Year: 1874

A"E1I1NAH fINdNCLOs


REVIEW OF THE INFLATIoN POLICY


LAMARTINE'S CHAIACTEG-DIsPLAY OF


LACES - SCOTCH FARE = ADVICE FROM
'CARLYLE-RUSsIAS GAMBLING-A BRUs-
SELS SCANDAL.


[From the Pail Mall Gazette.l


The extraordinary series of votes by which
both Houses of the American Congress have
determined to make an enormous addition to
, the amount Of paper money afoat in the United
States, and virtually to adjourn to the end of
time the payment in coin promised on the face
of all American notes, proves, we are afraid, a
good many things besides those which the
American press conceives to be made clear by
the success of the so-called "infation" policy.
It is, indeed, plain enough, as our American
authorities observe, that the quality of Ameri-
tcan craftsmanship is slarmingly deteriorating;
that no more reckless set of politicians ever
existed than those at the head of the party
now in power at Washington; that the Western
States of the Union are putting forward num-
Der of claims almost as mischieyous in their
way as those which the slave-owning States
used to be constantly pressing before the war;
but we fear that one thing is clearer than all
the incursble superfcislity Of the masses Of
theEnglish race all over the world in matters
which require the slightest strain of thought.
u 1t is no doubt true that remarkable and very
serious change has come over the political rels-
lions ofthe various parts ofthe American Union.
Those vast States Of the West which before
long will contain the great majority of Amer
ican citizens appear determined to grow
wealthy, not through the natural exuberant
fertility oftheir soil, but by the most violent
experiments on economical and fiscal princi-
pies. They are bent on compelling the rail-
ways to convey their produce to the seaboard
at arbitrarily low rates of carriage, and they
are eager to force up the price which this pro-
duce commands in the market by flooding the
country with artificial money. There is appa-
rently neither virtue enough nor knowledge
enough among the Republican leaders to pro-
tect them against the urgency of the West.
They see the farmers associations of the West
ern States threatening to become a great po-
Iitical power, and they can think of no better
expedent for buying their support than by
bribng them with hundreds of millions of de-
based currency. The fact is that the party led
by Senator Morton and General Butler is de-
moralized by the consciousness that, if it falls





tenure of power depends on its retaining its
enormous close borough composed of all the
former slave States. The negro majorities
which these States now give to the Repubh-
cans would in all probability fade rapidly
away but for that military power at their back,
which even now has only retired slightly into
the distance, and the South once lost the
Republican party would be ruined beyond hope
of dcmption.


But the mere interests Of this or that party
could never have produced such an amazing
result if they had not


TIE DESsEsT POPULAR IGNORANCE


to work upon. It is not possible to construct
or conceive arguments more conclusive than
those which establish the mischievous folly of
Initiating" paper currency beyond the point
at which it consists Of really redeemable prom
ises to pay. Many political phenomena of the
modern democratic world have shown that blum
ders and injustiees belong to no particular era
or state of society; and here we have the Leg
islature of the United States repeating that
particular fraud of feuda! princes which even
in the middle ages had fallen into the lowest
discredit. There is absolutely no difference in
principle between adulterating the metallic coin
age and Initiating" the paper circulation. The
sole real distinction consists in the greater liza
bility of the older piece of cheating to be found
out. A medieval gold coin had its proper intrin-
sic value in the market, and the money-changer
who melted down coin of some particular
issue and discovered that it was half made up
of copper at once knew that the Sovereign had
been swindling his subjects. But the effects
of adulterating paper currency have to be
detected not by the scales or the tests, but by
some slight labor of the brain. As e bank
note is, to begin with, piece of paper which
is absolutely without appreciable value, q very
superficial person may conclude that any num-
Der OF pieces of valueless paper may be made
valuable by printing on tb I'm the same words
which appear on the face OF a redeemable note.
The difficulty, such as 1t is, of seeing through
this fallacy gives the modern corrupter OF
money his sole advantage over his execrated
predecessor, but both the act end its
consequences are identical in these two
cases. The image and superscription Of
the monarch lied in the older example; the
assertion that ''the United States promise to
pay" is a lying assertion In the modern in
stance. The consequences were also strictly
parallel. The prince of the middle ages ena-
bled himself, in the first place, to cheat his own
creditors; the United States propose to cheat a
good many Of theirs by paying them their in
terest in greenbacks which have been dimin-
ished in value by the act of the United States.
In the next stage an creditors are placed in the
same position as the creditors of the fraudu-
lent Government. All debtors subject to its
Sovereignty gain an advantage at the expense
of creditors similarly subject. The train of
ulterior effects is precisely what twas five
hundred years ago, only distinguished by the
infinitely greater confusion and immensely
wider distress which are now caused by the
greater size Of the societies now affected by the
uuprincipled measure and by the greater i'm
portanCe to them Of the operations of COM
mercc.


1t may perhaps be thought that no such mad
ness as has overcome the American Congress
could possibly overtake the English Parliament.


ENGLISH PUBLIC OPINION,


it may be said, is too sound on such
points. Mr.. Atwood and the 'currency Jug
glers" denounced forty years ago by Mr.
John Stewart Mill in one of the few of
his written productions which is character
lied by really violent language, are now Alto
gether extinct, and at most we see their falla
N4So P-44OSAASaAAg lCNAfC ducu ONcT-specul2LfO1
has brought about crisis in the city, and there
is clamor that the Bank of England ought to
manufacture more bank notes, with the view of
making discounts easier. And then is there
not the great witness Of free trade to the eco,
nomical knowledge and intelligence of the
English peoDlea We are sorry to say that in
spite of all this we have not the faintest conf
dence in the depth, clearness, or soundness of
popular convictions in this country on points of
political or monetary economy. We believe
that the string OF measures collectively known
as free trade were carried principally through
the political strength Of the interests which
gained an advantage by them, and through
the relative political weakness of the interests
which they for the moment injured. Second
arily, we attribute the success of free trade to
the personal influence of men like Golden,
whose intelligence was in harmony with their
interests, and to the vastly greater influence
of men like Peel, whose intelligence had pal
p2bly dictated to them conclusions which It
would have been for their interest to resist and