The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-10-25

Inc great btIuBBlo lOE beCuNluB 6Qual
civil and political rights to all has at last
been brought to an end by enactment of the
fifteenth amendment to the Constitution.
Like the thirteenth amendment, which wiped
out the stain of slavery, and the fourteenth
amendment, which gave the negro civil
equality before the law, the fifteenth amend
ment, which forbids that race or color should
anywhere be made ground of political disa-
bility was carried in the teeth of a violent
Democratic opposition. The difficulties,
however, were overcome and the assurance
of the Republican programme in 1868, I'VE
will make the Declaration of Independence a
living reality on every inch of American
soil, was nobly accomplished. Against this
part of President Grants work it is vain for
the Democrats to protest now, so they pass
il by in silence. But it is nevertheless q
pledge redeemed, and one of the greatest.
Next in importance is the question of the
debt. The Democratic policy has generally
favored reputation either in its naked form,
or in the shape of proposals to ''tax the
bonds or to pay them off in greenbacks.
Every scheme of the kind the administration
of General Grant has resisted as ga national
crime" and Mr.. Colfax does what may be
needful in Indiana, but it is not necessary in
this country, when he shows by argument the
impolicy as well as injustice of these plans
Lest it should be said that the Democrats
have ceased to entertain their plans of repu-
diation, Mr.. Oolfax quotes resolution passed
only three months ago by Democratic con-
vention in Ohio, which affirms "That
the so-caled war debt is a fraud and swim
die, and was created under false pretences,
and in violation of the Constitution; we are
therefore, uncompromisingly in favor of
repudiating the whole of the bonded war
debt of the United States Such audacious
declarations as these cannot fail, as Mr.. Col
fax observes, to weigh down American Sc
curities in the Bourses of the world, and
they have succeeded too we'll in retarding the
natural enhancement of American credit. In
this way they have delayed the accomplish
ment of an other of General Grants pledges,
the refunding of the debt at a lower rate of
interest. But in spite of their efforts to de-
feat the result, Congress was able to pass in its
last session a Funding Bill, which would
gradually sell off the existing per
cent. bonds, and issue new securities at ), A,
and per cent. ''By the more faithful col
lection of our revenues" says Mr.. Colfax,
''our retrenched expenditure, and the conse
| quent monthly reduction of our debt, the
premium on gold had dwindled down to about
| 10 per cent, and our 6 per cent. bonds had
become worth their face in the recognized
| currency of the world. Unfortunately, the
outbreak of the European war and the conse-
| quent disorganization of the money markets
have advanced the premium on gold, and
weakened the prices of the bonds of all
nations. In consequence, the refunding
scheme has for the present been postponed,
| but that it can and will be carried out is not
to be questioned. While making this effort
to reduce the permanently accruing charge
for interest on the debt, the administration
of President Grant have also been laboring
to diminish the capital amount. During Mr..
Johnsons s last year of Office none of the debt
was paid off; in the first eighteen months of
the Grant administration nearly one hundred
and seventy million dollars were cleared off
and the nation was thus relieved of an an
nual charge for interest of about nine mil
lion dollars, or almost one million and three
quarters sterling.
How have these immense operations been
| possible? Mr.. Colfax answers, in part by the
unparalleled recuperative power and progress
sive force of the nation, but in part also by
administrative efficiency and honesty. The
| Democrats assert that the Government of q
Democratic President and Congress would
fall far more lightly on the people. Mr..
! Colfax takes two instances; the Democratic
! administration of President Buchanan before
| the war, and the existing Democratic Govern
ment of the city of New York. He calculates
that under Buchanan the expenses of Govern
ment amounted to two and quarter dollars
per head of the population-in gold, be it re-
membered and at the low prices ruling be-
is but two dollars a head, in paper,
and at present high prices. Again,
| the Democratic rulers of the
city of New York spend nearly "a millions of
dollars year on the government of one mil
lion of nhabitants-which rate of expendi-
ture, if they were to govern the United
States with population of forty millions,
would demand a revenue of 900, 900, 900 of
dollars. Comparing the last eighteen months
of Mr.. Johnsons Presidency with the first
eighteen months of General Grants, we find
that the expenditure, not including interest
on debt of the former was $32S, 900, 900, aud
of the latter $245, ,0O0,O In the same
periods the interest on the debt was respec-
lively $211 200, ,000 and $193, 900, 000 showing
a total decrease in the public charge during
the year and a half of the Grant ad-
ministration amounting to more than
| 800, 200, ,000 These splendid results the
Democrats cannot we'll impugn, and they are
driven to strange straits in attacking the
financial success of the Government. One
critic compares the taxes levied in the last
year of Mr.. Johnson's term with those levied
in the first year of the new presidency, and
finds balance of incomings for the latter of
nearly 2S, 600, 600 of dollars. He adds, ''This
is a reduction of taxation With a vengeance y
1t happens that in the two years precisely the
same taxes were in force and if the revenue
from them was so much larger under General
Grant than under Mr.. Johnson, the reason
was, not that the people were more heavily
burdened, but that the collection
was made more faithfully and
stringently, the excise aroused ia
activity, and the scandalous power of the
''whiskey ring broken. All through the
finance of the States the same improvement
was manifest. On the receipts from internal