Cleveland daily leader. [volume] ([Cleveland, Ohio]) 1865-1873, 1865-12-06

upon man by the preservation Of the nations
life Now, on the first occasion of the meet
ing of Congress since the return of peace, it
is of the utmost Importance TO ~inaugurate a
just policy, which shall at once be put in
motion, and which shah commend itself to
those who come after us for its continuance.
We must aim at nothing less than the COM
plete effacement of the financial evils that
necessarily followed a state of civil war.
We must endeavor to apply the earliest
remedy to the deranged state of the cur
rency, and not shrink from devising 8
policy which, without being oppressive TO
the people, shall Immediately begin to effect
a reduction of the debt, and, if persisted in,
discharge it fully within a definitely fixed
number of years.
THE CURRENCY MUST BE CONTRACTED.
1t is our first duty to prepare in earnest
for our recovery from the ever increasing
evils of an irredeemable currency, without
a sudden revulsion, and yet without IN
timely procrastination. For that end, we
must, each in u respective positions,pre-
pare the way. 1 hold it the duty of the
Executive to insist upon ~frugality in the
expenditures and a sparing economy is
itself a great national resource. OF the
banks to which authority has been given
to issue notes secured by bonds of the
United States, we may require the great
eat moderation and prudence, and the law
must be rigidly enforced when its limits
are exceeded. We may, each one of US,
counsel our active and enterprising cOun-
trymen to be constantly on their guard, to
liquidate debts contracted in q paper cur
rency, and, by conducting business as
nearly as possible on a system of cash
payments or short credits, to hold them
selves prepared to return to the standard
of gold and silver. To aid our fellow
citizens nthe prudent managementoftheir
monetary affairs, the duty devolyes on
us to diminish by law the amount
of paper money now in circulation. Five
years ago the bank-note circulation of the
country amounted to not much more than
two hundred millions now the c~ircula-
ton, bank and national, exceeds seven
hundred millions. The simple statement
of the fact recommends more strongly
than any words of mine could do, the
necessity of our restraining this expan-
sion The gradual reduction of the cur
rency is the only measure that can save
the business of the country from disas-
trous calamities and this can be almost
imperceptibly accomplished by gradually
funding the national circulation in securi-
ties that may be made r~edeemable at the
pleasure Of the Government.
H WAY TO FAX.
Our debt is doubly secure-irst in the
actual wealth and still greater undevelop-
ed resources of the country and next in
the character of our institutions. The most
intelligent observers among political econ
omists have not failed to remark, that the
public debt of a country is safe in proper.
ton as its people are free; that the
debt of a republic is safest of
all. Our history confirms and
establishes the theory, and is, l firmly be-
lieve, destined to give it n still more signal
Illustration. The secret of this superior
lty springs not merely from the fact that in
a republic the national obligations are dis
tributed more widely through countless
numbers in all classes of society; it has
its root in the character of our laws. Here
all men contribute to the public welfare.
and bear their fair share of the public bur-
dens. During the war undert the impulses
of patriotism, the men of the great body
of the people, without regard to their own
comparative want of wealth, thronged to
our armies and filed our fleets of war, and
held themselves ready to offer their lives
for the public good. Now, in their turn,
the property and income of the
country should bear their just pro-
portion of the burden of taxation.
while in u impost system, through
means of which increased vitality is Incl
dentally impaired to all the industrial ill.,
terests of the nation, the duties should be
so adjusted as to fall most heavily on ar
ticles of luxury, leaving the ne~cessaries of
life as free from taxation as the absolute
wants of the Government, economically
administered, will justify. No favored
class should demand freedom from assess
ment, and the taxes should be so distrib-
uted as not to fall unduly on the poor, but
on the accumulated wealth of the
We should look at the national
debt just as it is-not as a national bless
ing, but as a heavy burden on the Industry
the country, to be discharged without
unnecessary delay.