184 



CONGKESS, UNITED STATES. 



ifrnorantly or criminally, delivers up his patient also in 1836 and 1839 in 1847 and in 1857, and 

 tf death When the national life demanded a especially in 1866-rehef was only obtained by 



1 ' ^ n ' the repeal of the resumption laws and by inflat- 



ing the paper currency of the country. 



What a striking contrast between England 



continuance of the stimulant which had borne 

 it through the crisis, just as the wild delirium 

 of war was about to subside into reason, just 

 when our industries most needed help just 

 then all encouragements were withdrawn and 

 financial ruin ensued. Like the poor maniac 

 we read of who was wild with rage, the evil 

 spirit was rebuked and its departure left him 

 as 'one dead'-, but fortunately there was 

 'power and goodness" 1 at hand. He was com- 

 manded to arise, and he sprang into life, health, 

 and happiness. Alas ! alas ! when our indus- 

 tries were left as 'one dead' there was no 

 statesmanship with capacity to say, * Arise.' 

 There they lay in their helpless exhaustion, and 

 their dying condition was seized upon by inter- 

 ested parties to rob and despoil them. 



"Sir, it seems to me we should learn some- 

 thing from history, for history is philosophy 

 teaching by example. In England, it is said, 

 the years from 1797 to 1815 were the most 

 prosperous, industriously and commercially, 

 ever known. Agriculture, commerce, and 

 manufactures had greatly augmented. The 

 landed proprietors -were in affluence. Wealth 

 to an unheard-of extent had been created 

 among the farmers. Exports, imports, and 

 tonnage had more than doubled since the war 

 began. These eighteen years of prosperity 

 were years of suspension of specie payments by 

 the Bank of England. There was no abatement 

 in this prosperity until the moneyed nobility, 

 led on by Sir Kobert Peel, began a clamor for 

 resumption. Then all this prosperity of labor, 

 this universal and unheard-of prosperity, 

 ceased. As soon as contraction commenced 

 prices fell to a ruinous extent. Wages fell with 

 the prices of commodities, and it is said that 

 before the close of the year 1816 panic, bank- 

 ruptcy, riot, bloodshed, and starvation spread 

 through the land. The 1st of May, 1823, had 

 been fixed upon by law when the banks should 

 resume, and they contracted their circulation 

 rapidly to meet the gold and silver standards 

 of value. The result was that from 1815 to 

 1823 more than four fifths of the land-owners 

 of England lost their estates. The number of 

 land-owners was reduced from one hundred 

 and sixty thousand to thirty thousand, and, in 

 the language of Wendell Phillips, ' bankruptcy, 

 the very history of which makes the blood cold 

 to-day, blighted the empire.' Why all this 

 suffering ? Why all these tears ? Why all this 

 desolation ? It was brought about by men who 

 had determined to drive paper money from cir- 

 culation, had determined to bring down prices 

 and wage*, and had especially determined to 

 bring all the real estate of the kingdom within 

 their possession. They triumphed. To-day the 

 immense fortunes of the English lords and the 

 vassalage of the English peasantry are attribu- 

 table to the villainies of England's resumption 

 laws. In every panic with which England has 

 been afflicted in the one just referred to, and 



u 



at the close of her Napoleonic wars and France 

 at the close of her war with Germany 1 The 

 latter power, instead of contracting her cur- 

 rency, expands it ; makes her notes a legal ten- 

 der, pays her debts, sends thrift and prosperity 

 through all her provinces, abolishes the empire, 

 and establishes a republican form of govern- 

 ment. The finances are managed in the inter- 

 est of the people, and not in the interest of an 

 aristocracy, and the result is, monarchy gives 

 place to a government by the people and for 

 the people. 



" While the difference between England and 

 France is striking, the resemblance between 

 the financial policy of this Government and 

 that of England is also impressive. During our 

 late civil war the people of the North and West 

 were never more prosperous in all of their in- 

 dustrial pursuits. Every department of indus- 

 try was stimulated to the utmost capacity : farm- 

 ers and manufacturers, merchants and bankers, 

 all were richly rewarded for their labor and in- 

 vestments. In 1865, at the close of the war, 

 this prosperity was still in existence. This 

 prosperity extended in part to the devastated 

 South, and enabled her for a brief period to 

 restore her waste places and gather supplies to 

 feed her houseless population. The circula- 

 tion of money among the people at this time 

 amounted to $58 per capita. The facts assure 

 us that if this volume of currency had been 

 continued until this time the burden of taxa- 

 tion would have been wellnigh removed ; the 

 debts of the nation, of States, of corpora- 

 tions, and especially of individuals, would have 

 been wellnigh canceled ; ' tramps ' would never 

 have been heard of; riots would never have 

 disgraced Pennsylvania and other Northern 

 States ; all sectional strife and class supremacy 

 would long since have been submerged under a 

 tide of unrivaled public and private prosperity. 

 Alas ! as in England, so in this country : during 

 the war the commercial centers, notably New- 

 York and New England, from their superior ad- 

 vantages, gathered in the ' bonds ' of the Gov- 

 ernment: the crystallized tears, blood, losses, 

 and poverty of the nation these exponents of 

 a nation's travail. Every dollar that the specu- 

 lators and bankers of New York and Boston 

 could accumulate in this time of prosperity, 

 and which was not expended in hiring substi- 

 tutes to take their places in the field, where 

 brave men were battling for the Union, every 

 dollar that the camp-followers and bomb-proof 

 office-holders could command, was invested in 

 Government securities at about- fifty cents on 

 the dollar. At the close of the war, the Amer- 

 ican and European Shylocks, as they did in 

 England, became clamorous for contraction! 

 They cared nothing for specie payments. This 

 was a mere pretense to accomplish their ulti- 



