The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1864-11-11
The Great Debt; Who Must Pay IL ?

The appalling debt which has accumulated
upon the nation for the war-a debt of thou
sands of millions of dollars and accommodating
by millions upon millions of dollars per day
must be paid or the nation must sink into the
"fathOmless pit of bankruptcy and dishonor
Payment or disgrace in the eyes of the civilized
world, is the only alternative. Who are to
provide the means to avoid the disgrace
Where is the source of those means, and who
are to bring them out and reduce them to
| practicable and available use? These are vital
questions.
Every man, and especially every labrin
man, should distinctly and clearly understand
that the means to pay the aoar debt, as well as
every other pecuniary liability, must be pro-
vided by productive labOr,-that kind of labor
that brings into use new things of material
value. There is not any other earthly way by
which those means can be obtained and made
available. The whole burden of the public
debt is, therefore, thrown back upon the
shoulders of those engaged in productive labor.
The sources Of material wealth are the for
ests and the wild animals that inhabit Them
the mines, the fisheries, and the lands. OF all
these, the lands, are vastly the most impor-
tant for they annually, under the fostering
hand Of labor, refill the vacancy occasioned by
the years consumption of the necessaries Of
human life and human comfort.
The very idea Of wealth, of material value,
that attaches to either or any Of these sources
thereof, rests entirely upon the fact that there
exists labor to bring them into practical and
available use. Though the idea seldom enters
the human mind on its eager pursuits of life,
it is none the less true. that without labor all
these sources of material wealth would be
without value.
Money is not, in itself, wealth. 1t is only
the representative Of value, and is or rather
ought to be standard-an interchangeable standard,
by which the relative value of all labor and
commodities should be measured and adjusted.
1t is used to pay and cancel all public and pri-
vate liabilities because it is the representative
value of all acts and things having value. Mo-
ney would be absolutely worthless in the alb
sence of material things of value to which to
apply it, 1t is therefore the material things of
the world that constitute the basis of its wealth;
but it is labor, productive labor, that brings
those things into requisition and practical use.
1t is labor, the productive and reforming hand
of labor, that imparts to those things their
value, and all profits or Accommodations obtained
by mechanical transformations Of such things.
or by commerce in them, are but taxes upon
the labor that brought them out of natures
labratory into the fields and workshops of hu-
man enterprise. Without such natural mate
rial and the labor to bring it out, there could
not be any enterprise, and without the profits
of transformation, use and commerce, there
aooald be none.
farmer, by his labor, prepares his ground,
sows his seed, harvests his crop, and transports
it to market, new thing of material wealth
that did not exist the year previous-an actual
addition to the wealth of the world, produced
by labor He sells the crop. The purchaser
buys it for the purposes of manufacture or COM
merce, and to make profit on it. He pays
the farmer price that will assure him such
profits and he pays his ta:res out Of his profits in
whatever form they may be assessed or impos-
out of the price which he pay the farmer. And
it is precisely SO with everything that the farm
er produces by his labor and takes to market
1t is precisely so with him, who penetrates
the forest and by strokes of the laborious axe,
fells the huge oak or towering pine. He re-
moves the crude log to the place of market or
manufacture and there sells it to purchaser,
who profits upon it and pays his taxes out Of
such profits.
1t is precisely SO with him who digs into the
bowels of the earth and brings up to the sur
face and into the fields of other labor and into
the marts of commerce, the metals and mine
rails which, without his labor, would have re-
manned in their native beds without any meas
urable or known value, go long as the world
shall keep its form.
We present these truths because they are
truths and not with any design to detract or
derogate any thing from the merits of mechan-
ical or transforming labor, or from the benefits
of proper commercial enterprise and action,
for they too are all necessary to the strength
and prosperity of the nation, and to the ad-
vancement and continuance of civilization.
| In this connection it should not be over
looked or forgotten that whenever any mate
rial thing Of value is consumed or exhausted
| by use or otherwise, it is gone forever. A va
cancy is left, to remain vacancy or to be filed
by the reproduction of another like thing of
value, and for such reproduction recourse must
be had to the hand of productive labor To t.
lustrate: every charge of powder that has
been burned in this war, and every shot that
has been sent against the rebels, have, in the
material. been produced by labor, and they are
gone forever; and SO by every article that has
been worn ont or destroyed in the war and
emphatically SO by every particle Of food or
provender consumed by man or beast employed
in the armies All these things SO consumed
or destroyed must be resupplied with new ma
terial produced or brought out Of natures de
positories, by the hand of labor or the nation
must sink.
1t is apparent to every one that the ability O.
nation TO pay given sum is dependent more
upon its productive laboreTs than upon the
amount of material which it may have to bt
brought out, and especially in the case of {