The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1875-05-20
THn END OF F1qr1r1ous VALUES. We

~ is, pefnaps, an sunWcicoMe, ~. 5S..,
nevertheless, p most Wholebome: truth,
tha9 should be deolafed, that thu panic
Of 1873 wss blessing Unexpected and
crushing rs twas. and fearful as have
been its Bteady exnctions upon every
channel of industry and trade, it came
none too soon to save the country from
incalcnlable distress that may, and we
doubt not will, be rneasurnbly averted.
The causes which produced it were o de-
moralizntion in the general pursuits of
life, created, excused, accepted and
|duickened with each successivs year By
thesuphealthy speculative stimulus that
was bred by civil war. Nothing but
SUCCESS was success, and it's standard
was gradually lowered in all the attri-
bntes OF, sound, conservative business
conduct, until there was but one god,
and mammon was his prophet Expan-
sion and speculation ruled in all the
great courses of finance and trade; and
industry, the source Of all wealth, was
loosened from its safe moorings, by the
examples of the many who ostentatiously
reaped where they had not strewn. Sad
as were the lessons which q realization of
our condition brought to US by tho crash
of September, 1873, they would have
been unspeakably more bitter and fatal
to all, had the evil day been delayed
until the present. Nearly two years of
rigid retrenchment and private and bust
ness economy, THAT many foolishly blush
to confess, find us still crippled in every
channel of productive wealth, and the
past is strewn with countless wrecks of
hope and fortune Many fell when the
hrst blow came; others staggered a little
on, only. to go down in despair, and
slnce then thousands have fallen, after
untold struggles with multiplied misfor-
tunes. Nor is the end yet; nor will it be
until solid foundation and corrected
business habits and principles ere ac-
cepted in every line Of private and cor
porate efforts.
The failure Of Jay Cooke & Co. WINS in
no sense the cause Of the disasters of
the last two years. It was the natural
logical result of the disease that per
vaded tho business Of the country. It
was the broken sore that revealed and
developed the eating cancer That was
And it made Visible the hideous Gan.
creme before it had reached tho vitals,
In all previous panics or financial re-
vulsions our great corporations were the
first to fall. In 1857, it was the Bank of
Pennsylvania, and within forty-eight
hours after its suspension nearly every
monetary institution of the country was
suspended with it. Twenty years before
it was the United States Bank. The dis
ease was then purely q financial ailment;
and business and trade were paralyzed
because they were 80 Immediately de-
pendent upon the monetary affairs of the
country. But the panic Of 1873 was not
financial reyulsion in the strict SENSE
it was business revolution. Our our
rency never before was 80 sound, and
since the depression it has been abun-
dnnt beyond the credit of business to
command it. The speculative spirit that
Hooded the nation with yalueless our
rency in former times was turned into
two main channels, both strictly legiti-
mate within legitimate bounds, but
neither guarded their operations with
prudence. Manufacturing and railroads
were the fields. for the speculator. and
they were crowded with the throng that
worshiped at the shine of sudden wealth.
The war made unnatural demands upon
both, md all rushed into them trusting
to escape with ample gains before the
day OF reckoning should come, And
now manufacturing is overdone in Ame-
'ricn and throughout Europe The ter
'mination of the rebellion ended the cx-
ceptional demand here, and oycr-pro-
duction has followed. In England.
France, Austria and Germany the same
causes have produced like results.
Manufacturing was stimulated to nm un-
natural product by the Prussian-Austria
war, and again by the German-Fraaco
war, and to-day we are staggering under
vast over-production in all these great
nationalities.
Prostitution, heavy loss in capital and
In compensation to labor, and bankrupt
cy in very large circle of the weaker
manufacturers, nre as natural as the
darkness that follows the day: and so
inseparably is manufacturing inter
woven with the other productive and
commercial interests that the prostrn-
tion is as widespread rs industry itself
In railroads the tide of expansion and
speculation was almost unbounded, and
1t was we'll for not only this, but for
every country, that the admonition of
1873 came when it did and as it did. 1t
was great railroad enterprise that re-
vealed the unsoundness of the business
of the nation. It was conceived by ono
who, moro than any other man, had
reared the great structure of national
credit, and he erred mainly in being in
advance Of his time, just rs did Nicholas
blddle in urging that the Northern lakes
and Eastern sens should clasp iron hands
In the then wilderness of the present
Philadelphia and Erie. And it was our
great rnilrond enterprises that absorbed
almost the whole speculative talent and
capital Of the people here, and, to q
large extent, the capital of foreign peo-
pies. In every valley md mountain