Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

works a revolution in the system of bank balances. It requires five per cent in lawful money of the circulation of every national bank to be kept in New York and Washington. This takes twenty millions of greenbacks away from the sixteen redemption cities of the United States, and places them in Washington and New York, for the purpose of making the officers of the Treasury assort and redeem the mutilated currency of the banks and issue new notes in their place. By the third section forty-four millions are added to the greenback circulation. By this we are to lose all we have gained in the way of redeeming the promise of the nation to pay its long overdue paper. This is a permanent postponement of specie payments; it hopelessly cripples the machinery by which that result is to be reached. To this is added an unlimited increase of national bank notes.

By this measure we invite two dangers. With one hand we throw overboard the ballast; with the other we spread the sails, and thus commit the ship of our public credit

"To the god of storms,

The lightning and the gale."

I believe, Mr. Speaker, that the proposition before us is fraught with measureless mischief. If you will authorize free banking coupled with some wise restriction, something that will lead us slowly but surely toward specie payments, if we can reach the two great results, specie payments and free banking,

we shall preserve the quality, of our currency and shall leave

be kept on hand as a reserve for circulation. It required, however, that the banks should keep on hand a redemption fund in the treasury amounting to five per cent of the circulation.

"The act then in force authorized the national banks in the redemption cities to keep one half of their reserve in New York City, the country banks to keep a reserve of fifteen per cent, three fifths of which might be kept in the redemption cities. The banks in New York were required to keep all their reserve on hand.

"The proposed law decreased the reserves in New York by abolishing the reserve upon circulation. It also decreased the reserve in Boston, and in the other banks, in the same way; but at the same time it largely increased the total reserve to be kept on hand, by repealing the sections of the act then in force, which authorized such banks to keep large amounts in the hands of their correspondents.

"The figures of General Garfield were given in round numbers, and were an estimate, but the effect of the bill would have been as he stated, -a diminution of reserves in New York, and an increase of reserves to be kept on hand elsewhere. The bill, as it finally passed, did not change the proportion of reserves on deposits to be held with their correspondents by banks outside of the city of New York, and allowed the five per cent redemption fund to be counted as a part of such reserves."

its quantity to be regulated by the demands of trade. There never did exist on this earth a body of men wise enough to determine by any arbitrary rule how much currency is needed for the business of a great country. The laws of trade, the laws of credit, the laws of God, impressed upon the elements of this world, are superior to all legislation; and we can enjoy the benefits of these immutable laws only by obeying them.

I desire, Mr. Speaker, that all the real wants of the Great West and of the whole country shall be fully supplied; but let them be supplied by that which is reality, and not by broken and dishonored promises. Let us not offer to the people of this country the apples of Sodom, that shall turn to ashes on their lips. I believe, sir, if this legislation prevails, that the day is not far distant when the cry will come up from those who labor in humblest fields of industry, denouncing those who have let loose upon them the evils enveloped in this bill. It has been demonstrated again and again that upon the artisans, the farmers, the day-laborers, falls at last the dead weight of all the depreciation and loss that irredeemable paper money carries in its train. Let this policy be carried out, and the day will surely and speedily come when the nation will clearly trace the cause of its disaster to those who deluded themselves and the people with what Jefferson fitly called "legerdemain tricks with paper."

I was greatly surprised to hear gentlemen quote the fathers of the republic as supporters of irredeemable paper money. The gentleman from Pennsylvania1 has referred to Franklin to support his opinions. I appeal from the Franklin of 1729 and 1764 to the Franklin of riper experience.2 I have been, if not a thorough, yet a reverent reader of those great men whose names illuminate the pages of our history; and I affirm that they are almost unanimous in their condemnation of any standard of value except that of the Constitution, or any kind of paper money except such as is redeemable in gold at the will of the holder. From the days of Washington to the present hour, no President, no Secretary of the Treasury, and scarcely a statesman whose name is enrolled among the illustrious dead, has failed to make his protest against the weak and wicked policy of issuing and permanently maintaining an irredeemable 1 Mr. Kelley.

2 See the paper entitled "The Currency Conflict," post, p. 255.

paper currency. I should be false to history, false to the past of our nation, if I did not refer to this instructive fact. I ask leave to put on record a few paragraphs on this subject from some of the great men who have adorned the records of our country.1 It will be seen that from the beginning until now our leading statesmen have uttered their warning voices. At no period have their warnings been more needed than at the present moment. Gentlemen may despise the wisdom of the past, but at last the truth will vindicate and avenge itself.

Gentlemen hope that this bill will give relief to the country; but that hope is delusive. Any relief it may bring will be temporary, and it will bring in its train greater evils than those we now suffer. By the currency act of 1870, the West and South are now entitled to a distribution of $25,000,000 of banking circulation, to be taken from the overplus of the Eastern States. If that is not enough, let the amount be increased; but let the increase be coupled with provisions that shall prevent the further depreciation of the mass. Above all things, let us take no step backward; but persevere in the purpose to restore to the people their standard of value, and make their money better, rather than worse.

1 The pamphlet edition of this speech issued by its author contained quotations from J. S. Mill, (Political Economy, Book III. Chap. XIII. sec. 3); Dr. Franklin (Works, Vol. VIII. p. 368, and Vol. X. p. 9); Richard Henry Lee and George Washington (Washington's Works, Vol. IX. pp. 120, 186, 187, 231-233); John Adams (Life and Works, Vol. VIII. p. 410); Pelatiah Webster and W. M. Gouge (Gouge's History of Paper Money, pp. 30, 31); The Madison Papers (Elliott's Debates, Vol. V. pp. 434, 435); Alexander Hamilton (Works, Vol. III. pp. 124, 125); Thomas Jefferson (Works, Vol. VI. pp. 139, 142, 232, 241, 245-247); James Madison (Writings, Vol. I. pp. 243, and Vol. III. p. 166); Daniel Webster (Works, Vol. III. pp. 53, 542); John C. Calhoun (Debates in Congress, Vol. XIV. Part I. p. 476); James Buchanan (Debates in Congress, Vol. XIV. Part I. p. 355); S. P. Chase (Financial Reports, December 9, 1861, pp. 40, 41, and December 4, 1862, p. 16).

These quotations fill several pages, and need not be reproduced in this place.

CENSUS.

ARTICLE CONTRIBUTED TO JOHNSON'S NEW UNIVERSAL CYCLOPÆDIA.

CEN'SUS [a Latin word, from censeo, censum, to "weigh,

estimate, tax, assess "; a registering and rating of Roman citizens; the censors' lists; the registered property of Roman citizens; Fr. recensement, a "statement, return, verification"; cens, "census," or amount of direct tax qualifying one to be an elector; Eng. cense (obsolete), a "public rate," " rank," "condition "; also cess (obsolete), to "rate," to "assess"], an official enumeration of the inhabitants of a state or municipality. The various forms and significations of the word, as given above, indicate the chief objects for which the census has been used in the different periods of history, though in many cases other objects have been associated with these.

[ocr errors]

I. THE CENSUS OF ANCIENT NATIONS. An inquiry into the censuses of ancient nations is valuable only in so far as it exhibits the objects had in view and the methods employed. It is alleged that China ordained a census more than twenty centuries before Christ; also, that a census was taken in Japan a century before the Christian era; also, that statistical information was taken by officials in Peru under the reign of the Incas. But these and similar notices of ancient censuses are too vague and uncertain to possess much value. This article will be directed chiefly to those nations of which history speaks with definiteness and reasonable certainty.

1. The Jewish Census. — It was ordered in the Jewish law that the first-born of man and beast, as well as the first fruits of agricultural produce, should be set apart for religious purposes; the first-born of man to be redeemed, the first-born of the beasts, excepting the ass, and the first fruits of the earth, to be offered unto the Lord (Ex. xiii. 11-13; xxii. 29). According to Arch

bishop Ussher's chronology, this enactment must be referred to the year 1491 B. C. The law further provided that when the sum of the children of Israel was taken they should give every man a ransom for his soul, amounting to a half-shekel of silver (Ex. XXX. 12-16). So far as appears, this is the original institution of the Jewish census. It is clear that it was primarily for religious purposes. The Hebrew word answering to census or enumeration means a "numbering combined with lustration," from a verb signifying to "survey, in order to purge." The four most notable enumerations recorded in the Old Testament were: Ist. In the third or fourth month after the Exodus the males of the Hebrews, twenty years of age and upwards, were enumerated by Divine command, chiefly for the purpose of raising money for the tabernacle (Ex. xxxviii. 26). The enumeration amounted to 603,550. The number of men at the time of leaving Egypt is stated (Ex. xii. 37), but it is hardly probable that a formal enumeration was made at that time. Probably the result, 600,000, was retrospectively inferred from the first numbering at Sinai. 2d. A second enumeration was made at Sinai in the second month of the second year after the Exodus (Num. i. 2, 3). Here a new idea appears, as this numbering was to ascertain (1.) the number of fighting men between the ages of twenty and fifty; and (2.) the amount of the redemption offering. Exclusive of the Levites, the result was the same as the first. 3d. The next enumeration was made just before the tribes entered Canaan, thirtyeight years after the one just mentioned (Num. xxvi. 63–65). The number of men had slightly fallen off. 4th. The most notable of the Jewish censuses was that taken in the reign of King David. Its history can be gathered from 2 Sam. xxiv. 1-9; 1 Chron. xxi. I−7, 14; xxvii. 23, 24. This enumeration was followed by a three days' pestilence, which destroyed 70,000 men. The pestilence is credited to David's presumption. It is not altogether clear in what his offence consisted. According to Josephus (Antiquities, vii. 13, § 1), the king's transgression was in not collecting the redemption offering required by the law. This account is more generally followed by Biblical scholars, but some attribute the pestilence to David's presumption and pride, of which the enumeration is regarded as an indication. It appears from Ex. xxx. 12, either that the customary ransom was to avert a plague among the people, or that such plague was to be the penalty for neglecting to require the offering.

« AnteriorContinuar »