Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1877-12-27

caning season, and win be most important
factor in the future prospects OF Bellaire
TIE good fortune of our neighbors will be in
direcuy our good fortune, as any one can see
who watches the large and increasing trace
between Wheeling and Bellaire.
Some Aspects Of Financial
Questions.
Mr.. Garfield is one Of the members of Con-
grea who have earned the rare distinction OF
delivering speeches that makes votes. Heidi
that in his speech against the repeal of the
Resumption act, and he has furnished the
Independent with a letter on "Specie Pay
meuts and the Public Credit" that is as read
able and convincing as anything that has been
said or written on the subject In Mr. Gar
fields State of Ohio the imitation and repudia-
tion madness has risen to its extreme height,
sweeping before IL such papers as the Cincin-
natl Commercial and such statesmen as Sena
tor Thurman, but il has not been able to car
~ Mr. Garfield OF the solid ground into its
wild current We find 80 many good things
in this letter of his, brief as it is, that it is
difficult to pick out the best. Speaking of
''the strange brood Of financial dogmas whose
anarchic clamors now stun the public ear" as
the Legitimate offspring of our irredeemable
paper money!" he says that ''they are born of
disaster, and in their course under various
forms exhibit the same strange delirium and
lead to the same deplolable end" He. ad-
mirably sets forth the delusion of the advo-
Gates Of an irredeemable currency in its true
colors when he says that Congress could no
more create value out of that which has No
Value than it could create foot without
leagth or pound without weight" And
again
LET US not be deceived by words. Cheap
money means debasemcnt of the standard by
which all exchanges are measured. 1t means
universal arrangement of values and revolu-
tion in all our trade, foreign and domestic;
and is equivalent to a partial and compulsory
bankruptcy, by the scaling down of all debts,
public and private. It means condition OF
affairs which will make all business uncertain,
and, therefore, unsafe. Under the pretence
of increasing the rae of wages, 1t will cheat
the laboring man by making the purchasing
power OF his earnings less than before. While
keeping the word of promise to his ear, it
breaks it to his hope And this notion of
cheap money is plainly delusion born of the
greenhack. Because our Government in the
stress of war compelled its creditors to receive
due-bills in place of money, many have cone
to believe that promise is as good as perform
ance, and much cheaper"
The Ohio Representative sharply scores the
paper-monsy y theorists, but much of what he
writes is equally applicable to the silver fa
natics who imagine that they are rather more
virtuous than the undisguised repudiationists.
"Whether," he writes, "they intend it or not,
the sue cas- of their policy will be the inevita-
BILE destruction Of the public credit, and the
consequent destruction of business prosper
ity." To the careful study of gentlemen
who prate of reviving industry through pro-
cess of dishonesty we commend his applica-
ton of an incident that has already gone the
rounds Of the public press.
''If the prompt and faithful payment Of
debts we're not legal and moral duty, an en-
| lightened selfishness would imperatively de-
/ mand it. Reputation of public obligations
| or neglect TO meet them promptly and fully
is the widest form of public extrayagance.
There is something as pathetic as it is sug-
gestive in the reasons recently given by SEN
ator Lamar for declining an honorable COM
n,ercial mission to Europe, in behalf of the
Southern Boards of Trade, to induce foreign
capitalists to make investments in the cotton
industry of the South. He says: 81 happen
to know am not the man. While in Europe
/ was consulted every day by Mason and
Slidell and our financial agents in London
and Paris. The greatest obstacle in the way
of the financial recognition of our Confede-
racy was the fact that our President was from
Mississippi, to which the odium of repudia-
tion was attached. / remember the chief
men on Change told Mr.. Mason Sir, you
cannot float your loan unless your Confed-
eracy disavows the Reputation of Mississip-
pi." Now, if were there my time would
/ be more occupied in explaining this matter of
Reputation than in pushing the enterprise.
be Senator then suggests another man, and
urges In his favor the fact that he comes from
State that enjoys an untarnshed credit.
Thus q single act of reputation has thrown
its baleful shadow across more than quarter
! OF q century, and is still serious obstacle to
the business prosperity of great State"
With one more quotation from the letter
we shall content ourselves:
''Wise craftsmanship demands that the
Government shall no longer permit its broken
promises to obstruct the progress of industry,
nor continue to stand in the market as the
| formidable competitor of every citizen who
/ wishes TO borrow money. Whatever rate of
interest the Government pays, the citizen
must pay more. Hence, the refunding of our
six per cent. debt at lower rate ef interest
is of vital importance to all our people. If
our whole debt could be funded at four per
| cent. 1t would not only save twenty-five mil
hons Of dollars per annum to the Treasury,
but would bring down the rate of interest on
all private loans thereafter. The work of re-
funding, which was going on with such bril-
| liaht success month ago, has been suddenly
stopped by the recent threatening action Of
Congress, and by the fact that those who now
assail the public credit are seeking to combine
all the discontented and suffering classes Of
the community in aggressive resistance to the
financial policy Of the present Administers
tion." ~
In connection with the topics so ably treat
ed by Mr.. Garfield certain facts that have
been jus: reported from the West are very
1 appropriate for mention here. The Western
people have heard 80 much of the clamor Of
the silver demagogues that the laboring class-
e. have been persuaded that silver Is really
the best money in existence. Consequently
the employers have collected all Of 1t they
could lay their hands on, and are paying Il
out at par for wages. This operation for the
moment IL decidedly profitable one for the
employer, but the workingman Is beginning
to see that he d the unfortunate loser, to the