Daily Ohio statesman. [volume] (Columbus, Ohio) 1855-1870, 1867-11-14
The Great Radical Leader ON

The Great Radical Leader ON I
Paying Government Bonds with |
Greembacks.
The letter of THADDKus STEVENS, to one |
of his banker friends in Lancaster, in which
the writer takes strong ground against the
assumption that Government bonds pur-
chased with greenbacks should be paid
in gold, has made decided flutter among
the bond owners who control the Radical
organization. The blow, coming from their
head-center, they consider the unkindest
cut of all. During the six years last past
Mr.. STEVENS charges that the Government,
by mismanagement of its finances, lost
thousands of millions of dollars
Mr.. STEVENS utterly repudiates the idea
that the payment of the bonds in green
backs would produce an expansion of the
currency, which leading to contraction
must end, as undue expansions do, in utter
ruin to many, and shows that expansion is
just as probable with gold as currency as
it is with paper. Greenbacks. being by law
a legal tender-the Supreme Court de-
Gliding that Congress had right to make it
receivable in payment of all debts, even in
contracts where the payment was to be paid
in gold, the Court forced the lender to r, :
ceive greenbacks at their face-Mr. STE
WINS argues that the Government credit
ors, If necessary, could be forced to receive
their interest in paper, although contract
ed to be paid in coin. But this, the great
Radical does not propose at this time
He will violate no contract but will pay the
interest in gold, because it is..so contract
ed, but the principal, contracted, as he al
leges, to be paid in greenbacks, he is deter
mined shall be paid in that currency and
nothing else.
The doctrine broached by Mr.. GREELEY
and by JAY Cooke, that a dollar means a
piece of metal, and that paper promise of
| the Government, like bank promise to
pay the dollar, is not a dollar, when the
Congress has made it so, is monstrous
doctrine, and one not to be tolerated.
The idea of paying the bonds in gold
Mr.. STEVENS claims, had its origin among
the gold gamblers, whose acts he compares
to the operations of faro players, with the
arts of which game, an exchange insinu-
ates, the late Chairman of the Committee
of Ways and Means is said to be familiar.
\
He ridicules the idea of two currencies,
maintains the authority of the Government
to pay its debt in anything it pleases, and
introduces a suppositious number of
horses to draw his argument to the desired
conclusion. He is in no hurry for the re-
sumption of specie payments-consid
the redemption of four millions of
greenbacks a month too fast-advo-
Gates high tariffs, taxes on exports,
Cotton particularly assuming that Eng
land must pay just what America may
please to demand for it. not considering
the fact that the price is now fixed in Liv-
erpool, not in America, in consequence of
England's supply being independent of us
The acrimony of the temper displayed in
this letter, coming from the leader of the
dominant party in Congress, is to be
regretted, for, in parts of it the reasoning
is strong. and in his conclusions, Mr.. STE
VEINS in his whole political life never ad-
vocated sounder or more honest senti-
ment.