The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-08-03

at six or seven per cent on the market between
s 6 enS Soo enough to raise eos at Least
notes, not redeemable In coin, but fundable in
specie-paying bonds at twenty years"
These, MIR. Stevens, are your words. You
cannot deny them. They prove beyond oavil
that you understood the matter as Secretary
Chase did, and as every one else did. We be-
heved you and followed your lead. "Legal-
tender" paper was q hard dose to swallow
very hard-but our soldiers must be fed and
paid, arms and munitions must be bought
or made, and the Rebellion at any sacrifice
put down. You devised and enacted the
financial meas sures; we begged every patriot
to sell whatever he could spare and invest the
proceeds in Government bonds. We assured
every one that these bonds were payable and
would be paid at maturity in coin. You au-
thorzed US to do so. We did not mean to
swindle them; did you9
Mr.. Stevens, this is a very grave matter.
The bread of widows and orphans Is at stake.
We wish there were polite phrases that would
suffice for its thorough discussion, but there
are not. Nor can we pass it in silence. Those
who at our solicitation lent their fortunes to
sustain our Government in its dire extremity
have right to our best efforts to save them
from spoliation, and shall have them.
III. You state that the new funding bill
provides for redeeming the Five-twenties by
an issue of bonds at lower rates of interest.
Certainly; did we not all expect TO do pre-
cisely this Were not the six per cent. bonds
made payable at the pleasure of the Govern
ment after five and within twenty years ex-
pressly that this might be done Our Gov
ernment borrowed in 1914 at twelve per cent.
getting ninety to ninety-fve dollars in de-
preciated paper for every 500 of its bonds,
which it nevertheless redeemed at par in coin.
Did it 80 on borrowing at such rates after the
war with Great Britain was ended OF course
not. Great Britain has for fifty years been
steadily paying off loans at higher rates with
the proceeds of new loans at lower, until her
entire debt is now consolidated, and her Soon
soils" draw but three per cent. interest. There
is no difficulty and no hardship in this. All we
need is such credit with moneyed men that
they will be glad to loan us money at four per
cent, then we say to holders of "Five-twen-
ties'' over five years old, "Take the new bonds
at four per cent, or we will pay you off,"
or course, If our four per cents are the least
fraction above par they will all take these
rather than the money, and the conversion is
effected. No one can complain, for no one has
been wropged. IL was part of the bargain
that we might pay off these Five-twenties after
they had run five years; and we ought ere
this to have converted many millions Of them,
reducing the interest one-third It is the
threat of reputation that now renders this
process impracticable. We could borrow at
four per cent. as we'll as Great Britain, if there
were no fear that we would cheat the lend
ers. We are paying the penalty of bad re-
putation, which you, Mr.. Stevens, have aided
to give us.
". You say, If The Five-twenties had been
payable in gold, there would have been no
reason for specifying that our new consols are
thus payable. But you, Mr.. Stevens, are q
lawyer and legislator, and ought to know that
laws are being altered and amended every day
to meet and battle the ingenuity of rascals,
who are perpetually scheming to evade, to
eircumvent, to nullify them. When they
have picked flaw in one, whereby they are
enabled to cheat with impunity, we pass can
head them of on that tack and compel them
10 try another. That is what we shall do in
authorizing the new consols.
V. The bondhoder may or may not choose
to take one of our new Consols when we get
ready to offer it. II he does not, some one
else will, provided those Consols are above
par; and we will use the proceeds to redeem
and cancel the Five-twenties whose owners
will not take the new bonds. Thus giving
every one his righteous due, who will have the
right to complaint
VI. Finally, Mr.. Stevens, be entreated to
ponder well this noble plank in the Chicago
PLATFORM whereon Grant and COlfax are about
TO be elected
"That the best policy to diminish our bur-
den of debt is to so improve our credit that
capitalists will seek to loan us money at
lower rates of interest than we now pay, and
must continue to pay so long as reputation,
partial or total, open or covert, ls threatened or