The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1874-04-23
Tho Predicate Greatest vicrory-Sal-
walton OF the National Honor.


President Grant has the remarkable faculty
of doing the right thing at the right time.
His character shows the supreme value of
what has been called Saving common sense"
His message vetoing the Senate Imitation bill
is, on the first reading, disappointing docu-
ment 1t lacks rhetorical completeness and
finish. There is not what might be
called a striking. burning sentence from
the beginning to the end It would
be difficult to write more clumsy or
more awkward document And vet the more
we study it the more remarkable it appears.
We see that the President understood the
subject from the beginning that he
comprehended the whole question, its strong
points and its weak points, and that he
arrived at the conclusions he expresses by
inexorable and crushing logic.
For there is no logic SO severe as that
of common sense. The argument which the
President makes is complete and unanswera-
BILE. The assertion that the Senate bill would
really result in contraction is dismissed as
mere play upon Legislation. The theory of
the bill, he shows, is to add hundred mil
lions to the currency. Now, if this theory
should prove unfounded, if the expected re-
lief to the suffering industries" of the country
were not to be realized, then there would be a
demand for still greater measure of infa-
ton. We should inevitably embark upon an
endless, troubled sea OF financial embarass-
ment national discredit and unavoida-
BILE reputation. This danger the President
points out as the keystone of the whole diff
Guilty. With admirable force he shows Con-
gress that to make the terrible venture thus
imposed upon him would be q departure
from the true principles Of finance; blow to
the best interests of the nation; trihing with
our obligations to our national creditors-the
breaking of the solemn promises of the
Senate and the House, made in the name of
the nation, as its sovereign, responsible
authority departure from the published
pledges and declarations Of the two great
national parties assembled in convention, and
in conflict with his own personal assur-
ance as the Executive and his recommended
tons to Congress in his annual messages.
These are the reasons which have made it the
duty of the President to veto this bill,
The logic which imposes that duty is COM
plete, severe and unanswerable.
But the President is not content with this
statement of his case. He proceeds to prove
which will he read by the country with the
deepest interest and pleasure. In the first
place he quotes his recommendation to Con-
gress in 1869, in his first annual message,
committing himself SO strongly to resumption
of specie payment and contraction of cur
rency that to have signed the Senate bill
would have been dishonoring his own
record; that his record, in fact made
such thing impossible. He then, with
common sense almost cruel in dealing
with the rhapsodies of Morton and the
dreams of Logan, shows that the House
itself in 1855, when the war was over and we
were all honestly bent upon reconstructing
our finances in such a manner as to win the
confidence of the civilized world and redeem
our national credit, as we had vindicated the
integrity OF our soil, did, by vote of IA
yeas to nays, solemnly pledge itself to the
similar course. This pledge also, made as
we have shown ct the outset of our
peace, was repeated by Congress in
1869, in an act which the President
quotes in full, and in which Congress
declared ''that the faith of the United States is
solemnly pledged" ito make provision at the
earliest practicable period for the redemption
of the United States notes in coin" This the
President justly describes as % continuing
pledge of the faith of the United States
against any scheme for imitation. Further
more, and as if to strengthen position which
seems to us unassailable, the President shows
that Congress in 1864 during the war, and
when there was every temptation to
make use of extraordinary powers in
the issue of money, entered into an
obligation with the national creditors that
the total amount Of the United States notes
should not exceed $500, .OOO This would
seem to close the case, but the Presi-
dent meets the only serious argument ever
advanced in favor of the bill, namely, that
there is an unequal distribution of the bank
ing capital of the country. To this considera-
ton he twas disposed to give great weight -
but upon reflection he remembered that there
still remain four millions of dollars as
signed to States having less than their
quota not yet taken, and that, in
in addition, these States have the option of
twenty five millions of dollars more When"
says the President, in tone which might be
called ironical if this were not grave state
paper, ''this is all taken up, or when specie
payments are fully restored, or are in rapid
process of restoration, swill be the time to con-
slider the question of more currency
There are some recommendations on the
subject of free banking, but upon these we
do not dwell now. Our first duty is to ex-
press to the President our hearty and pro-