St. Paul daily globe., 1895-06-02
TRADE STIMULANTS.

When all men, or the majority of the
men who vote, get the idea clearly
fixed in their minds that any nation
is but an aggregation of it's individual
units; that the same effects follow the
action of the millions that follow
those Of unit; that in a general way
what is unhealthful or injurious for
one man is the same for all, and that
the course that is prudent and safe
for one is that which is the same for
all, we will have less of this senti-
mental experimentation in govern
ment. In trade, in finance there is
not one law for a single man, and
another for a million, any more than
there is one for the single drop of
water and another for the deluge.
Gravity operates just as certainly
on the feather as on the meteor. The
business course that will bring ruin
on the Individual will none the less
surely bring disaster merely because
a nation of sixty-five millions .pursues
it. When this is realized and every pro-
posed public measure is brought to it
for test, we will have done with legis-
lation that brings only mischief and
disaster in it's train.
When man needs stimulan'ts other
than his normal forces, it is an evil
dence of weakness and disease. The
healthy man finds in his ordinary
food the quantity of stimulant needed
to keep his energies up to their full
capacity. If his condition is such that
he feels his energies tagging, and he
supplements them by adding artifi-
cial stimulants, he is making matters
worse, not better. He is wasting his
recuperative forces. He is simply
making himself more and more de-
pendent on artificial support in ever
increasing quantity. This is element
ary. It is within the experience of
many men, and the grasp of the COM
mon sense of all men. Whether his
energies are directed to manual labor,
to brain toll or to trade, it is equally
true that a resort to Stimulants is
unwise: that the increase of action is
followed by the equivalent reaction; /;
that here as everywhere the law of
compensation holds good and has it's
way.
Every business man knows there
are unwritten laws of his vocation
that he must heed; credit has it's limits
that he dare not transcend; the equa-
ton of purchases and sales, of pro-
duction and markets, must be kept
in mind; that the worth of promissory
notes is proportional to their GER
tainty of redemption; that conserva-
tive prudence is better than brilliant
audacity; that supply must not run
ahead of demand; that that business
is sound and healthy that keeps the
relations of these two factors normal,
and that any stimulus to the one or
the other is sure to be followed by a
destructive reaction. No worse enemy
to business ever attacks it than a
boom; which is merely the added en-
ergy of an extrinsic stimulant, ex-
aggerating trade conditions, creating
a deceiving mirage. All this that is
true of any one trader or manufac-
turer is equally true of all; and all
cannot do safely what one cannot,
whether the all are the government
or a trust.
And still, so obscuring is the effect
of regarding a government as a vague,
indistinct entity, instead Of being sim
ply what Sumner terms s'All of U.s.
that business men in plenty, VINO know
and obey the inflexible laws of bus
mess in their own pursuits, support
policies of government that are in di-
rect violation of those laws; and which,
applied to a single business, would
speedily bring Bankruptcy. Knowing
that stimulation in their own business
is the worst kind Of policy, they ap-
prove of the application Of stimulants
to business by legislation. Knowing
that the law of mechanics that what
is gained in speed is lest in power is
just as true of business as of mechan-