New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-04-17
THE FINANCES OF FRANCE.

THE NATION TO WHOM AN ENORMOUS NDEM-
NIFTY WAS PAID SUBJECT TO CREATER FINANCIAL
DISORDERS THAN THE NATION FROM WHOM IT
WAS ExACrED HOW THESE STEPS TOWARD
SPECIE PAYMENT LOOK TO A U. 8. Ex-sRCKe-
TARY or THE TREASURY.
TO ths Editor Of The Tribune;
SIR: Agreeably to your request. will try 10 find
time TO send you an occasional letter upon tho gen.
oral subject Of the finances OF tho United States.
with moro especial reference TO the currency. Soma
years ago my views were pretty fully presented in
my reports TO Congress. Those which then ad-
vanccd have undergone no change; on the contrary.
my convictions Of their correctness have been con-
frned snd strengthened BY reflection and OBSERVE
ton. have nothing new to say upon the sub
joct now, but in writing In this way. from
this side tho Atlantic. ~ private citizen.
may reach many who lack the time or the dis
position to look into official documents or 10 read
moro elaborate articles In this and the following
letter shall allude to the financial condition OF
France, as Introductory to what may have 10 say
upon that Of the United States II is fortunate that
financial questions or at least tho question Of the
currency can be discussed without exciting partisan
or sectional prejudice. Men may be influenced in
their opinions of tariff, Of protection. free trade.
and tho like by local interests but there can be no
local interests in regard to the currency. sound and
stable circulating medium is the very "lifobloOd OF
commercial nation The question Of the currency
is national question, In which all sections are
equally interested, and with which party politics
and local jealousies have nothing to do.
Few countries have ever been In . worse condition
than France appeared to be in at tho close OF the
late war with Germany. Her armies had been rout-
ed: her Emperor had become o fugitive; her
strongholds such as Strasbourg and Metz had been
captured; Paris, starved into submission. had been
entered by the German forces. Some OF her most
fortile and populOus districts had been 30 devastated
that agents of contributors in Great Britain and the
United States had been sent into them, to supply
their unfortunate inhabitants with food and cloth
ing farming implements, and seeds for tho next
years crop; and as if all these mefortunes had NOT
filled her bitter cup it had been filled to overflow
ing by bloody contest--Frenchmen against
Frenchmen-fOr tho possession and control Of Paris
Her beautiful capital had been again bcseged. not
by foreigners, but by her own people, the monu-
ments of her glory had been destroyed, not by the
Germans, but by those who shared in the na.
tiOnal honor Of the achievements which
these monuments cOmmemorated BY this
civil war, unnatural and so deplorabe, the SYM
patty Of other nations excited in her behalf as de-
feat followed defeat in her contest with the Germans
had been turned into Indifference, if not into dis
gust and 80 helpless had she become that submission
to tho demands of the conqucror was her only alter
native What those demands were. the world
knows-the ccssiOn of two of her beautiful and pro-
ductive provinces, and the payment OF thousand
millions of dollars to indemnify Germany for tse
expenses Of the war. Never before had great and
powerful nation boen so speedily and thoroughly
mastered: rarely, if ever, had brave and proud
people been compelled to conclude hostilities with
L.
visonal only; with demorslized people; with an
empty treasury an immense debt to be nearly
doubled by the expenditures Of single year includ-
ing the indemnity this great nation, heretofore one
of the most powerful and influential in Europe.
seemed to be on the verge of political AID financial
ruin.
Such was France rs she appeared before the world
some four years ago. and what is her condition today
I allude not to her political cOnditiOn-although In
the organization Of a government on Republican
basis she has surprised tho world by her wisdom and
prdcnce-but what is her financial condition. 1t is
in most respects better than that of any nation IN the
world Her waste places have been restored: her in
dus.ries have been stimulated into unprecedented &C.
tivity; her exports, largely exceeding her imports.
have made her great creditor nation, so that gold
has been steadily drawn to her from England, from
the United States and even from Germany, until tho
nous sum of three hundred millions OF coin and
bullion, and its notes, although not absolutely
convertible, are only tho tenth of one per
cent discount. II her prostration was aston
ishing by its suddenncss and completeness.
her recuperstive power seems still more wonderful.
1t is undenable that country Ia Europe has been
80 prosperous as France has been during the two
past years. In no other country has labor been 50
well rewarded. In mono has there been so little
monetary or commercial disturbance. 1t is On anom-
ally, in the financial history of nations, that tho
conquering nation to which an enormous indemnity
has been paid, has been from the beginning OF tho
payment of tho instruments subject to greater Dan-
cial disorder and embarrassment than the nation
from which the indemnity was exacted. IL Is trno
that this indemnity was paid with borrowed money.
but it is also true that the French people were chiefly
the lenders and that the securities which were sub
scrbed for by the citizens Of other States have been
steadily going back to France, so that the French
debt, tho largest iii the world, more than twice ~
largo as that of the United States, is literally home
debt. Here let me remark. that this enormous in
dcmnty of a thousand millions of dollars was
paid by France to Germany in less thaa
two years, with scarcely any disturbance
to the money markets of other nations contrary TO
the predictions of some of the most eminent of Eu.
ropean fnanciers. 1t did not possible that 10
great o displacement of capital could take place
| without considerable disturbance Of International
| exchanges. That this transfer was effected within
so short period without producing the ANTICIPATED
trouble is an evidence not only Of the wisdom OF tho
French financiers by whom this great feat WAS &C.
complshed, but also Of the prodigiOus capital now
| in active employment among commercial nations'
IL Germany had not at the same time undertaken to
substitute gold circulating medium for silver and