New-York tribune., 1868-12-21

again by simply h0arulnS OF burning oui SUI
plus currency.
V. The difference between your plan and
mine, reduced to its simplest terms, IS TINS:
A man Just emerging from protracted ana
extensive lawsuit, on which his all was staked,
finds himself very heavily in debt, with large
assets not Immediately available, beside con-
siderable sum in ready money. lie has two
odvisers one of whom says: al would use my
money in payng such debts as will most surely
"enhance the market value of all my outstand-
ing obligations and thus enable me to borrow
" the wherewithal to fund my remaining obliga-
Z" tions mt lower rates of interest and make my
"credtors easy by giving them assurance that
" they could sell their claims to advantage IL
"ever compelled to part with them' ana
"would increase my income and diminish my
" expenditures so as to pay off more debt
"weekly henceforth until the last dime was
extipguished"-" No. says the other, that
4" Is no way. Do MT pay a red cent at present,
"bnt hoard all you have and all you can get
" for the next thirty months; promising there
after to pay everybody in full" 1t seems 10
me that the former plan is the better poth ior
debtor and creditor
! | object to your prospective Resumption that
il dooms all business to thirty months more Oh
painful uncertainty. We tried your plan YIN
substance) once, by directing the Secretary to
cancel and destroy Four Millions of Green
backs per month after certain day. That
vould have brought us slowly but surely TO
Resumption, had it been perseyered in' But
so soon as the shoe began to pinch, Congress
ordered it taken OF Who can say that 1t
will not do 50 again if your scheme be adopted
You~seem to think that we can come to Re
sumption so gently that we shall hardly feel
! itl BE entreated to discard that error. Inc
pist of Resumption is general fall of twenty
FIVE to forty per cent. in prices, and conse-
ouent appreciation Of debts. Make the process
as gradual as you will, it involves distress to
many and at least apparent loss to ALL
We shall all be worth fewer dollars than now,
because our dollars viii mean more after Ke-
sumption than they now do. Wages
must fall property sell cheaper or be unsala-
able the sheriff and the constable viii be after
a good many of us. We must suffer any how;
but prefer to take the plunge at once and
be done with it. Then, men may build houses,
and improve lands and start factories, and run
furnaces, assured that they are on solid ground;
but, if your plan be tried every wise man must
| know that the house lie builds in 1869 OF 10
| will not be worth 50 many dollars when built
as it will cost him, AID 80 will decline or post
pone the undertaking. How calamitous this
must prove to Labor and Business, think
J even you must realize.
VI. Allow me to call your attention to some
other statements in your speech, which seem to
me not well considered.
| Yon say that the greenback note il a
"promisc 10y the Government to pay so
&" many dollars, on dcmahd.' / cannot find
/ that pro' ,sc, aud you do not quote it. On the
/ contrary, il was distinctly understood, when
! those notes were issued, that they could not
/ be paid in coin on demand" They were Is
sued aud taken with that understanding. 1t
icds promised that they should be converted
on demand" into fye-twenty bonds; but that
promise has been Tccalod-I think unjustly
aud unwsely. AS it stands, the promise sub
stantially is, The United States will pay so
soon as they can"
Now, believe they can pay at once-sO they
epolt to pay. would resume tomorrow on our
! Seventy Millions of coin, and provide further
means of maintaining Specie Payments next
day. But, if We are mol to resume forthwith,
then would use at least iifty Millions of the
coin in tho Treasury to buy up and cancel in
tcrest- bearing bonds, and thus appreciate that
credit those securities, which are our ultimate
resources FOR maintaining Specie Payments.
You do not doubt that the market value of
our bonds left unpaid would be decidedly en-
haneed by thus buying up and destroying
Sixty Millions of them; and l think you
must see that this would render it posi-
ble to negotiate new loans on better terms
than we could now do. This is exactly the
end contemplate. Had We done this three
years ago. we should have saved ut least Ten
Millions that We have since paid as interest;
we should have improved and strengthened our
credit; and We should have been far nearer
Resumption than we now are, though with less
Gold in the Treasury For, as the strength of
a chain is that of its weakest link, so the diff
Guilty of Resumption lies in providing for that
portion of our Greenbacks which we have not,
aud never shall have, coin in hand to redeem.
With Two Hundred Millions of gold in the
Treasury we should still be very far from Re-
sumption pr0rided that every holder of Green
back should wish 10 exchange it for coin. The
one thing needful for Resumption is to provide
some form of National obligation which the
holders Of Greenbacks will prefer TO coin--in
| other words, some Government security which
will largely sell at some rate above specie par.
| Whenever we have that we can resume with
but Ten Millions of coin in the Treasury.
Without ii, we may fail to maintain Specie Pay
ment, though We begin with coin reserve of
Two Hundred Millions
VII You tell us. Mr.. Senator tho,
"The legatender currency OF conn,rv ho... -. ,.
Of credit aud security, boz, pnbc and 20 eVfry iorm