The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1867-03-16

The President Predicts n Financial
crash and RePudin tion OF the Ma
tiOnnl Debt.
A correspondent of the New York
Citizen sends to that journal report,
written from memory, of a conversa-
ton with President johnson, from
which we take the following extracts:
WASHINGTON, March g.
..And now, apart from the directly
political, - continued the President,
what is the main issue looming up
IN the Immediate future? What is
sue Is clearly foreshadowed to be the
Aaron's rod which must swallow up
all minor questions? 1t is the great
financial issue-the issue of the ma
tlonal whether it shall be paid
or repudiated? This issue has hbres
extending into the pocket of every
citizen; for wherever a man has a
dollar, or can earn dollar, the Go
vernment is now compelled to go for
its portion of his substance. and with
the vast machinery under its control,
the money is fetched.
And what has been the course of
that Congress which has just ended,
and which this blind aristecracy OF
national debt sustained in over
riding my efforts for return to sound
principles of internal government?
Look at the bill giving from $780,
100000 to 5000, 900, ,O0O-nominally
for back bounty, or as an equaliza-
ton Of bounties to the soldiers; but
really, as all intelligent men must be
aware, to be parcelled out as a prey
among the bounty sharks and claim
agents, who are the most reckless and
clamorous adherents of the dominant
majority in Congress. Then look at
appropriations amounting to another
hundred millions for internal i'm
provements, which should properly
be left to the laws governing private
industry and the progress Of our ma
tlonal development Look also at
the increase Of all salaries with pro
digal hand; this virtuous Congress
first setting an example against re-
trenchment by voting to themselves
an increase of salaries. Everywhere,
and IN an ever-increasing ratio, the
motto seems to be, Always spend
and never spare;' a fresh issue from
the paper mill over yonder," (slightly
pointing his pencil to the Treasury
Department., 'being the panacea
prescribed for every evil Of our pre-
sent situation
Every effort to increase our annual
taxation is resisted, for increased
taxes might help to awaken the
people from their false dream of pros
perity under the sway of revolutions
ary and radical ideas; but no addition
to the national debt can be proposed.
no further imitation of our inflated
currency, which the preponderatina,
votes of the Western States will pot
be certain to favor. The war of
finance is the next war we have to
fight, and every blow struck against
my efforts to uphold strict con-
struction of the laws and the Consti-
tuition is in reality Il blow in favor of
repndiating the national debt. The
manufacturers and men of capital in
the Eastern States and the States
along the Atlantic seaboard-a mere
strip Of fringe on the broad mantle of
onr country, if You will examine the
map-these are III favor of high pro-
tective, and, in fact, prohibitory ia
riffs, and also favor q contraction Of
the currency. But against both me:l-
sures, the interests and votes OF the
great producing and manufacturing
States of the West stand irrevocably
arrayed, and q glance at the map and
the census statistics of the last twenty
years Will tell every one who is open
to conviction how the war must end.
The history of the world gives no
example Of a war debt that has ever
been paid; but we have an excep-
tional country. and present an excep-
tlonal case. Onr debt might easily
be paid, provided the brakes against
excessive expenditures could be
turned on quickly enough-but now
IS the appointed time, and now or
never the work must be commenced.
Ii that debt is ever to be paid, we
need economy in every branch of the
public service-the reduction, not an
increase, of salaries to Congressman
and other officials; the systematic
reduction Of our national debt, and
not its increase by such monstrous
bills as this last demagogue measure
for the pretended equalization of
bountieS.