Washington telegraph., 1865-06-28


only confused by considering the burden
of the principal while that principal is
not due or payable
| Interest on our De6t-On the 3lst OF
March, 1865, the total amount of the in
terest-bearing debt was 81, ,416,37O.
the annual interest amounting to S1O2,-
! $50, ,531, an average of $50 per cent
per annum. OF the bonds and notes
which make The aggregate of the interest
/ bearing debt. 2764 millions are at 5 per
cent; III millions at 6 per cent; 1861
millions at 6-46 per cent. (the compound
interest notes and 30l millions at 7.3O
per cent The compound interest notes
will all be due in Jnne, 1867. and the
! 7 30s are payable or convertible int
/ per cents in August, 1857 and 1865 1t
must be recollected, also, that the $40
millions of $50 bonds, issued under the
act of February, 1862, viii be payable,
at the option of the Government, on the
1st of May, 1867; and the 5-2Os, into
which the present running loan of 7-3O
notes are convertible, will, in like man
ner, be payable in August, 1872 and
1878. / is entirely probable that all
these st ,cks will, at the period desig-
mated for their optional payment by the
Government, be changed, if not discharg-
ed, into 5 per cent. loans. We are,
therefore entirely safe in putting the av-
erage rate of interest upon our permanent
debt at 81 per cent. per annum, payable
half-yearly. The average interest upon
the total debt, including 5l5I millions
i'll g gleenbacks and fractional currency, is
now but 35 per cent. per aunum. Here,
again, allowance is made for the possible
funding of this large sum. now bearing
no interest, thus overc!Ia ging the ac-
count of the Government by the amount
added for interest on the Government
currency, which viii most probably lie
kept in circulation until such time as the
revenue shall exceed expenditures.
The actually .accruing interest upon
/ the total debt for the current year is, as
before stated, fraction under 103 mil
lions per annum; bnt to cover the posi-
bic additions of the / an now on the
market we put it a. l26 millions For
the year 1866, We assume the principal
at 2700 millions, and the interest at las
millions; thereafter the debt is taken al
5000 millions, interest 16J millions.
Several pages are taken ~ with sta
tistics of the wealth, and annual products
of the country, ba ed upon the census
reports of past decades In table he
sets forth the probeblep per centags of the
annual products Of tie country required
TO paw the accruing interest. as foil ws
For 1865. 2 81 per cent; for 1866. 3.l7
per cent; for 1857, 3.25 per cent fog
1870, 2 "A per c. t; for 1880 IS per
cent for 1881. 27 per cent
| Trospecticc Pcsources. The burden 81
interest upon the public deb; is here CT l.
cuiated down 10 lIe rate. of the increas.
of wealth in the last decade, ilnmediatel,
+ before the rebellion commenced. Is rhi.
the measure of enhancement for the next
sixteen years ! Let lis see: In that last
decade, nine o oar Northwestern States
and Territories grew upon the valuation
OF 1880 full 4ll5 per cent.,-from 452I
to 1862 millions Four new territories,
which had not been reported in 1850
Were valued in 1860 at SO millions; and
the still newer ones, Dakota, Nevada
Colorado, Arizona, and Idaho, are not
valued at all These last are among the
richest in the precious metals and are
rapidly rising int, equality of product
! with California itself, but have no report
in our estimates. The Government still
holds, in the great West and Northwest,
$50 millions Of acres of land usdisposed
of, which are now, at the conclusion Of
the war, to come rapidly into market.
and, what is much more to the purpose,
| though worth thousand nj lions 10 the
Treasury in purchase-money, VIII, after
the example Of those settled and improved
since 1850, rise in taxable value, at an
average rate of 455 per cent, and in
twenty years increase about thirty times
the cash value of the property of their
occupants; and if every dollar received
from the sale of the public domain shall
| be bestowed upon these new States by
the Federal Government in donations to
their internal improvement and educa-
tional enterprises, the taxable wealth and
the resulting revenue in these new States
viii be thereby only increased in manifold
proportion to the investment.
TIE Mineral Regions which invite our
disbanded armies, and the st;l! larger
hosts Of E'''"p"an inmi migra,::- 10 open
up their treasures, extend through IL
degrees of latitude, and longitude of
nearly equal measure, making an area of
more than a million of square miles
They are literally stocked with gold,
silver, precious stones, marble, gypsum.
salt, tin, quicksilver, asphaltum, coal,
iron, cop. er, and lead; asking only an
amount of labor relatively equal to that
expended on California, to yield four
hundred millions per annum in gold and
| silver alone; and in the other minerals,
which will b. mined as soon as transpor
tation is provided, a least half that sum
And these things are n t merely in the
possible of the lar future; they are near
enough to answer the exigeucies of our
condition, a population now of thirty
millions, which, during the last half cen
tury, has doubled its numbers every 22J
years, with all the industrial enginery