The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1866-10-06
Relief to Debtors:


the Legislature at its recent session:
The mountain has labored, and, IN
our opinion, brought forth mouse.
After some weeks spent in frothy de-
clamation, in which the State and
Federal Constitutions were thorough
ly ventilated, orr Legislature gave
US, as relief to debtors, an act sus-
pending the sessions of the Court of
Common Pleas for one term. We
are not in favor of creditors pressing
debtors at this time, and we are in
favor of every measure of relief for
the debtor, consistent with equity
and good conscience. But we main
tain that the measure adopted is no
relief at all; in our Judgment, it is
we'll calculated to aggravate the feel
ings of the creditor, as it will excite
his suspicion that his debts are to be
ultimately repudiated, by destroying
or indefinitely postponing his legal
remedies for their collection, and i'm
pei him next spring to sue his debtors
Unfortunately. Every law passed
by the Legislature tampering with
contracts between man and man, de-
stroys confidence between them,
which is worth all the stay laws that
ever can be passed, and when conf
dence is destroyed, legal remedies of
course are sought. We sympathize
with honest debtors, and it is evident
that most of creditors do, or why is
it that nine hundred old executions
are now lying in the sheriff's office of
this District, unenforced? The stay
law, from its inception, was an unwise
one, and but for its passage one-half
of the Indebtedness which now hangs
over the country would have been
paid off during she war. A class of
men who kept out of the war took
advantage of that law, accumulated
wealth by speculation, and let their
debts run on. Those same men, to-
day, instead of paying off their debts,
are using their money in speculation,
attending sales and buying property.
Such men should be made to pay. If
spring. in what respect is he bettered
by delay of six months? Can he
raise the money more readily than
now? We think not, for money is
always scarcer i'll the spring than it
is in the fall But our Legislators
either do not comprehend the true
condition of the country, or else they
resolutely shut their eyes to it. Now.
the truth is, the country is hopeless
ly bankrupt, and legislators should
accept the fact, and act accordingly.
The man who expects the indebted
ness of this country to be discharged
in full, is doomed to disappointment.
1t cannot now, and will not be able
for fifty years to come, to pay more
than so per cent The debts which
have been inherited by this genera
ton we're contracted upon the secu-
rity of negro property. That pro-
perty has been swept away, and the
debts remain with no property left
adequate to their payment-and
what hope is there, that our people
can ever replace the 450,000,0 900 of
negro property that they have lost?
Absolutely none. If, then, men can
not pay, what good will stay laws do
them? There will be no safe basis
for business transactions until there
is q general settlement. No man
knows what he is worth-no man
knows who to trust The sooner,
therefore, that the indebtedness of
the country can be adjusted, the
sooner will confidence and property
be restored. Men cannot pay their
debts in full, and they should at once
pay what they can and take new
start To afford the best measure of
relief to debtors, as we'll as to give
any value to their action at the late
session, the Legislature must go for
ward and pass liberal homestead and
bankrupt laws. In the latter law,
after permitting the debtor to retain
enough of his property to keep his
family from suffering, we would al
low him to surrender his property to
his creditors, and be forever thereaf-
ter discharged from their demands.
If forced into bankruptcy the debtor
could then go to work with some
heart to take new start. Creditors
in view of this law would, we
imagine, prefer to wait with the
debtor and let him pay as he was
able, to receiving five cents on the
dollar, in the bankrupt court, and
have their claims forever barred.
A SENSIBLE AND PRA(TIcAT, RIr-