The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-10-31
ness Of his view and hasten to deal with the

ness of his view and hasten to deal with the
issue he presents.
We certainly cannot Garry on the Govern
. ment, whether it continues republican or is
merged into despotism, without money; and
to obtain 1t the people are to continue to be
taxed. II is pretty generally agreed that
taxation is already as heavy as can be borne.
The resources of the country, including its
labor, which stamps value upon everything,
can endure but very few additional straws to
their present load. Hence the financial ques-
tiOn Is the one that presses the hardest. Re-
construction amounts to nothing without the
ready means to sustain it; and all questions
Of suffrage, bureaus, and military government
must give way before the supreme urgency
of the money issue. Years ago, Mr.. Sumner
and his school affected lofty contempt for
these questions of trade and commerce, of
finance and the development of the national
resources. They professed to believe that the
Government was established as a sort of en-
gine for the propulsion of their ideas on re-
form and progress among the people, and that
the ways and means question was entirely
aside from its proper administration. To-day
they are confronted with the inquiry-Hew
are we going to get along3 This reform busi-
ness has proved immensely expensive. This
experiment in progress has drained us of our
means. We gladly spent for the Union, and
hold the debt incurred in its behalf to be
sacred; but we have since raised and spent
nearly as much more, and it has all gone for
this idle experimenting, which is about to ter
inmate, If persisted in, in the complete over
turn of our republican system.
The real question therefore, is that of pay
ing our way. But it is equally plain that our
way must lie parallel with the old constitu-
tlonal paths, or our resources are exhausted
already. Revolutionize the Government, and
you throw all the fixed relations Of industry
and enterprise into chaos. Break up this
equal plan which the Fathers wisely established
for the States, and general confidence is stimuli
taneously overthrown; and the subsequent
work of building upon its ruins is very slow
and tedious. In short, without firm and en-
during financial system, all these theories and
experimenting fall to the ground at once. II
the two are thus inextricably joined, it is not
hard to tell which is practically underneath,
and which supports the other.
The speeches of Governor Seymour set forth
this view OF the matter with singular perspi-
Guilty and impressiveness. He teaches what
all rejecting men must well know, that, with
such heavy taxes, such inordinate expendi-
ture, such gross extravagance, and such
criminal corruption, no Government can long
go on, especially a Government instituted and
upheld as ours is; thence this becomes the
single issue of the campaign; upon this the
radical party is to be tried. 1t has had su-
preme control of the finances for the past four
years, and the country has only become more
deeply involved. If matters continue thus
We shall all go down in a common ruin. Ii
party is not to be arraigned on its past con-
duct, but expects the people to let that go and
listen yet again to its fair promises for the
future then politics have become of no prac-
ticsl account, and there is no further use in
disputiDg with guilty men for the control of
the Government.