Year: 1862

Il


Now that the Secretary Of the Treasury has
made his oficial statement, it is tAs duty Of
Congress to take up the question of our finances
without delay. They are in very deranged and
disorganized condition, and something must be
done Immediately If the national credit Is to be
saved from utter ruin. The ourrencyi Is depre-
cisted to the great injury Of the industrial
classes Of the community, who have to pay in
fated prices in the ratio Of the depreciation.
The credit of the government is inpaired at
home and abroad, and the troops An i field
are unpaid and discontented. Money is .ue
sinews of war, and without II the struggle for
the Union must be soon brought, to an unsuc-
cessful close. The amount required is enormous,
and will tax to the utmost the best financial
skill Of IT, country to devise the ways and
means. Every step we move in the progress Of
the war the national debt Is increased, and the
financial difficulties Of the republic will be con-
tinually accumulsting till bankruptcy at last
stares us in the face, il We do not return to .
sound basis


Mr.. Chase has made wonderful progress
In financial ideas since the issue of his
former reports. But he is still q tyro in the
science. He has adopted many Of our opinions
which he before rejected; but he does not
advance far enough. He is not thoroughbred
fnancier, and does not 60 to the root Of the
matter. We're he as good radical in finance
as be is in politics it would be well for the
country and for himself He is like the man
born blind, whose eyes were opened by Christ,
and who at frst saw objects indistinctly, men
appearing to him "as trees walking" 1t is
necessary, therefore, for the financial genius Of
the country to help out his struggling, faltering
ideas till he gains clearer vision. It devolyes
upon the ablest men in Congress to take hold
of the subject, adopting all that is good in Mr..
Chase's propositions, supplying his deficiencies
and correcting his errors; and it is the impera-
tive duty of every man in the national assembly
to ignore the existence Of the niger and all
minor questions till the means of carrying on
the war are amply provided, and adequate
measures are adopted Tor the restoration Of the
currency to a solid foundation. There are
only three months in which to accomplish so
great q work. Let not the time be wasted by
the madness Of faction.


In the first place, it will be necessary to adopt
the financial system by which Pitt carried Eng.
land triumphantly through her long war with
France-the system Of loans and taxes--one
half the current expenditure to be betrayed
each year by the proceeds Of taxation, and the
other half by loans bearing interest payable in
specie. Thus Is national debt to be kept
down and national credit kept up. We have no
night tosaddle posterity with the whole burthen'
Of transactions il which we are the actors. Pos
terity might justly repudiate II, and hence the
public confidence cannot be secured for such a
system. Equity and the laws Of finance require
that we assume our fair share of the debt, in
stead Of shifting it upon the shoulders Of future
generations. Thus alone can we preserve un-
impaired the national credit; and it was in
shrinking from this inexorabls requirement that
Mr.. Chase and the republican majority in Con-
gress committed their greatest blunder. They
feared to meet taxation manful!y. We're they
conscious of wasteful expenditures, Of fraudu-
lent contracts, of gross mismanagement of the
war, and Of secret revolutionary design to
pervert the simple object Of the confct-the
restoration Of the Union to the basis on which
the founders Of the government laid ito "a
natical crusade against the domestic institutions
of the South and the rights of sovereign States,
guaranteed by the constitution? Their hesita-
ton to appeal directly to the people for sup
port Of the war can only be explained by the
fact that they and the people meant very diff
ferent thing by the war, and that they were un-
willing to make discussion as to the tendency
of their course. Whatever may be the cause
of the cowardly conduct of the administration
and Of the majority in Congress, the nation has
had to pay the penalty in a disordered cur
rency and diminished credit, and the sooner
the remedy is applied the better for all con-
cerned.


In the next place, we must return to specie
payments as soon a. possible. In the exi-
gencies OF critical moment 1t may have been
necessary for the government to suspend pay
ments in silver and gold, the constitutional cur
rency of the country; but that suspension
ought not to have been continued a
day longer than was necessary to make
arrangements for resumption. The same
thing has happened to the American pso-
pie and to the English. Both became suddenly
involved in a great war. In 1877 the British
government found il necessary TO borrow in
immense sums the gold Of the Bank Of England,
and to save it from bankruptcy an act was
passed relieving it from specie payment But
in seven months after the passage of the act the
Bank announced that it was in condition to
pay specie If the political circumstances OF the
country would permit. The effect was that
for three years its paper kept on par with
gold, and sometimes even commanded pre-
MUM. When people found they could get gold
for the bills when they wanted it they did not
demand is,'notes at par being more convenient
than gold. The Bank, however, presumed too