The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-11-21

Nom Me NJ Y Herald.

men or all business pursuits, East, west,
North and South are anxiously looking to
Congress for some measures of relief. "Trade
is depressed, - '"business is dull, " "imes are
very hard with us, 'nothing is doing in our
line," are expressions which may now be
heard in any store, in any line of business,
from one end of this city to the other. So it
is, doubtless, to greater extent, in every
commercial city, town, and village of the
United States. Rents and provisions are still
high, our Federal taxes, State taxes, and
county and corporation taxes oppress the peo-
pie more heavily from month to month, while
profits and incomes are rapidly diminishing
and the fountains of labor are drying up;
and so all eyes are turned to Congress
in the hope of some measure of redress.
Great reforms in our internal revenue laws
are demanded and corresponding notifications
OF our external tax laws; great retrenchments
are called for in the Government expenditures,
but a deficiency of money in circulation is the
general complaint Of business people every
where and of all classes. There is not money
enough afloat to meet the legitimate demands
of trade; hence the general depression. The
Secretary of the Treasury has adopted and is
vigorously pursuing system of oOntractions
which, unless seasonably arrested, may oulmi-
nate in the same results as excessive imitation
failures, bankruptcies, panic, and gene
raj collapse.
what, then, is Congress called upon to do
We think an act should be passed repeating
the act for the curtailment of the volume of
legal-tender notes, and that simple legal-ten-
ders, without interest, should be provided for
and issued in the place of interest bearing
legal-tenders as fast as they mature. Further
more, we want legal-tenders in the place of the
national bank notes as fast as posSible; for
why should twenty-five or thirty millions in
terest on the national bonds as basis of cir
culation be paid to these national banks,
when, by the simple substitution of green
backs, all these bounties to the national banks
may be saved to our national taxpayers and to
the TreasuryH
Mr.. McCulloch, his admirers say, is moving
steadily towards specie payments; but while
gold continues on the margin of l40 the
prospect of specie pavement by his policy of
contraction is not very promising. With the
reduction Of imports and the curtailment of
manufactures there are corresponding reduc-
tions in the revenue returns of the Treasury,
while the costs of collection are still increas-
ing, from increasing frauds and schemes of
evasion, embezzlement, and robbery. ALI
these things cover q wide field for legislation,
and the very existence of the party in power
depends upon its action on this paramount and
all-absorbing money question. Hence the
attention Of the whole country is now turned
for relief to Congress, where the power and
the responsibility belong. We would there
fore remind the party in power of the public
wants and expectations in season for action at
the coming session, and especially would we
warn the two Houses of the folly and the
dangers of Mr.. McCulloeh's depressing policy
of contraction to hurry up specie payments.
Mr.. PendIetOn's Financial VaEary.
MON lbe N. Y Tribune.
The World calls our attention to Mr.. Pendle-
toms so-oalled ''Plan for paying the National
debt" in fifteen years. It is as folloWs:-
"Three hundred and thirty-eight millions of
these bonds are, by the report OF the Secretary
OF the Treasury, deposited today as seeurity
In the vaults of the Treasury. Three hundred
millions Of bank paper is issued on the faith OF
these bonds. Now, gentlemen, maintain that
this circulation ought TO be called In; that these
ponus ought TO be redeemed with legal.tenders,
whlch VIII take the place OF that bank clrcula-
tion.
bonds would be reduced TO fourteen hundred
millions; and twenty millions OF dollars would
be saved TO the Government from the interest
which is paid TO the bankers for the bonds
which they have deposited.
millions Of interest which is saved, and add Il
to the forty y-eight millions Of dollars which
these gentlemen say they can pay from the cur
lions OF dollars, year by year. and II you con-
vert that sum into greenbaeks, at I4O, you have
a hundred millions OF dollars year and II
this is appropriated as aslnking fund, you can
pay of the whole debt IN less than hfteen years
without adding one dollar TO your taxation, or
one dollar to your CIRCULATING medium,
ssBear In mind dthatI am arguing q proposition
that these bonds can be paid In greenbacks
| without Initiating the currency"
The only portion of this plan which Is Mr..
| Pendleton's is that relating.to the twenty mill
| lions of dollars whicn he thinks can be saved
by abolishing the National Banking system,
and making the Treasury Department issue all
the currency now issued by the National