Year: 1874




of modern statesmanship, few things could
be more inappropriate than an inordinate de-
yotion to the past. While many of our think
ing men are striving to discover some conven-
lent system of cremation, so that we may be-
come dust and ashes with the utmost despatch
and at reasonable expense. it may be deemed
ungracious to disinter the opinions of the
fathers, in the hope of their influencing in
any way the opinions of the statesmen
with spontaneous genius who have come
up in night in Washington. A Senate
and House that find nothing in the
teachings of the history of every successful
Commonwealth and prosperous commercial
capital, in the mature experience of cities like
London and Paris and Frankfort, will hardly,
be expected to listen patiently to the old fogy
ideas of a Washington and Jefferson. II is
with no such hope that we print this morning
the most instructive and interesting letter
from Washington upon paper money and
what the fathers of the Republic thought about
imitation. AT the same time plain people may
find these opinions full Of interest and in
struction.


In the first place we have text from the
learned Montesquieu, whose mind was ripened
into exquisite culture by scholarship that
seemed to embrace the wisdom OF the ages,
that sit would be an excellent law for all
countries to ordain that none but real money
should be current" Coming to our own peo-
pie, we see Washington hoping never to hear
serious mention of paper issue in Virginia.
Washington evidently had not anticipated the
wisdom OF the Western Logans, for such an
issue ''would be productive Of much mis-
chief" and could only come from zig
norance and design" On another occasion
he called it a every foolish and wicked plan"
Thomas Jefferson regarded the issue of paper
as policy with "a train of evils, moral, po-
ltical and physical" and he warned his
countrymen, in spirit that must have excited
the whitening wrath of the Mortons of the
time, that such policy would bring the days
Of the Mississippi bubble, that business
would be crushed, and the end would be
''execrations on the heads of those function
aries who, from ignorance. pusillanimity or
corruption, have betrayed the fruits of their
industry into the hands Of projectors and
swindlers."


1t will rejoice our Rocky Mountain states
men to learn that the wise Franklin wrote an
essay in favor of paper money in Pennsylva-
mia. But this was when in his twenty-third
year, and we find him later in life 'swash-
ing his hands of the evil of paper money
by warning Congress of the mischief, the in
justice and the corruption Of manners that
would come from q deprecated currency.
Richard Henry Lee, whom even Mr.. Senator
Sprague may know was the President Of the
Continental Congress, publicly expressed his
fears that the issue of paper money would
ruin Virginia, and earnestly called upon
"every friend to his country, every
honest and sober man" ''to repudiate
so nefarious a plan of speculation" James
Madison, it will vex Senator Came
ron to learn, regarded the issue of
paper money as folly, as 'unjust
unconstitutional, anti-federal, unnecessary
and pernicious" Mr.. Madison deemed the
matter important enough to discuss in the
Federalist, where he discussed ''the pestilent
effects Of paper money on the necessary conf
dence between man and man, on the industry
and morals Of the people and on the character
Of the republican government" John Adams
paper money" speaking Of it in the words of
Swift, as "the madness Of the many for the
profit of the few" We are afraid that when
Adams had sincere convictions on any subject
he was given to plain speech, for he actually
spoke of the blessed paper money as a 'theft
of great magnitude"


Alexander Hamilton, even in an American
Senate, will be regarded as an authority upon
matters of finance. and we find him de-
nouncing the issue of paper as "hurtful to
public credit" He lived in q benighted time,
when national debts we're not deemed national
blessings, for he saw '.no danger more threat
ening to the country than the progressive ac-
cumulation of debt" 1t is interesting to
observe how these views entered into the de-
bates Of the Constitutional Convention. The
issue of paper money was carefully consid-
cred, and when the motion to refuse
States the power to make such issues
was considered it was defeated by "a
decisive vote. This sentiment ruled the
Convention, and we see it everywhere
in the writings Of the fathers. Then we
were poor, struggling confederation, sparsely
settled, with limited population and revenues
which had been exhausted by long pro-
tracted and enervating war. Now we are
rich, prosperous, with new wealth coming
to us from other lands to swell the marvellous
richness Of our own. But our fathers took
the severe and manly course, and, in spite of
their weakness, redeemed and sustained their
credit. We, their children, through our SEN
ators, seem to prefer the more easy and
ignoble course Of averting stern and imme-
ate dutv by wandering to the spirit of infla-