Litchfield enquirer., 1875-10-21
Mr. Schurz's Reply.
ST. LOUIS. Oct. Sth. 1S


 To Editor of the Cincinnati Conanser- cidl:-
 DEAR SIR:-Last night I returned from Ohio, and found your dispatch intimating desire that should promptly reply to the letter of Mir. Wendell Phillips, pub lished in the New York Herald of October 6. have just read that letter, and con- sider 1t scarcely necessary that I should answer it. Still if you desire it will de- vote few hours to the task.
 Mir. Phillips is not known as an elegant writer, but the tone of his letter is so Aippantly offensive, so small and super- cillicious in personal attack. that I should have been inclined to consider it a hoax. had not found in it fair collection of those crudities and startling misapprehen- sions of facts distinguishing all Mir. Phil lips productions on the subject of finance. I will take up seri0tiDs the four points of my speech which Mir. Phillips attempts to disprove.
 First: quote the following passage from Governor Aliens speech at Mariet- ta:-"These men," meaning his oppon- ents, Ego about and cry there is too much money in this country I wish to God we could find some of it. Laugh ter. they say it Is in the banks. Is it? It might just as well, for the purposes of money and currency, be in the bottom of the Pacific Ocean; for if it is not in circu- ation 1t Is no more money than so many corn stalks would be. To be money it must circulate as a medium for carving on the exchanges of the country" Then l proceeded by quoting the fact that an overwhelming majority of the business transactions of the country are effected by the transfer of bank accounts through checks, notes, and bills of exchange. that in fact the circulation of money takes place mostly through the banks, to show the brilliant nonsense of Governor Aliens statements Mir. Phillips tells us that he and Governor Allen were aware of those facts. If they were could they still be guilty of SO glaring an absurdity as that money in bank might just as we'll, for the purposes of money and currency, be at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean. Al. though have never been an admirer of Mir. Phillips financial theories, yet I al- ways considered him far less foolish than Governor Allen. If he insists on stepping down to Governor Aliens level, be it so. But here is something still more curi. ous. Mir. Phillips say the very fact that so large a proportion of the business transactions of the country are affected by means of checks, notes and bills through the banks, is the corner stone of their gravest charges against our present system of finance. He argues that as cheeks, notes and bills of exchange are performing the functions of currency, the banks are able at Will to infate and con- tract the currency. and he and his friends mean to break this ''aristocEacy of money manufacture" by introducing their system of greenbacks and inconvertible bonds, which he says will leave thls power of in- ffation and contraction in the hands of the whole mass of business men. There is so monstrous an accumulation of absurdities in this proposition that I scarcely know where to begin and where to end in dis secting them.
 WHAT BUSINESS MEN DO.
 Who ia it that draw checks and make notes and bills of exchange? Who creates that kind of currency which consists in checks. notes and bills, and who causes that contraction and imitation of which Mir. Phillips speaks? It is not done by the banks, but it is done by that same 'whole mass of business men" to whom Mir. Phillips speaks of giving that power, as they now were deprived of it. If the business men did not do it under our present system it would not be done at all If Mir. Phillips does not know this the smallest clerk in dry goods shop can give him some useful information on the subject. Can Mir. Phillips be in earnest when he gives us to understand that he and hls party want to abolish this system? Does he really mean anything when he says, "We mean to have more greenbacks and less checks?' Is he so utterly igno- rant as not to know that the check, the note and bill of exchange, as they pass through the bank constitute the very agen- cy, which. by almost infinitely increasing the greenbacks or any other sort of currency, enables that currency to satisfy tLe requirements of business, and without this agency the immense number and va- riety of our business transactions could not be carried on at all. Tn the year 1873, according to clearing house records, checks, bills of exchange and notes passed to the amount of S33, ,00O. .OOO, 900 in New York alone, in making purchases and pay ments. and Mir. Phillips wants to put in the place of that medium of exchange, eff. fecting such gigantic transactions, his
 system of greenbacks and inconvertible bonds" Wipe out these facilities which the genius of modern civilization has de veloped and reduce the immeasurable compass and the endless variety of oul business transactions to the actual hand | ing over from hand to hand of greenbacks Mir. Phillips pretends to be man of prog ress. What is this but return to the clnrnGv nekh0da 0f harhnriarn9 Or 60As