The National tribune. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1877-1917, 1903-04-16
revulsion known to our history followed

revulsion known to our history followed
in the same year.
Then followed the war of the rebel
lion and the new era of revenue laws
which attended and helped so decisively
to overthrow it. But I must reserve that
story for another chapter, meantime anti
cipating it by inserting here the eloquent
tribute paid by Mr.. Gladstone, the great
statesman of England, to the unexempli-
fed financial achievement of the Ameri-
can people in debt paying:
Most remarkable was the financial Sc
quel to the great conflict. The internal
taxation for Federal purposes. which, be-
fore its commencement, had been I'M
known. was raised in obedience to an
eXigency of life and death so as to ex-
coed every present and past example.
1t pursued and worried all the transac-
tons of life. The interest of the Ameri-
can debt grew to be the highest in the
| world. and the principal touched $780,
100000. Here was provided for the pa
thence of the people tombstone of ex-
IRENE severity.
in England. at the close of the great
French war, the propertied classes, who
were supreme in Parliament, at once re-
belled against the Tory Government and
refused TO prolOng the income tax even
for single year. We talked big. both
then and now, about the payment Of our
national debt; but G3 years have now
elapsed, all of them, except two, called
years of peace, and we have reduced the
huge total by about one-ninth: that is to
say, by little over 500, 100000 or scarce
ly more than $7,50O,OOO year. This is
the conduct of a state deliberately digest
ed into orders and degrees, famed for wis
dom and forethOught and consolidated by
long experience. But America continued
long to bear on her still smarting should
ers the burden of the war taxation.
I'm IL years she had reduced her debt
by Sl9O,OO0,0OO, or at the rate of $50 ,000,-
900 for every year. In each II months
she had done what we did in eight years.
Her self-command, self-denial and wise
forethought for the future have been, to
say the least, eightfo,d ours. These are
facts which rebound greatly to her honor,
and the historian will record with surprise
that an enfranchised nation tolerated bur-
dens which in this cvantry selected
class. possessed of the representation, did
not dare to face; and that the most un-
mtigated democracy known to the annals
of the world resolutely reduced, at its
own cost, prospective liabilities of the
state, which the aristOcratic and plutOcra-
tic and monarchical Government of the
United Kingdom had been contented igno-
bly, to hand over to pOsterity."
Thus the generation of patriotic Amer
leans which suppressed the great rebel
lion and preserved the Union, including
hundreds of thousands of tax-paying ex-
soldiers of the Union army, assumed and
discharged an obligation which the people
of what was then the richest nation in the
world would have "handed over to pos
terity." And these same ex-soldiers post
pOned their own just and pressing claims
for pecuniary consideration for many
years, that the Nations money creditors
might first be satisfied. and the Nations
credit be held untarnished before the
word.
Go be continued)