anc
not for less We have not yet reached
E the point when the Government, exer
cising its high prerogatives, as the mem
Der from New York, (Mr. Spaulding.
y calls them, can take for its use the
property Of the citizen without pay
: Mr.. Chairman, put the question to yol
with all respect, would it not be as hon
, est to go to the banks, and say, "yo,
S have such an amount of gold; just pa.
: over, and we will give you our bonds?'
:, The advantage of that process would b.
n that you could measure the injury yol
n had done and make reparaton; but hov
! can you measure the amount OF lnjur..
t to the country by deprecated ant
: iuctuating standard of payments?
: During this discussion we have bee
: told that old rules will net answer.
o have read, and / presume all have, tn
t saying Of the wise man, that "the thin!
O that has been done, it is that whicl
e shall be dons;'' and that there is Il
y new thing uude: .he sun" DO not be
" lieve there is any new thing in the law
a of fance. l do not believe all the leg
d islative wisdom we could get togethe
e could, if concentrated in one man, dis
, cover any new thing in the doctrine 9
l. business. Experience, practical knowl
d edge, are the only safe guides in thl
a matter. But there is one great intereS
Vt which you will appreciate, and which,
u think l know something Of, and that
d the interest of labcr Of all classes c
y community to be injured by this grea
o,T Il hat trIt