The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-06-24

they fail to get all they want they will
accept all they can get, and that should be
the currency bill as originally passed by the
Senate, or something akin to it in its essential
features
By enacting such a measure Congress will
supply the first element of judicious policy.
''Give me neither poverty nor riches was the
prayer of the wise man. 'Give me neither
contraction nor expansion" is the request
which the country may properly address to
its law makers. If it is not possible to create
prosperity by the manufacture of paper
money, it is not desirable to hasten specie
payments by lessening the volume of cur
rency to which the community has adapted
itself We shall gain much by the passage of
a bill which, while avoiding these opposite
extremes, removes the not unreasonable dis
content of the Southern States and the newer
States and Territories in the West. To this
extent we may have the assurance, on the one
hand, that speculation shall not be unduy
fostered and values disturbed, and, on the
other hand, that commerce and business en-
terprise shall not be crippled or INJURED by
an arbitrary diminution of money facilities
So far, one requirement in regard to fnan-
cial policy promises to be satisfied.
The funding schemes indicate a want of
another sort, and one which will probably re-
main for q time unsatisfed. The desirable
ness of some plan by which the bonded debt
shall be simplifed, and its annual cost re-
duced, is nowhere denied. The Republican
party ingrafted this proposition on the Chi
cago platform, and Republican administra-
ton will in time give it effect. But it will be
one of the results of increased prosperity and
restored confdence-not the cause of either.
Mere legislation will not hasten it. An
attempt to hasten it, If unsuccessful, would
do more harm than good. For failure to fund
the debt after the mode of funding is pre-
scribed, and the power to fund has been con-
ferred will reflect unfavorably upon the
credit of the Government. 1t will be tanta-
mount to a declaration that the confidence
professed by the Government is not shared
by the people or by European nations. For
this reason there should be no hurry. More
important far are measures fitted to benefit
the people by lesseping their burdens and
promoting their prosperity. The new Tax
bill, with its expected reduction of seventy
five millions, is the best possible preliminary.
We take the Tax bill to be protest against
the policy that would retain fiscal burdens in
order to pay off debt prematurely. The credi-
tors of the Government are content to await
the maturity of the obligations they hold, and
with that fact the country may also be satis-
fed Its immediate care should be to relieve
the people-to arrest the drain which is ex-
hausting industry, and impairing their COM
fo1t and independence. The bill now before
the Senate is the answer of Congress to an
urgent and Just demand, and on the whole it
is satisfactory answer. 1t is, in fact, part
of the financial policy, and its operation will
be favorable to the conditions on which the
public credit most depends. For though re-
duction of the revenue implies reduction of
the surplus which superficial observers have
regarded as essential to the credit of the
Government, it is certain that that will be
best promoted when the Government draws
its income from sources that are strong and
healthy rather than as the result of pres
sure which crushes the energies and exhausts
the means of the producing classes.
But the reduction of taxation, as feature
of our financial policy, is not enough. The
effort to tighten burdens must be followed
by an equally energetic effort to cut down
| expenditure. Here is the point at which
Congress is most likely to fail How ear
| nestly the administration has labored and still
| labors to save money the statement of Mr..
| Dawes to the House. on Tuesday, plainly
| shows. Judged by the expenditures of its
predecessors, the Grant administration has
earned credit by systematic retrenchment.
| Nor are there wanting tokens of improve
ment in the appropriation bills, which would be
| better still had MIR. Dawes more lmitators and
| supporters But there is need of more
thorough sitting than has yet been practised.
The discovery that the Bounty bill which
| passed the House, ana Is now penang III Cne
Senate, will absorb at least one hundred
millions, instead of nineteen millions, as was
at first understood, reveals the carelessness
and imperfections with which measures in
volving large expenditures are prepared.
One blunder like this will virtually undo for
the next year, the good effected by the re-
duction of taxes. 81 -. .l..- .ei =.
The public credit requires yet another SER
vice. There must be dogged resistance to
the many subsidy schemes which are pre-
sented for Congressional favor. Their rejec
ton is imperatively demanded, not less by
the people, out of whose pockets the subsidy
ngers would draw the last accessible dol
lar, but in the name of the Government whose
credit the system of subsidies would impair
If preparation for funding is ever to be
made, it must be made herein the avoid
ance of grants or loans designed to further
private interests Subsidies amount to this
and nothing more. Call them what yor
will, they are devices for transferring the
money of the taxpayers, who have none
to spare, to the purposes of individual
or corporations, whose command of lobb!
influences enables them to control legis
lation. The virtue which reduces taxe
must eschew subsidies if it would be ap
preciated. 90 .f 5a.