The New York herald., 1871-03-14

quietly year after year, but large proportion
of them, If not the majority, are led to be-
lieve that, far from expressing them, as it
really does, it is just the thing to make them
prosperous, rich and happy.
As for the great writer's on political
economy, there is not one of them whose pre-
cepts are not violated by Mr.. Boutwell,.
Neither Duesnar nor Rosse nor Ganlk nor
Leblanc nor Adam Smith gives the least en-
couragement, when intelligently interrogated,
to system the obvious tendency Of which
is to render money scarce and to paralyze all
kinds of productive industry None have
maintained any such absurd aud odious prin-
ciple as that large debt accumulated during
great war carried on for the preservation of
the country, for the purpose of preventing its
ACKNOWLEDGMENT, should be wrung as soon as
possible from those whose valor and patriot
ism had saved it, nor has any statesman
worthy OF the name ever pretended that the
reduction of the national debt by means of
oppressive taxation, however rapidly it may
be effected, is any evidence Of national pros
perity, but the reverse. None having any ap-
proximate idea of the immense wealth and
resources Of England will deny that she could
pay her debt, enormous as it is, in few years,
If she deemed its payment essential to her
prosperity; but no such opinion is entertained
either by her statesmen or her political econo-
mists. Accordingly, quite a considerable
proportion, even Of the debt accumulated
during the wars Of the first Napoleon, is still
unpaid. As to the debt incurred by the
Crimean war, it will not be paid for ct least
two generations. The Chancellor of the Ex-
chequer who would urge the contrary course,
or maintain that the people of the present day
| should be burdened with all sorts of odious
| taxes, in order that those of generation
or century hence might be able to rejoice at
the wisdom and foresight Of their ancestors,
could not retain Office for one month.
| Now let rs com pare for moment the two
| systems, taking for basis those principles in
the soundness of which the political econo-
mists of all nations concur. One of the most
indisputabe OF those principles Is that the
annual gain of a country is ''the sum applica-
BILE to the extension of commerce, the reserva-
tion OF a greater quantity Of foreign articles,
the increase Of shipping, &c" In maintaining
this proposition the author Of the ''Wealth of
Nations is in full accord with the great politi-
cal economists of the Continent. DR.. Smith
also says, with equal force and truth, "As it is
the power Of exchanging that gives occasion
to the division Of labor, so the extent of this
;s;o 80 10 Ec,.& l,x~k he
Of that power or the extent of the market"
Do any of our readers need to be told what
is the extent Of our power in this respect, at
the present moment, compared with that of
England? Has our commerce been extended
or our shipping increased by the boasted ex-
plots of Mr. Boutwell, in reducing the national
debt, in strict accordance with the odious pre-
cept of Machiaveli?
| Even by the manner in which Mr. Boutwell,
manages the government loans he exhibits that
''nfinitesimal lttleness" complained of by
| Napoleon, and also proves his utter inability
''to seize any question under its veritable
point of view." Nor does the new loan
form an exception; for, instead of entrust-
ing the subscriptions to the great
leading banking houses at home and abroad,
he makes government agents Of all sorts Of
petty brokers, as if he wished to disgust the
former, who, it is well known, have no more
wish to be placed in the same rank with the
latter, even in an Important Circular" than
the general has to be placed in the same rank
with the corporal. Perhaps, however, we
should not blame Mr.. Boutwell, for this, but
rather give him credit for ''fellow feeling"
Be this as it may, we should be sorry for the
dangerous monomania under which he has so
| long labored, and which seems to grow worse
from day to day, if only for the sake Of Massa-
chusetts for instead Of representing the in
telligence, refinement and talent of that
ancient and respectable Commonwealth, what
he really represents is its petty thrift. its fussy
smartness, its little cunning, its narrow preju-
| dices-in word, its yankee notions"