Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1878-10-30
Economy.

As temperance now means only total absti-
nence,a and as charity which stood once for the
loving kindness of a Christian for his fellow
men, now signifies to most minds no more
than alms-giving, so economy, which once
meant the wise use of wealth. is belittled,
with most of us, to mean simply saving.
The mind of the people, and of their leg
islative representatives, is now very wide
awake to this last meaning of economy.
The call on all sides is for a retrenchment
of expenses, reduction of salaries, les
SEEMING of the number of able-bodied men
feeding at the public crib without rendering
equivalent useful service. This call is in
the main rightful and righteous one,
though sometimes in danger of begetting a
penny wise and pound foolish action.
The cutting down of governmental ex-
penditures from that which prevailed in the
flush times" the wedding out of useless
officials, and the reducing of the salaries of
others to the curtailed standard of our mar
rowed circumstances, is the urgent necessity
of an overtaxed and Strengthened people.
II in the process some useful organization,
like our Board of Agriculture, for instance,
should be lessened in its resources, or even
voted out of existence, the loss would be
but temporary. Good institutions may
suffer thus for a time but only to be re-
stored in equal or greater efficiency as soon
as their absence reveals their usefulness.
1t was so few years ago, when reform "
legislature in our sister Tor mother) state
of Connecticut abolished the State Board of
Agriculture, only to see it restored with in
creased authority after one years trial of
doing without it.
But when we took up our pen to write Of
economy we had something more in view
than the advocacy of administrative saving,
however important that may have become.
We wished to review portion of the sub
ject in that higher meaning of the word,
the wise use of wealth, or property, not
only from the individual, but also from the
social and national stand-points.
America is too much under the example of
Atlantic has been so narrowed by inventive
art, it is now so easy for our people to cross
it and travel through the European coun-
tries, and so many who do this have so lately
come into the possession of property which
they do not know how to spend, that Euro
pean ideas are getting great hold among us.
1t is not only all the essence of our religion,
but of our government, that the employ
ment of wealth mainly for purposes OF dis
play is wrong. Simplicity in all outward
manifestations of personal or associate riches
belongs alike to the spirit OF Christianity
and of republican democracy. Under
these kindred regimes wealth should be the
reward only of usefulness, and should be
expended for the promotion only of useful
ends. We have departed fearfuly from
this standard, in the church. in the state
and nation, and as individuals Expendi.
ture on every side for the last fifteen years
has more and more been for purposes u dis.
play rather than use. It has been an era of
"high living in the lowest and most con.
Trajectory sense of those words. 1t was
said of Roman emperor that he found a
Rome of brick and left it Rome of mar
BILE. We have not had an emperor to dc
this for us, but as regards most American
cities that imperial policy has been pursued
not at a time of great and general prosperity
but when most dreadful and Obstructive
civil war had lately rsvaged half the re
public, loaded the whole of it with debts
beyond the mathematical powers of most
minds to conceive, and buried on the battle
field or made crippled pensioners of a mil
lion of her most vigorous citizens.
thoughtful mind could hardly be
brought to believe that after such scenes Of
trial, of suffering and loss, twelve years Of
reckless expenditure for mere display anc
show would succeed. A sobered economy
strict checking of all useless expense
would almost necessarily follow. And wher
upon the losses and ravages of war SHOULD
succeed the conhagration of two great cities
if by magic, castle-like palaces should al
most at once replace the more modest We
sufficiently, and more than sufficiently, cost,
warehouses of trade that mansions, hotels
churches and public edifices of carved ston
should spring up on every corner, richer il
style and ornamentation, far greater in cost
than the painful growth of centuries in othe
lands Any one who visits our great cite
now, and remembers what they were twent
years ago. will realize what we mean whel
we speak of these things.
OF what good are these magnificent cor
structions Of granite, of freestone and of maj
BILE? There they stand, representing S
many hundreds or thousands of millions G
dollars. They are the property of our million
aires. They are expected to produce "a re'
enue, and bear taxation proportionate
their cost. They are to be cared for, ker
in repair, insured against loss or damage b
fre-and all this at whose expense
the expense and by the labor OF every wealtl
producing hand in broad America NJ
only are vast sums now sunk in them, bu
continuous millions must be drawn, ind
rectly it is true yet always drawn, from tn
pockets of the working people to pay tn
rent, repairs and all the other expenses
these costly buildings so long as they exis
They are simply the manifestations of tn
spirit of display without use which has co
rupted our nation. The south is richer h
day because it has none of them. Ever
dollar paid out for the interest and cost
maintenance on these edfces is added
the price of the commodities that pay toll
the commerce of these cities, and the co
sumers OF these commodities have the mon,
to pay.
II may be said that we cannot and cou
not help this extravagant waste, and that
any rate the disbursements for the lab
that produced these palaces benefited Il
people. Bnt how did the men who bu
them and discussed that money come in
possession of it Did they acquire it
useful service, bestowing such benefits up
the people that out Of those benefits the p,
pie could afford to return to them the m
lions they expended Is this wealth tod
in the hands of the great philanthropis
the great reformers, the great inventors a
promoters OF industry, as their Just rewa