The Washington herald., 1914-10-17
Financial Effect Of the War.
ARTICLE II.
(eoneIuded from yesterday


We shall raise this year. according to the govern
ment estimate nearly Is.sooooo bales Of cotton, and
good deal Of this viii be sold at or near, or below,
the cost Of production This viii be due to the fact
that because of the war, European spinners lay
ing in little If any Of their usual stores Of na
terial The distress Of cotton planters viii doubt
less be relieved somewhat but its net result is bound
to be such that smaller acreage of cotton viii be
planted for the next years crop. Also, sooner or
later the worlds spinning mills viii start up again,
and the demand of cotton manufacturers for raw
material win increase.
Therefore, it is highly probable that immediately
following the close of the war, much higher prices
for cotton viii prevail and the Southern section Of
our country will enjoy corresponding increase Of
prosperity And there is every probability that sub
stanaly the state Of affairs win prevail in the
agricultural districts a whole. While the women
old men and boys of Europe can harvest fair pro-
portion of the foreign grain crops this year. they
do only small portion of the fall planting and pIow-
ing and the general work of preparing for the crops
of the following year; and even if the war should
end tomorrow, the number of men who will work
next year in the European grain fields will be far be-
low the normal A diminished quantity of European
wheat production in 1915 is almost certainty. The
foreign demand for our wheat next year will prob
ably be even greater than It was this year. and
country will feel the effect of this for better for
worse. At any rate, the American farmer is not
likely to be in complaining mood
As general proposition all postwar periods are.
for considerable length of time, except in the terri
tories specifically ravsged by the war (but even
sometimes in these territories hemselves) periods of
rising prices, speculation and "booms" Eventually
another story has to be recorded, and then il is
of the devil taking the hndmost but it has been
usually found under such circumstances that the
American business man is as nimbe in taking care
of himself as is his neighbor A general factor of
importance in this regard is the way in which immi
grafton is affected. While there will be great de-
mand for labor in Europe after the it is rea-
sonable to expect that large number of men, espe
cially young men, will feel impelled to leave coun-
tries where the horrors of war have been acutey
felt and to take up their lives anew in country
where it is unlikely that they will be called upon to
risk life itself in struggle of national aggression
of national defense Further, an unknown but very
considerable sum must be added to the reckoning in
our favor in the shape of the money disbursed in
country for several years to by those resi-
dents of the United States who ordinarily spend large
sums of money each year in foreign travel The
quantity of money thus annually disbursed under
normal circumstances by American citizens in Eu-
rope cannot be accurately estimated but there are
eminent banking authorities, through whose hands
pass the letters of credit drawn for this purpose who
place the amount of money spent by Americans each
year IN foreign travel at $3oooooooo
On the other hand immediate influence of the
upon American affairs is the element of the ad-
effect of the possible collapse of particular for
eign business firms But let it even be supposed that
the form which the ending of the war will take will
not be IN striking military defeat like that of
Metz or Sedan but the wearing out of one country
or the other by attrition that will entail great
financial sacrifices. Nevertheless even in the imagi-
native case of the actual bankruptcy of the losing
combatant in the struggle it would not be fair to-
presume that any colossal ruinous loss would fall
upon our own shoulders. The worst that will really
happen to the country mostly involved is through the
death of great a number of its male citizens and
yet somehow at such times the world seems to for
get the matter very quickly and to be in way over
come thereby At the close of the Napoleonic wars
the national debt of England the victor in the strug-
gle and the country which bore the brunt of it. was
SS5ooooooo, bulk of national obligation never be-
fore since reached in Great Britain and repre-
senting weight of taxation, considering the COM
paratve poverty of the country at that time three or
four times great as that of similar debt today
1t is worthy of incidental remark that the cir
cumstance, now little remembered of the vast debt
thus accumulated 100 years ago, throws food of
light upon the terrible tenacity and prodgious re-
sources of the great power which the mlitarism of
Germany has challenged. But instead of crushing
England, as might be supposed the pilng up of the
debt marked the beginning of the real prosperity of
the English nation In her own peculiar way nature
seems to provide compensation and even advantage
to the world for the temporary distress of particular
peoples nations Of the kind described and one of
these compensations may be the present occasion
new birth of prosperity and national power for our
own beloved country, arising from the worldwide
recognition of the fact that the United States is al
most the only country of modern times whose paths
are not those of conquest and lust of territory and
whose feet have rested upon the eternal principles of
peace and justice between men and nations