The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1879-08-09

IL RESPECT OF the striEgency in the money
market, to which we referred in our last, the
Ha1aiian Gazette Of this week proposes a re-
markable remedy, viz that the government
issue a series Of " post notes. sat least two
dollars Of paper for one of coin in the Treasury
We have no idea that government Will for a sin
gle moment entertain any such insane project.
At present the government paper is Just as good
rs coin, for the reason that the public are
assured beyond the shadow of a doubt that
for every paper representative of value issued
the equivalent in coin is in the Treasury
vaults. 1t is better than coin as q medium of
exchange, because less bulky. Government bonds
readily command a premium, for the reason
that government credit, through sound manage
ment, is rightly deemed unimpeachable. But
our Gazette wIseacre, in his phrenzy for re-
lief for the imaginary worthy men who are
struggling to keep their heads above water, -
would upset this sound condition of govern
ment credit and substitute in its stead an
issue Of soft money-the veritable SO rag baby ;"
Of the American inflationists. If " two dollars
of paper for one of coin in the Treasury -
why not three or four, and so on, Gd R6irtum ?
The relief afforded by an initiation like the one pro-
posed would be but temporary, and the pro-
cess would have to be repeated to the end of
the chapter, which end could only be disaster
to the Treasury as we'll as to those tenn
porarily relieved. Experience in all countries
has proved beyond the shadow of a doubt,
that the less tampering with the circulating
medium of a country the better. All attempts
to cure the present - tight - condition of the
money market by the application of artificial re-
needles will be worse than useless, for the inevi-
table relapse will be more dangerous than the
first attack. 1t is however quite true that in
many of the States of America the custom has
been followed by banks of issuing a great deal
more paper than they had money to back it, and
the history Of banking failures in that country is
a fair complication Of the evil effects of the
system.
An influx of foreign capital is spoken of, but
it is somewhat questionable whether the money
ed men Of California will care to bring their
funds hither for investment in a banking business
Of a limited scope, in view Of larger transactions
at home; and the capitalists Of Europe are too far
away to become interested. 1t is nevertheless
true, and the statement is easily demonstrable,
that there is here an opportunity for the in
vestment Of say a half to a million of dollars. on
perfectly safe securities, at n rate OF interest at
from seven to nine per cent. Were these facts
thoroughly known in Europe, where by last ac-
counts we learn that money was rapidly accumu-
latiDg and interest ruled low owing to the search
ty Of safe and profitable means of investing, it is
more than probable that a modicum of the surplus
thus lying idle would be brought to Hawaii mel.
But the sort of influx Of capital We would like
to see would be the direct investing of foreign
funds in our plantations by purchase of part in
terests, so that the expansion that has taken place
in these enterprises during the past years would
bear less heavily on their projectors. As was
shown IN our commercial article of last week, the
ordinary-not to speak of extraordinary-ex-
penses of a sugar estate constitute a heavy drain
of coin. For instance, we were cognizant of
a shipment of twenty-eight Chinese laborers the
past week, who received in the aggregate the
sum of $1,000 as advance wages. Ten of these
engaged for two years, with 800 each advance
fourteen for eighteen months, with $50 advance
and four for one year at $50 advance. As a
general rule, every Chinese laborer on the planta-
tions receives five dollars in advance for every
month of the term for which he contracts to
serve.
1t cannot be denied that during the past
few years, our mercantile community has i'm
ported too largely of foreign goods, and the
entire community-more especially the planter&
as a general thing-have been extrayagant in the
way Of expenditures but we are of opinion that
the latter are now cognIzant of the present search
ty Of money, and, Notwithstanding the SO great
expectations from large crops and remunera-
tive prices, they are cutting down expenses and
economising wherever possible. 1t must not be
forgotten in this connection that the prices OBJ
tanned for our sugars in California are some