UNITED STATES. 



789 





all tlio process, without creating ut any time an ar- 



tillciul hcaieity, uiul without exciting tnu oublic im- 

 agination with alarms, which impair ooiilhicnce, con- 

 tract tin- wholu large machinery of credit, and disturb 

 the imturul operations of business." 



MEANS or RKSl'MPTION. 



" Public economies, ottiuiul retrenchments, and 

 wise Inanoe." aru thu menu.- which the St. Louis 

 ni ion indicates us provision for reserves and 

 radmptiooa. 



The bust resource is a reduction of the expenses 

 of thu Government below its income ; for that im- 

 poses no new charge on the people. If, however. 

 tliu improvidence and waste, which have conducted 

 us to a period of falling revenues, oblige us to sup- 

 plement the results of economies and retrenchments 

 by some resort to loans, we should not hesitate. 

 Tin- Government ought not to speculate on its own 

 dishonor, in order to save interest on its broken 

 promises, which it still compels private dealers to 

 accept at a fictitious par. The highest national honor 

 is not only right, but would prove profitable. Of the 

 public debt, $985,000,000 bear interest at six per cent, 

 in gold, and $712,000,000 at five per cent, in gold. 

 The average interest is 5.58 per cent. 



A financial policy which should secure the highest 

 credit, wisely availed of, ought gradually to obtain a 

 reduction of one per cent, in the interest on most of 

 the loans. A saving of one per cent, on the average 

 would be $17,000,000 a year in gold. That saving, 

 regularly invested at four and a half per cent., would, 

 in less than thirty-eight years, extinguish the prin- 

 cipal. The whole $1,700,000,000 of funded debt 

 might be paid by this saving alone, without cost to 

 the people. 



PROPER TIME FOR RESUMPTION. 



The proper time for resumption is the time when 

 wise preparations shall have ripened into a perfect 

 ability to accomplish the object with a certainty and 

 ease that will inspire confidence and encourage the 

 reviving of business. The earliest time in which 

 such a result can be brought about is the best. Even 

 when the preparations shall have been matured, the 

 exact date would have to be chosen with reference 

 to the then existing state of trade and credit opera- 

 tions in our own country, the course of foreign com- 

 merce, and the condition of the exchanges with other 

 nations. The specific measures and the actuiil date 

 are matters of detail having reference to ever-chang- 

 ing conditions. They belong to the domain of prac- 

 tical, administrative statesmanship. The captain of 

 a steamer about starting from hew York to Liv- 

 erpool does not assemble a council over his ocean- 

 chart and fix an angle by which to lash the rudder 

 for the whole voyage. A human intelligence must 

 be at the helm to discern the shifting forces of the 

 waters and the winds ; a human hand must be on 

 the helm to feel the elements day by day, and guide 

 to a mastery over them. 



PREPARATIONS FOR RESUMPTION. 



Such preparations are everything. Without them, 

 a legislative command fixing a day, an official prom- 

 ise fixing a clay, are shams. They are worse : they 

 are a snare and a delusion to all who trust them. 

 They destroy all confidence among thoughtful men, 

 whose judsfnent will at last sway public opinion. 

 An attempt to act on such a command or such a 

 promise, without preparation, would end in a new 

 suspension. It would be a fresh calamity, prolific 

 of confusion, distrust, and distress. 



Till ACT OF JANUARY 14, 1875. 



The act of Congress of the 14th of January, 1875, 

 enacted that, on and after the 1st of January, 1879, 

 the Secretary of the Treasury shnll redeem in coin 

 the lc?al-tender notes of the United States on pre- 

 sentation at the office of the Assistant Treasurer in 

 the city of New York. It authorized the Secretary 



"to prepare and provide for" such renunij 

 r-|.t i-ii- payments by the use of any surplus revenue* 

 not otherwise appropriated ; and by burning, in hit 

 discretion, certain classes of bonds. 



More than one and a half of the four years have 

 passed. Congress and the President have continued 

 ever since to unite in acts which have legislated out 

 of existence every possible surplus applicable to this 

 purpose. 



The coin in the Treasury claimed to belong to the 

 Government bad on the 30th of June, fallen to lest 

 than $45,000,000, as against $59.000,000 on the 1st of 

 January, 1875, and the availability of a part of that 

 sum is said to be questionable. The revenues are 

 falling faster than appropriations and expenditures 

 are reduced .leaving the Treasury with diminishing 

 resources. The Secretary has done nothing under 

 his power to issue bonds. 



The legislative command, the official promise, fix- 

 ing a day for resumption, have thus far been barren. 

 No practical preparations toward resumption have 

 been made. There has been no progress. There 

 have been steps backward. 



There is no necromancy in the operations of gov- 

 ernment. The homely maxims of every-day life are 

 the best standards of its conduct. A debtor who 

 should promise to pay a loan out of surplus income, 

 yet be seen every day spending all he could lay 

 his hands on in riotous living, would lose all charac- 

 ter for honesty and veracity. His offer of a new 

 promise, and his profession us to the value of the old 

 promise, would alike provoke derision. 



RESUMPTION-PLAN OF THE ST. LOUIS PLATFORM. 



The St. Louis platform denounces the failure for 

 eleven years to make good the promise of the lejral- 

 tender notes. It denounces the omission to accumu- 

 late " any reserve for their redemption." It de- 

 nounces the conduct u which, during eleven years 

 of pence, has made no advances toward resumption, 

 no preparations for resumption, but, instead, has ob- 

 structed resumption, by wasting our resources and 

 exhausting all our surplus income ; and, while pro- 

 fessing to intend a speedv return to specie payments, 

 has annually enacted fresh hinderances tliereto." 

 And, having first denounced the barrenness of the 

 promise of a day of resumption, it next denounces 

 that barren promise as " a ninderance " to resump- 

 tion. It then demands its repeal, and also demands 

 the establishment of "a judicious system of prepa- 

 ration" for resumption. It cannot he doubted that 

 the substitution ol " a systim of preparation " with- 

 out the promise of a day, for the worthless promise 

 of a day without '' a system of preparation," would 

 be the gain of the substance of resumption in ex- 

 change for its shadow. 



Nor is the denunciation unmerited of that improv- 

 idence which, in the eleven yeais since the peace, 

 lias consumed $4,500,000,000, and yet could not af- 

 ford to give the people a sound and stable currency. 

 Two and a half per cent, on the expenditures of these 

 eleven years, or even less, would have provided all 

 the additional coin needful to resumption. 



RELIEF TO BUSINESS DISTRESS. 



The distress row felt by the people, in all their 

 business and industries, though it has its principal 

 cause in the enormous waste of capital occasioned 

 by the false policies of our Government, has been 

 greatly aggravated by the mu management of the 

 currency. Uncertainty is the prolific parent of mis- 

 chiefs in all business. Never were its evils more 

 felt than now. Men do nothing, because they ure 

 unable to make any calculations on which they can 

 safely rely. They undertake nothing, because they 

 fear a loss in everything they would attc-iiipt. They 

 stop and wait. The merchant dares not buy for the 

 future consumption of his customers. The manufact- 

 urer dares not make fabrics which may not refund 

 his outlay. He shuts hit* factory and discharges liis 

 workmen. Capitalists cannot lend on security they 



