Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1875-08-25
California.

Ii the advocates OF paper money
would comprehend the advantages of
a system that is based strictly on coin,
they have but to turn to the State of
California. True, Texas is one of our
most fourishing States, and it has
never known or dealt in any form of
money but that which is hard. Cali
lornia is the most pronounced and pos
tive example Of a State that rests on
a speclebasis, having contemptuously
refused to have anything to do with
greenbacks from the first. Her pres.
ent industrial condition is. in this view
richly worth the study of the citizens
Of other States. Rag money has never
diluted the reality of her prosperity or
feyerod the transactions Of her mer-
chants Her mining products are ex-
pected 10 be much larger this year
Than for any previous year, while her
agriculture yields from two to three
times as mllah IS her mines. Prices
are low because based on coin, and
profits and prosperity correspond.
She produced nearly six millions of
bushels of wheat in 1860, and nearly
seventeen millions in 1870. She
stands the seventh among the grain
growing States OF the Union. Her
dairy products in 1860 amounted to
four and half million dollars in val
lie, and in 1870 to eleven and half
millions. Her farms in 1860 were
valued at nearly forty,nine millions OF
dollars, and in 1870 at over one hun
dred and forty-on millions, trebling
in ten years. In the same decade, too
thevalue of property has nearly doubled
on the assessors books, with no
assistance at all from paper, while the
real value Of property is estimated to
be fully three times what it is taxed
for, or S775,000,000 in the aggregate.
But the last practical test Of her pros
perity is to lie found in the condition
Of her debt.
Instead of increasing her debt, she
has steadily reduced it. Paper money
invariably tends to the abuse of credit,
and the advantage of honest money in
this respect is plainly to he seen in
California. Her State, city, county
and town Indebtedness has ~been di-
minishcd very sensibly, and the whole
amounts to but eighteen millions, or
but two per cent. and a fraction on
the total value. The State debt in
1871 was but a little over four and
half millions, which has been reduced
in four Years to less than three, The
city deb, of San francisco is only
S9,700,O00, or Que and a half per cent
on its aggregate valuation. Every
thing rests on the solid basis of specie
The banks have a capital of something
less than eleven millions, there being
thirteen of them altogether, and they
all do business with hard money
alone, The picture of such Com
monwealth in these times of debt and
an irredeemable currency is refreshing
and recalls the times when the fashion
was not to plunge recklessly into sea
of promises for whose payment little
or no thought was taken. 1t is not
an accident, this condition of the State
on the Pacific Coast nor is it an OK
ception t. any rule. On the contrary,
it is an Illustration of the only sound
rule known--a rule which men like
Kelly and Phillips, Butler and Nor
ton, Logan and Ferry are doing their
best to upset. California has no
Shams to be taxed for. What she
owes she pays in solid cash. Is it any
wonder that. with her vast and con
stantly developing resources, she
should present such q lesson to the
contemplation Of the country, herself
the green oasis in desert of paper T?
The country mast get back to the
ground on which the prosperity of
California so firmly rests. before it
can avail itself as it ought gifts Won
dertul resources. Against all theories
for rag money is constantly to be set
this example of prosperous California