The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1879-09-25
The Sinking Fund.

When q man secretly conveys all his pro"
perty to his wife, and few months after
doing so announces that be is bankrupt
without assets, he is usually denominated a
swindler. Fortunately the State of Vir-
ginia cannot engage in any such nefarious
transactions. II she could, the Agltators
would call upon the good old Common
wealth to do it. For they claim that the
McCuLLocH bill violates a contract which
she has made with herself or with part OF
herself: or, in other words, depriveS part
OF herself of right which 4 part OF herself
has under the Constitution made by her
self
+ This is neither joke nor 4 libel. 1t is
an actual fact. We find the proposition
maintained in one of the most decorous and
well.written articles which we have ever
seen from the pen of an Agitator. In that
article we are graveiy informed that the
old funding bill has interfered fatally with
.sthe constitutional rights of the sinking
fund, of the literary fund, OF the school
system, and OF all the beneGciarics OF these"
It would be hard 10 say what the constitu-
tional rights of the sinking fund are. 1t is
true the Constitution says that "the Gene
raj Assembly shall provide by law a
sinking fund.-" but it does not say how
large fund that shall be. 1t does, how
ever, declare that that fund Shall be cap
piled solely to the payment and extinguish-
ment OF the principal Of the State debt"
Parson MASSEY, PAUL, FULKERSoN, and the
rest of the Agitators, who have sworn to
support the State Constitution, and who are
now doing all that they can to prevent "the
payment" OF the public debt, may we'll ask
themselves whether they have not violated
their oath Of Office. And it would be at
least modest for them to make no
further illusions to what the Consti-
tuition requires in this respect. So far from
trying to provides sinking fund, those Agi
tatorS have used their utmost eXertions to
render The State bonds absolutely worth
less-those held By the sinking fund as we'll
as all the rest. Their advocacy OF the BAR
BoUR bill, which was intended to render
those bonds valueless, and so to minister to
forcible reimbursement, proves that they
have no respect for the constitutional re-
quirements touching the State debt.
But, view the subject as we may, there is
nothing in the claim that one constitutional
requirement is more binding than another.
II the State is as poor as she is represented
to be by the Agitators, and therefore unable
to comply with all the requirements OF the
Constitution, where is "the higher law"
which demands that the requirement in re-
gard to the sinking fund shall override the
requirement in regard to the payment Of
the public debt? 1t is the fault Of the
Agitators that all Of those requirements
are not respected. Shall they blame us
for their owa shortcomings? We would
provide for the sinking fund and
also for paying 'the creditors Of the
State. II We succeed in doing one Of these
things we shall do more than the Agl-
tators. Their complaint that the sinking
fund is not provided for is as impudent and
hypocritical as the plea OF the Partisan muir
derer OF bis father and mother who, when
asked what he had to say for himself,
claimed the protection Of the court for a
poor orphan. They have murdered the
credit OF Virginia, and now claim that the
debt-payers shall reyiyify it, or yield the
reins OF governments to sheir hands.