Have we the means of organizing a monetary system of sufficient strength to resist that combination, and to give efficient aid to European liberty in her conflict with despotism?

sources are regulated by a combination American sixes-that this is the age of European monarchs, or the concen- of progress-that the words of that trated money power of their bankers remarkable man, Kossuth, will be reand agents? peated, and make a deep impression on European fundholders-and that when once the process of transferring to the United States is begun, it will require no London agency to accomplish it. No one can foresee the effect of the I beg you to bear in mind, that the panic thereby produced. Who, ten combination which broke down the years ago, could have believed that Bank of the United States, has given so many wealthy European emigrants way before the energy, activity, and would have come to the United resources of this young and vigorous States? The transfer of capital by people-that American credit has re- this process has but just commenced. vived, and that the greater security The following table shows the num

and increased dividends will induce ber of depositors in the savings banks many to sell out their European three of England, and the amount deposited and four per cents., and invest in on the 20th of November, 1840:

These deposits are by law invested | those securities upon a falling market, in the public securities of the British and thus depreciate their value. government, and the effect of any The whole number of persons in panic which would induce the depos- Great Britain receiving dividends on itors to demand payment would be to the 5th of January, 1842, is given in compel these savings banks to force the following table:

When you examine these lists and three hundred dollars per mile per ansee how many there are who have num for carrying the mail on first-class small incomes, and reflect upon the in- railroads, which is six per cent. on five ducement which such persons have to thousand dollars, and which, at five emigrate to the United States, and to per cent., would reduce the charge on invest in American securities, we are the Department to two hundred and justified in believing that American fifty dollars per mile per annum, leavcredit, resting upon a permanent and ing fifty dollars per mile per annum as fixed basis, will be preferred by a sinking fund to pay off the principal, many persons in Europe, and that which it would do in less than thirtylarge sums will be remitted to the three years. The effect of this would United States as a permanent invest- be to give the use of the railroads for ment. ever thereafter free of all charge, and It is estimated that there are near consequently to save to the Departten thousand miles of railroad now in ment twenty millions of dollars in operation in the United States, and thirty-four years. As this would be that there soon will be at least so much money saved, whether it be twenty thousand miles, and the capi- applied to defray other expenditures of tal invested more than six hundred the Department, or availed of to reduce millions of dollars. The present dis- the rate of postage, the change of sysbursement for mail service on rail-tem is entitled to a credit for that roads is about one million of dollars. As this service is so rapidly increasing, for the sake of round numbers, we will assume that the proposed change of system will commence on a disbursement of twelve hundred thousand dollars, which will be the interest, at six per cent., on twenty millions. We propose that the Postoffice Depart- less than twelve years, the following ment shall make contracts with rail- table shows that the gain by the road companies for the perpetual use change of systemof their roads, and that instead of beWill be, in 33 years. ing paid, as now, on contracts for four years, the railroad companies shall receive an amount of five per cent. bonds, chargeable on the revenues of the Department; the interest of which, at six per cent., would be equal to the service rendered. Thus, we now pay

sum; and as we are legislating not for to-day only, but for the future, the change of system is entitled to a credit, not for that sum only, but for the sum obtained by compounding the interest on that sum in perpetuity. As any sum compounded at six per cent. semi-annually duplicates itself in

66 45

$20,000,000 40,000,000

57

80,000,000

66

59 66

160,000,000

66

81 66

320,000,000

66

93

640,000,000

66

100 ""

.967,674,470

But this will not be all; the effect would be greatly to enhance the value

of the large fund invested in railroads. purposes to issue, will not be a charge It would make railroad shares and upon the treasury, for, inasmuch as railroad bonds available as capital, the system provides a sinking fund and thus furnish a basis for invest-out of the present disbursement, which ments, and for the organization of a pays the principal, it will be as much system of American credit, much more a creation as if it were California gold. permanent and reliable than the sys- It will not only be so much saved to tem of European taxation. It should the government, but it will furnish a be identified with and controlled by the basis of banking on the principle of great body of our people. It should be the free banks of New York, which essentially American in all its aspects, have now been in operation for many tendencies, and affinities. It should years, without the loss of a dollar to be identified with our soil, and so the bill-holder; and, it matters not connected with our progress and wel- whether it be so used by the railroad fare, that it may not, and never can, companies, or by others, the effect for be any other than American in feeling good will be the same. It will create or policy. It is strictly local, and yet a capital which may be used to build connects itself beneficially with the up manufactories, stimulating and susmost remote sections of this great taining our domestic industry, and country. It is an interest acting within furnishing the means of enabling our prescribed limits, confined within its agriculturists, our planters and farown sphere, but connected with, pro- mers, to retain their cotton and their moting, sustaining, and enlarging, corn until the British consumers will other similar interests in each and be compelled to come here and purevery other part of this great re- chase it at American prices, instead of public; an interest self-sustaining, buying it as they now do, in Liverand rapidly increasing, whose power pool, through British agents, at British and strength consist not in taxes prices. levied upon a down-trodden and opUnder the system proposed, the pressed people, but in the facilities, American banker who deposits these accommodation, wealth, prosperity, and bonds, as the basis of a bank circulablessings, which it gives, and whose tion, will receive the interest on his beneficial power and influence may be bonds and on his bank notes. These, so organized, increased, and concen- together, will be at least twelve per trated, as to protect us from the pow-cent. per annum ; but, as the payment erful European combination to which I now made to railroad companies is six have referred, at the same time that per cent., the change of system will be each company preserves its individual entitled to a credit for six per cent. powers, control, and influence. compounded, and at this rate the sav ing will be

We have seen that the change of system of mail contracts will save to the people of the United States, through the Postoffice Department, nine hundred and sixty-seven millions of dollars in one hundred years. It will do much more than this. The twenty millions of dollars which it

As the expenditure for transporting at the rate of one hundred thousand the mails will increase, as the system dollars per annum, the saving will be of railroads is extended, we must at the rate of twenty millions of dolcredit the system with the saving on lars for every period of twelve years, the roads to be made, as well as on and the compound interest thereon. the roads now in operation. If we The amount will then stand thus: suppose that the system will be ex- The saving will be to the United tended so as to increase the expendi- States, through the Postoffice Departture for carrying the mails on railroads ment, as before stated

Such would be the saving to the as a basis of banking, it will be found people, through the Postoffice De- that the accumulation of capital will partment, on the present system of be much more surprising. Thus, the expenditure for carrying the mails. first issue will be twenty millions, and If we apply the same rule for esti- a like sum in addition every twelve mating the profit to the railroad com- years. These sums, compounded at six panies, or to those who use the bonds per cent. per annum, semi-annually

1,903,206,000

Add saving through Post Office Department, as above.

And we have the sum of (to the credit of the change of sys

tem proposed)...

$14,845,470,000

Let not these sums startle you. I accomplish, not by one great mambeg you to run through the calcula-moth bank, concentrating its power, tions, as I have done, and you will be and regulating the price of cotton by satisfied that, enormous as this sum contracting the currency, but by so appears, it is, indeed, not a moiety of what would, in fact, be gained by the -beneficial influences resulting from the plan proposed. It would create railroads, build up manufactories, create wealth and incalculable resources, by the stimulus it would give to the pro- tion, and, therefore, free from the presductive industry of the country. To sure of the screws of the bank of

distributing aud organizing the business of banking as to furnish a supply adequate to the wants of the couutry, of a currency deserving the public confidence, and not subject to the control of British intrigues or specula

the South and West it is indispen- England. sable as a means of exchanging their

respective products, and this it would

Yours, truly,

DUFF GREEN.

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE TARIFF.

DUFF GREEN TO THE HON. R. M. T. HUNTER.

To the Hon. R. M. T. HUNTER :

In the Congress of the confederation, April 30, 1784, a report of a committee, of which the following is an extract, was agreed to:

"Unless the United States, in Congress assembled, shall be vested with powers

they can never command reciprocal advantages in trade; and, without these, our foreign commerce must decline, and eventthat the states should be explicit, and fix ually be annihilated. Hence it is necessary on some effectual mode by which foreign commerce, not founded on principles of equity, may be restrained.

I HAD become satisfied that the use people of the South, and among numeof machinery had so increased Euro-rous other letters, I addressed the pean manufactures, that the conflict following to the Hon. R. M. T. Hunter: of interest would cause an effort to readjust the commerce of the world, and that that adjustment must necessarily more and more identify the interest of the South, as the producers of cotton, with the interests of the North, as manufacturers, and of the Northwest, a large part of whose surplus provisions would find the best market in the manufacturing and competent to the protection of commerce, cotton and sugar producing states, if the whole people could be made to realize that the North and the South, and the East and the West, are, or should be one people, united by one common bond of mutual interest, because the real conflict of interest was not between the North and the South, as slaveholding and non-slaveholding communities, but as between the North and the South, including the The resolutions asked that the states East and the West, as one political should give to Congress." the power of community, organized under a common prohibiting the subjects of any foreign government for the promotion and pro- state, kingdom, or empire, unless tection of their common interests, so authorized by treaty, from importing far as those interests may or might be into the United States any goods, affected by their intercourse with each wares, or merchandise, which are not other, or with foreign nations. I saw the produce or manufacture of the dothat the effect of the sectional organi- minions of the sovereign whose subjects zation of the North was to cause a they are." counter sectional feeling and political organization of the South, and therefore I did not content myself with appeals to the people of the North. I deemed it to be my duty to address '

"That the United States may be enabled to secure such terms they have resolved," &c.. &c.

Subsequently, on the 13th of July, 1785, the Congress, upon motion of Mr. Monroe, proposed an amendment to the ninth article of the confederation, roviding, among other things, that