The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-09-18

Editorial Opinions of the ;,1 LeadinE ,Cr Scnr""s
O'Ys nav for the Evening Telegraph.
s1,cprrARy BOUTWELL, IN NEW YORK.

srcRETARY BOUTWELL, IN NEW YORK.
From he NJ y. Word.
Mr. Boutyell's visit TO this city would have
been one of the most sensible things he has
5one if he had not come with an empty
head and made his stay so short. If he had
a fertile inventive mind, he would have
visited this citv after his respite from official
cares. with a fresh and tolerably matured
policy on the chief questions pertaining to
his department, and would have thought it a
GREAT advantage to submit his views to the
Consideration and criticism of the sagacious,
practical men who daily breathe the atmos-
phere of commerce in its principal seat on
fbis continent Previous to his vacation,
time enough had elapsed since his induction
into Office for thorough acquaintance with
the daily routine and ordinary workings of his
department. and with the merits and demerits
of the system he inherited from his prede-
cessors He had also had time enough to
look into the financial systems of the leading
commercial and debt-burdened countries,
and to have formed Judgment of their ex-
cellences and defects. He had the materials
needed for an intelligent survey of the situa-
tion; and the leisure of his vacation was op-
portune for the solution of the problems with
which his official situation requires him to
prapple If he is to present definite, COM
prehensive policy to Congress in his annual
report, which he must begin to write within
the ensuing two months his vacation has
given him the best opportunity he can have
for giving that policy substance and shape.
If he is foundering in the dark now, If he
is cropping after policy now, he will sail his
ship without rudder, compass, or chart during
his whole financial administration. He will
either announce policy on the meeting of
Congress in December, or his management of
the Treasury will be succession of make
shifts, and his department will drift at the
mercy of circumstances.
1t would be absurd for him to come to New
York to get IDEAS; but the criticism of our
leading merchants and bankers would be an
invaluable aid in testing the soundness of such
ideas as he had formed by his independent
reflections 1t is quite out of the beat of men
engaged in the active pursuits of commerce to
devise a financial policy for nation; but
their keen sense and practised perception
are we'll fitted to detect the flaws, or Judge of
the soundness, of policy which had been
thought out by fruitful mind. We
do not expect the great body of skilled
engineers and machinists to be inventors;
but they are admirably qualified to Judge
new invention and estimate its value
and practical working The suggestions
made to LIr. Boutwell, on Thursday by the
bankers, sugar rehners, and the rest were of
the most trivial character, relating to the
mere details and frippery of administration,
touching only the bark and never pene-
trating near the core of any subject which
they broached But if the Secretary had
made speech at the dinner Thursday evening,
and had put forth any great, or even any new
and valuable ideas, he would have set the
faculties of oil the able mon of the city at
work. and might have spent a week
here very profitably in listening to
the criticisms and answering the OBJ
jections of practical men in every walk of
IJa han houa fO
Washington with new stock of materials for
maturing and perfecting the system which
he ought to lay before Congress for its sane.
tion. If the Secretary of the Treasury does
not devise policy, it is not likely that Con
gress will; for the great body of the members
are better qualified for emendatory criticism
than original thought, and there is no mem
ber of either house on whom it is specially
incumbent, as it is on the Secretary Of the
Treasury, to master that class Of subject
We have had no inventiveness in the Trea
sury Department since Mr. Chase was at the
head of it, we are pursuing a system which
has become inapplicable bya change of cir
cumstances. Whatever may be thought o.
the merits of Mr.. Chase's policy, it cannot bC
disputed that he had policy; nor that it wa
formed early and carried the country success
fully through the colossal expenditures of thu
war. There has not been a new idea in the
Treasury Department since he left it, no
does there seem likely to be under the admin
istration Of barren, mediocre man like Mr.
Boutwell,. Mr.. Chase, in spite o
his defects, exhibited certain
largeness of conception to the like of whic
the present Secretary can never eX
pand his small, commonplace mind In Mr.
Chase's time the Government was compelle
to raise enormous sums by loans or fail in tn
war; and that officer had a quick insight int
the problem that was set him. The chic
thing was to find sale for the prodigiou
amount of bonds with which the Governmen
was flooding and Cutting the market. He
therefore, undertook to enlarge the market b
creating new demands for public securities
Objectionable as his policy doubtless was il
some respects, it was adapted to this object
The new banking system had at least til
merit of promoting the funding of the green
backs by causing a demand for Govern
ment bonds which would not otherwis
have existed. The revolution in the bank
ing system of the country by which all tn
banks were required to secure their Gil
culation by a deposit of bonds, enlarge
the market and operated as a relief to tn
glut. The new banking system may not b
good one for supplying the country with
permanent currency; but it was certainl
adapted to its immediate purpose Of enlargin
the market for bonds and tiding the Govern
ment over the endorsements caused by th
compulsory strain on its credit At any rate
Mr. Chase had a well-marked policy, on
easily and clearly understood which served il
temporary objects and prevented collaps
OF the public credit when a collapse woul