Year: 1874

periods Is signal nluslratlOn OF tne ulIu-


Guilty of coming back to specie after an era OF


depreciation. After the war ended. by the


final overthrow of Napoleon, there was again


a similar series Of postponements until 1919,


when the act called "Peels bilr' was passed,


requiring gradual resumption and allowing


four years to complete the process. But in


point of fact, it was completed within the


ensuing two years, the dreaded task having


proved to be comparatively easy.


Our own experience has been somewhat
similar, although Congress has not made
such ridiculous series of dates fixed and
abandoned When the Legal Tender act was
passed it was expected that specie payments
would be resumed Immediately after the close
of the war, and it was owing to that expecta-
ton that the law was 80 incautiously worded
as to give color to the argument after
wards used to prove that the public
debt was payable in greenbacks. Had
it been foreseen that there would prob
ably be no resumption for twenty years
after the passage Of the Legal Tender act q
loophole would not have been left for such an
Interpretation. After the close of the war
Congress, on the recommendation of Secretary
McCulloch, attempted to bring the country
back to specie payments by gradual contrac-
ton Of the currency. But public clamor
forced the government to stop when forty -four
millions Of legal tenders had been withdrawn,
and the experiment has never been resumed
On the contrary, twenty-six of those forty-four
millions have been thrown back into circula-
ton and fixed there by the laws passed near
the close Of the last session. So we are not as
near resumption as we were in Secretary
McCullochs time, except so far as the growth
of the country has put us forward. The
representatives Of the debtor class are not
likely to get up a new agitation for imitation,
but it is quite certain that they will make
resolute and united resistance to contraction.
We conclude, therefore. that Speaker Blaine
is casting the political horoscope on this sub
ject with remarkable skill and foresight


II may, perhaps, be thought that the noble
example of France furnishes an argument to
prove the ease and promptitude with which
nation which has suspended specie payments
may resume. But this apparent exception
really confirms the rule. It must be recol-
lected that the French German war was ended
by single brief campaign. Itbegan in July,
and Paris was invested by the German armies
about the middle of September. The treaty
of peace was concluded in the next February.
There was not time for the issue of the large
amounts of paper money by which the our
rency of country is deprecated The pro-
digious indemnity extorted from France made
it necessary to go at once into the markets of
the world for heavy loans, and her success in
procuring them depended upon her keeping
her currency and finances in sound con-
dition. The depreciation was slight and it is
only depreciation that forms great obstacle
to return to the specie standard. And yet
nearly four years have elapsed without re-
sumption in France. Her currency, however,
is at par and Me Bank Of France has accu-
muiated an immense specie reserve, and could
safely resume cash payments any day if the
political condition Of the country were more
settled. But even France, whose currency
was not materially deprecated by her short
war of few months, has found it slow pro-
cess to re-establsh redeemable currency