Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1873-06-21
THE FUNDING BILL.

law. has given rise to a good deal of
real, or simulated indignation, but we
have looked, in vain, for the sugges-
ton, by some of the opponents of the
bill, of some plan by which the honor
of the State can be better secured
and the weight of taxation lightened.
We are so destitute of financial skill
as not to know whether that measure is,
or is not, the best that could have been
devised, and doubt whether those
most hostile to it, are much better pre-
pared to answer the question. To de.
nounce, requires but little mental
effort and is, we regret to say,
weighty argument with the unreason-
ing masses.
1t will readily be inferred, from the
foregoing remarks, that we do not step
forward as the champion of the fund
ing bill; still, we are unwilling to ''go
it blind" against it. When a better
fiancial scheme is offered, every one
will give it the preference; but what is
the use of distracting the public mind
and planting the germs of prejudice
and discord in the popular heart, by
mere wrangle over a question that is
definitely settled? No one can expect
the repeal, except by revolution, of
contract between the State and its
creditors, that is already perfected. IF
this be so, it is the part of patriotic
wisdom to make the most of the stu
alton rather than to NAL Ike matters worse
by embittering one portion of the peo-
pie against the rest, and risking the
common good ofall in an unwise effort
topromote the pecuniary interest of a
few.
1t will be remembered, unless we
are mistaken, that a legislature pre-
ceeding the last, enacted law author
ising the Railroad Companies indebted
to the State, to liquidate their respee-
tive Indebtedness with the bonds of
the State. Unluckily, or for a sinister
purpose, the law failed to designate the
kind of bonds the State would receive
from the roads. And thus was lost, or
thrown away, the States opportunity
to repudiate the fraudulent bonds is
sued under the despotic and Infamous
rule of w. G. Brownlow. As a mat
ter of course, in these days of devotion
to Mammon, the Railroads hunted up
and paid into the Treasury the illegal
issues-they being the cheapest bonds
on the market, and thus the State re-
ceived, In payment of honest debts, a
batch of spurious bonds which it was
under no obligation to redeem. There
are railroad companies, however, that
failed to reap their share of this gold
en- harvest and are still largely indebt-
ed TO the State, and it has occurred to
us that, perhaps, this-anti-funding de-
monstration is evidence of war of
the indebted railroads upon the bond
holders-the former striving to depre-
ciate bonds that they may buy them
cheaper, and the latter, to increase
their value, as a matter of individual
interest and State credit Now, in such
a contest, the people have no pecu-
mary interest. The State is bound
for the face of its bonds, and it
matters nothing to the people
whether the railroads buy them at par,
or at forty cents in the dollar; but
when the credit of the State is to be
seriously impaired in order to cheaper
its bonds, it becomes the duty of the
people to crush the attempt On the
other hand, if the bondholders-stig-
matized as the blOated advocates OF
the funding bill-believed that they
could best protect their private inter
ests and the State credit, by such en-
actment, were they not bound by honor
and self-interest, to advocate that meas
ure?
But, say the anti-funders, the money
of the bondholders bought the passage
of the bill, and to this the bondhold-
ers reply that the money of the rail
roads paid for the opposition to the
bill. We would rather believe that
neither charge is true, but feel assured
that fingingdir " is neither the sure
nor the honorable mode by which the
truth is to be brought to light but il
whatever spirit the people may be In
clined to view the controverted points
we must remind them that there are
chronic agitators in every section ant
community, whose purpose seems to be
to distract and divide public opinion
and thus defeat the ends ofpolitical jus
tice aimed at by the prudent and pa
triotic. We would suggest further
that it is virtue to submit gracefully
to the inevitable and a mark cf wis
dom to avert the evils that may follow
rather than to make those evils inevi
table, by the foolish effort to prevent
that which has already happened, from
ever having happened. The bonds ar,
funded, and there is no alternative bu
to pay, or repudiate them. If the an
ti-funders are for reputation, lie
them come out squarely upon tina
platform if they are not for repudia
ton what are they fussing about
Perhaps their noisy opposition to fund
ing is simply a cloak to hide som,
flank movement in the battle for polit
ical supremacy, if so, the people ough
keep an eye upon that movement, in
stead of taking part in the rasc design
ed to cover the thanking party.
The objection most frequently urgeC
against funding is the fact that tn,
interest, unpaid for several years, isad
ded to the principal and therefore
compounded. This is an ugly feature il
the bill, and is sufficient in the estima
ton of many, to damn all its provis
visions. But the interest was due ant
unpaid because the revenue was no
sufficient to meet it. Suppose there
fore, no funding bill had been passed
,ro,,l1 n not have baaD nacaSS,rv II