Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1894-11-16
PRESS COM MENTS.
Bonds. Not Industries.
On. Y, Tribune.)

President Cleveland will not be cap
tiously criticised by Republicans for hav-
ing determined to issue $50, 100000 more
bonds. They recognize that the response
bility is his, and that he has to face a
party which is in the last degree vicious
and dangerous in its financial tendencies
But there is reason to doubt whether the
new issue will prove beneficial on the
whole, except to speculative or partisan
interests which should not govern action.
1t has been an important fault OF the
President that in judging and seeking
public prosperity he has thought less than
he should have of the employment and
wages of American industry and has too
often been governed by partisan interests,
as when he refused to call an early session
of Congress last year, and when he al
lowed the tariff bill to become a law which
he was not willing to sign. The desire
to get bonds issued before Congress can
make another exhibition of it's incapacity
and unwOrthiness is natural for a part!-
san, but it is an open question whether the
government will in the end be helped
rather than hurt. So a speedy issue of
bonds may give flip to speculation,
but it is questionable whether it will
help industries that are struggling to re
vive.
When the last issue of bonds was eff
fected stocks were pushed up an average
of 81 per share for railroads and 81. so per
share for trusts, but only for short time
for in less than two weeks stocks were as
dull and as low as before. 1t is well re-
membered that the desired effect upon
general business was not realized. Wheat
and cotton We're lifted a shade, but imme-
diately fell lower than before. The issue
of bonds was based on the idea, desperate
ly urged by free traders then as now, that
doubt about the ability of the government
to maintain gold payments was the main
cause of depression. But the volume of
actual business, measured by clearings
throughout the country, did not increase,
but declined in February after the issue
of bonds. The truth was and now is that
monetary danger has had very little to do
with the activity or the wages of indus
try.
At this season wheat and cotton and
other products ought to go abroad largely,
and the automatic regulation of prices by
the extent of the foreign demand and the
condition of exchanges is not thing to be
arrested without necessity. An issue OF
bonds will probably send many securities
abroad instead of products, and tend to
encourage importation of goods in place
of those manufactured here. Both at
home and abroad it will draw attention
strongly to the excess of expenditures
over the revenue and to the inadequacy of
the new revenue law If it were true, as
congressional committees asserted, that
the new law would yield large surplus
after January |, there would be far less
occasion for borrowing money within
about month of that date than there was
last August, when the free gold reserve in
the treasury was 50, 500, 900 smaller than
it is now An issue of bonds is therefore
strong evidence that the new law will fail
to provide the necessary revenue.
There is another phase which the Presi-
dent seems to have overlooked. In little
more than fortnight Congress will meet,
maddened by defeat and factiOnal strife,
and still further inflamcd by an issue of
bonds for which authority was refused
The large body of Democratic members,
who think their only chance now is to ap-
pease the Populist element will see an Oc-
casion to attempt new monetary legisla-
ton. That effort and the agitation atten-
ding it will not strengthen the credit of
the government, nor will it tend to help
confidence and business revival. 1t is
therefore all the more questionable
whether, in deciding to issue bonds at
once, the President may not again be
considering narrow rather than national
interests.