Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1879-03-13
Finances Of France.

financial achievements. It has borne
a burden of debt, carried an amount
of taxation, maintained q credit and
restored sound currency, under dis
asters which would have shaken even
the United States. We attribute this
grand fact to the circumstance that the
people Of all classes in France are in
structcd in honest finance. Not q
Frenchman believes that something is
created out Of nothing. Not French
man believes that the government can
print thousands of millions of notes and
keep them as valuable as coin, When
debt is to be paid in France it is I'm.
derstood that it is to be paid 10 honest
money, not in printed slips of green
paper. When France paid Germany
81, 900, 900, 900 of indemnity, it did not
evince the baseness to offer its paper
currency in payment, but absolutely
carted out large portion Of it in solid
coin, the balance in bills OF credit en-
London, Amsterdam. Hamburg, Frank.
fort and Berlin. To speak in brief,
there are no Democratic Greenback
fools 10 France. Even the most violent
radicals, like Gambetta, Louis Blanc,
Victor Hugo and others, are as con.
sentative on the monetary question as
Grevy or Theirs. They believe that
the true way to pay debt is by thrift,
economy and industry, and not by is.
suing more paper. Such politicians
as Cary, Butler, Ewing, Bouck, Bragg
ii f laEEEc d aha KGi coulu not atn ' re-
spectacle audience to listen to their
wild financial theories. And yet it is
curious that precisely such lunatlcs
will muster even in SO sparsely settled
state as Wisconsin following Of
1907 men, and the most extraordi.
nary sign Of the times is that tho men
Of that cast, who assume to be leaders
here, do not learn anything about hon
est finance, but they are continually
striving to thrust their revolutionary
and ruinous ideas into the financial
policy of the country.
Our attention is just now more par
ticalarly called to the subject of French
finances since the publication of their
national budget. The vouchers for
the year 1878 are now all in, and the
minister of finance knows upon what
he can base his estimates for the year
1880. He has made what an Amer
lean would call very close estimate,
that lie, he puts bis surplus 80 small
(s25 ,000) that it would be thought
here imprudent to consider it Of any
reliable account. But the French f.
nanciers are not only careful .calcula.
tors, but they are prudent expenders.
Immense deficiency bills are unheard
Of under their management. The
chambers appropriate what the gov.
eminent and laws require. They are
never ruled by that foolish economy,
which frequently breaks out in this
country, of appropriating less than
the law justly demal ads, thus ensuring
certain deficit. If they have Fl.
nancial necessity they meet it sauarely
and boldly and do at once what ought
to be done, and that in our Judgment
is the true craftsmanship of sound f.
nance:
N. Leon Says estimates for 1880, which
have just been submitted to the chamber at
Versailles, show an increase both in revenue
and expenditure over the figures of 1879,
which. in their turn were above those of the
previous year. In round numbers, the esti-
mated revenue for 1880 is fllO ,242, el2, an
increase Of f2,200.000 over 1879; and the ex>
penditure is .sllO, III, S04, an increase of e.
100000. The surplus reckoned upon is thus
very small, only some f65,O00.
The items which make up the grand
total of exendItures are worth recount.
ing. The charges for tie interest on
the public debt are enormous, being
f49,30O,oo0, or $245, 500, 900, nearly
half Of the whole revenue of France.
The army demands f22, 500, 900, or q
fraction over 81 10, 600, 900 per annum;
the navy fs,oOo,0O0, or $4,000, 900 !;
the public works $50. 900. The
cost of collecting all taxes and duties,
direct, or indirect, is ELI, 900. 900, or
nearly ten per cent, which is much
more than in the United States,
where it does not exceed five per cent.
In this respect our finance ministers
do better than in France. France
propably employs more officials than
the United States to collect the same
amount of revenue, as she has an inn
mense inland frontier to guard, bor-
dering on Belgium, Germany, Swift
xerland, Italy and Spain Evening
Wisconsin, FEB. %, '79.