Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1864-07-15
Can we Pay our National Debt P


The population Of the United Kingdot
is about the same as that Of the Unite,
States. The national debt of Great Brit
ain is about four thousand millions, AM
ours about enc thousand seven hundre'
millions. Can we support our debt with
out ruinous taxation? Can we bear, tha
is to say, much less than half Of wha
Englishmen bear without suffering?
Supposing that the circumstances o.
the two nations were alike, no American
of spirit would doubt that we can support
as heavy IA burden as our English cous
ins-let alone one far lighter. But ou
circumstances are not alike they have
country thickly settled, soil exhausted
to great extent of its fertility, a system
of land tenure extremely wasteful, an or
ganization Of society which reprcsses in
stead of encouraging individual energy
and enterprise. We have virgin soil
incxhaustible mineral wealth, system o
land tenure, at least in the free States
which conduces to the highest prosperity
of the creates. number, and condition
of society in which individual enterprise
is encouraged and fostered. With these
and other advantages, we must grow il
wealth much more rapidly than the Eng
glish, and the measure Of national wealth
is the measure of strength to support the
burden Of a national debt
Mr.. Robert j. Walker sets this ques
ton in clear light by some statistics
which he has recently printed in London
He shows that our national wealth was
increased in the ten years from 1850 to
1860 oye- one hundred and twenty-siS
per cent, while that Of England from
1851 to 1861 increased but 81 per cent
He shows, from the census tables, that
the ratio of increase OF our national
wealth has been constant, and always III
excess of the increase OF the population
Thus from 1920 to 1880 our wealth in.
creased II per cent !; from 1880 to lS4U
II per cent; from 1910 to 1850 81 per
cent? and from 1850 to 1860, l2G.45
per ceut.
If we 90 on at the same rate for an.
other decade the result will be in 1870
an increase Of over go per cent.
Bat, he adds, if the product per head
of the slave States haa been the same in
1859 that it was in the free States, that
would have added to the national wealth
an additional value produced OF Sl,53l,.
63l ,O00, according to official census re.
turns. Now, the way to make the south
ern States as rich and productive as the
Northernand even mere so, as Mr.. James
Brooks justly observed more than thirty
years ago, during a journey in the South
is to abolish slavery. Substitute sklliul
intelligent, interested free labor, for un
skilled, ignorant and uninterested slave
labor, and, as he remarked, South Caro-.
Ina would be the weathiest State in the
Union.
Now, we are going to have the assist
ancc OF this added and hitherto undevel
opcd wealth to pay not ouly the interes
but the principal of our national debt:-
With "small farms and divided labor
taking the place of the teudal system,
as MIR. Brooks says, all the immense un.
developed natural resources OF the South
ern States will vastly increase our ma.
tional wealth and prosperity. Will
slavery abolished, free working men vii
pour by hundreds OF thousands from al
parts Of Europe into u region to which &
mild climate, Il sparse population anc
nigh rewards for labor will tempt them,
bat from which they have been hitherto
excluded by the fatal competition Of un'
paid slave labor against those who must
have a fair days wages for fair day.
WORK" Emigration, SO astonlshingly great
during the last three years in the mids'
Of war, will increase still more when tht
area opened to free workingmen is more
than doubled and Mr.. Walker does moi
overshoot the mark when he estimates
the increase in our national wealth, from
the substitution Of Fl ee for slave labor ii
the South, in ten years, at the great sun
of over seventeen thousand millions o.
dollars, nearly ten times our present na
tional debt. Thus the mere addition w
shall make in ten years to our natlona
wealth, by ubolishlng the " institution
which has been so long curse and ;
source OF dissension to Us, would many
times over pay our national debt.
But to show in another way what ar
onr prospects, Mr.. Walker compares th'
future wealth of Great Britain and th'
United States, supposing that each in
creases in the same ratio as during tht
ten years for which in each case We har'
the latest census returns. 1t will be re
membered that the increase in the Unite
States from 1850 to 1860 was l26.4) pc
cent, and in Great Britain from 1851 t
to lo6l, 81 per cent. Assuming thes
ratios--which, however, are unfair tc
wards as-the result would be as follows
UNITED KINCDON.
1851, wealth. ...'',S ,9oo' ooo' oo
| 1871, .................43,la 3, la5,O &, ,0C
| 1891, I" ............ 81, ", ,33o,uo
| 1891, 4" .............,... e05S ,hI3' ot
| 1901, d" .llO 9tG,eJI"
UNITED STATES.
1850. wealth, .lG. .li9 ,Gl C ,0(
1870, ................36 SOB, t50, ,oe
1850 .................S2 81, $50, SOS 81
| 1890. ............. Isl j 4, 213 q
| 1900. ............ ..... .4-S,35O' '4'S, =
thus it appears by the censQs OF eac
nation," says Mr.. Walker, "that, each ii
creasing in the same ratio respectively