The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1874-06-03
Drifting I'm Finance-What Will the
New Secretary Do!

| new secretary Oos
1t has long since reached the definite stage
of recognition, in virtue of which a truth
assumes the form Of proverb, that q man
never goes SO far as when he is going 'no-
where He who sets out without definite
destination, and goes whittier he may go by
any road or by-path into which he may stray,
as he has no special distance to make nor
place to stop at, is very apt to keep on while
his energy or impulse holds out, and these are
unreasonable forces. An uncertainty thus
introduced may add some charm to summer
days ramble in the tangled paths of the
woods, or even to the springtide wanderings
of a pilgrim who is pious enough to worship
at any shrine that may be found by the road
side in pleasant country. But this DISPOSE
ton to purposeless journeys has tendency to
invade other spheres of life where it is less in
place and more likely to prove mischievous.
Just now it is largely seen in the drifting ac-
tivities OF the many well disposed gentlemen
who are endeayoring to do something for the
country in the way of financial legislation and
financial organization generally. They go on
forever and forever, going nowhere in particu-
lar. No point is named as the end of the jour-
ney-no path is chosen by which they are to
advance, and at present they seem to
be crossing stream like party of
boys in boat. and sometimes boy pulls an
oar at one side for few strokes and then
| gives place to boy who pulls little at the
other side, and SO it is altogether point for
the imagination whether the stem of the boat
will come among the rocks up above or be
driven in the mud on the fats down stream
Altogether this seems thoroughly undesirable
| frame Of mind in which to regulate fnan-
cial system.
| If there is any one thing that above all
others requires the recognition of fixed points
it is national finance. Governments are good
or bad, and political systems are prosperous
or otherwise according as the legitimate tunc-
tons of government are performed with the
least perceptible pressure on the people or
interference with them, and with the least con-
ceivable injury to public morality by tempta-
tions to evade the laws. and by the bad exam
Piles of official corruption. All this important
relation of the government to the people is
within the circle Of national finance. Indeed,
government might be economically defined
as machinery contrived to take from the
cultivators of the soil certain portion of
their produce and to regulate the distribution
of what is thus taken among the cultivators of
less material products; and in this view right
organization of the finances would comprise the
whole Of political science The dollar would
be the bearing upon which the pivot of the
political world turned. and the world would
revolve smoothly if the laws should always
provide that the dollar might find its proper
place. Throughout the world an examination
of governments would respond fully to this test
Of an inspection of their financial laws. All
the thoroughly misgoverned countries are
chronically bankrupt; and in England, where
the political system is more thoroughly stable
than in any other country, where justice is
more strictly and honestly administered, and
property and life are most secure, the financial
system is the most absolutely sound.
Our own financial system, it is scarcely nec-
essary to say, would bear examination very
badly in such roll call of nations; and In
deed. would indicate at once the cause of the
enormous evils and abuses that threaten our
whole republican fabric. Public dishonesty
is SO common and notorious that people laugh
incredulously at the fancy that a man takes
Office, even the highest with pure motives
Oppression never was worse under any tyranny,
ancient or modern, than we have seen
it in this city when it assumed the
form of the execution of the laws that were
o,,ppoci+it,ouclv de To cocuro ravapu 70 <bo
government. And the natural result of this
is hatred toward the laws and resistance and
bribery, and eventually contempt for the
whole system and rotting away and breaking
down Of the very foundation that government
has in the consent and respect Of the people,
and finally loss of faith even in the posi-
blity of well administered and honest re-
public. This is the present condition with the
more thoughtful part of the American people.
And if this Republic should fail either by gen.
eral disruption and disintegration, or fall into
the abyss of centralized power toward which
it is now moving with headlong fury, the
crime against humanity involved in that fail
ure will be directly due to our financial short
comings, to the organized ignorance of our
treasury department., and TO the almost In
conceivable villanies and robberies of the
whole people and Of sections of the people
that are consecrated in the laws 1t is plain,
therefore, and it is OF the greatest consequence
that anybody who proposes to improve our
condition financially should 60 about it with
distinct purpose and with clear recognition of
the necessities of the case, otherwise he will
go too far and do more harm than good.
All the errors and wrongs of our financial
system cannot be remedied just now, even if
there we're an honest intention to remedy
them, as there certainly is not. Originating
in bad laws, they have become part Of q
general public decentralization which law can