Page
236.
“THE
situation,
military and financial, at the beginning of
the year 1862, was
gloomy and
inauspicious.”
“The whole course
of the Trent transactions had been a sore wound
to the national pride.
Men of all parties felt that England
had conducted them in a characteristic spirit
of insult and menace.
The history of this
‘affair’ is brief:
On the 8th of
November, 1861,
Captain
Charles Wilkes—
commanding the sloop-of-war
San Jacinto,
then cruising in the Bahama Channel—
forcibly detained the English mail-steamer:
Trent, and took from aboard of her
James M. Mason and John Slidell,
who were making their way to England as emissaries
of the Confederate Government.”
Page
237.
“The news of this capture
was received in the United States
with pride and exultation;
in England with a storm of anger.
The British flag, it was almost universally declared,
had been insulted and outraged,
and a reparation must be exacted
as ample as the offense had been great.
Her Majesty’s Government was prompt
to action; it was
instantly as industrious in preparing
for war as if war had been
actually declared.”
The British minister—
“Lord Lyons was instructed to exact
not only the immediate release of the
Confederate emissaries,”
(within seven days)
“but an ample apology also.”
“Not exceeding seven days!
On this occasion,
at any rate,
Mr. Lincoln’s Government was uncommonly efficient,
and in six days Mason and Slidell
were delivered up.”
“There was little
in the military situation at that time
to compensate for the
deep humiliation
of the Trent business.
Quite otherwise indeed. Nothing at all
had been accomplished; . . .”
“The public heart
was sore and restless; and a great clamor
suddenly arose.
A victim was needed.
The administration of the War Department
was famously
incompetent; . . .”
“Mr. Lincoln
promptly seized an opportunity
he had long wished;
he sent a note of three lines
to Mr. Cameron; informing him that
the President had made up his mind
to accept his
(Mr. Cameron’s) resignation
as Secretary of War.
Mr. Cameron, however,
had not offered any resignation,
either verbal or written.
But he went out of office,
and was succeeded
on the 13th
of January
by Edwin M. Stanton.”
Page 238.
“ Income from
taxes was hopelessly
inadequate;
loans could not
be procured,
except of bank-notes
and upon inadmissable discounts;
the public necessities pressed
inexorably, and the people
were impatient and clamorous.
Delay was dangerous, therefore,
in every aspect.
“ The
suspension of
cash payments by
the government,
as well
as by the banks,
developed that a
resort to
PAPER MONEY
had become unavoidable.
A hard money war
was impracticable.”
Page
314.
“The prospect
of a civil war near
at hand had occasioned
a large falling off
in the
income from customs,
even before Mr. Lincoln’s
inauguration.
The actual presence of war
operated still more
calamitously upon the revenues
from this Source.”
“Additional methods
of permanent revenue
were necessary; and accordingly the
Internal Revenue Bureau
was created by an act
of Congress,
approved by the President July 1, 1862.
The germ of this bureau will be found
in the act of
August 5, 1861,”
“for the
levy of a direct tax
of twenty millions,
and the appointment of Federal officers
for its assessment
and collection.”
Page
322.
“Meantime,
the rapid and extraordinary advance
in the prices of cotton and tobacco especially,”
“excited an eager cupidity,
and a multitude of daring speculators
engaged in the trade.
Cotton (middling) sold in
December, 1860,
at ten cents a pound;
in December, 1861,
it had advanced to 28 cents;
December, 1862, it sold at
68 cents;
in December, 1863, it had risen to 84 cents;
and in 1865 it had reached
the extraordinary figure of
120 cents
per pound!
It is not an astonishing circumstance,
therefore, that the prospect of sudden fortune
made in cotton, attracted into that traffic
thousands of bold and adventurous men.
They infested the armies
and corrupted the army officers.
They penetrated through our own military lines
into the enemy’s country,
and communicated Information
and furnished rebels
with supplies.”
Page
323.
“General Grant,
in a letter written to Mr. Chase
on the 21st of July, 1863,
from his headquarters at Vicksburg,
said:
‘ My experience in West Tennessee
is that any trade whatever
with the rebellious States is weakening us
to at least 33 per cent.
of our force.
No matter what the restrictions thrown around trade,
if any whatever is allowed,
it will be made the means of supplying to the enemy
what they want. Restrictions, if lived up to,
make trade unprofitable, and hence
none but dishonest men go into it.
I venture to say that
no honest man has made money
in West Tennessee in the last year,
while many fortunes have been
made there during
that time.’ ”
Page
239.
“Mr. Thaddeus Stevens,
representing the paper-money idea
in its simplest form, proposed the issue of
United States notes
to an amount adequate to the wants of the Treasury,
which should be receivable
in payment of Government dues
of every kind, be a legal tender
in payment of all debts
both public
and private.”
Page
239.
“ But Mr. Chase had
already, in his report
to Congress made
on the 9th of
December, 1861, expressed his aversion
to a circulation of
United States notes even when
convertable into coin.
He admitted that
the substitution of
a national for a
State circulation would not be
without benefits;
the people would gain the
advantage of a uniform currency,
and relief from a
considerable burden in the
form of interest
upon debt.” . . .
“ But
he expressed
his apprehension
that it
would be attended with serious
hazards and inconveniences.
The temptation,
especially great in
times of pressure
and danger,
to issue
notes without adequate provision
for redemption;
the ever-present liability
to be called on
for redemption beyond means;
however carefully provided
and managed;
the hazard
of panics,
precipitating demands for coin
concentrated on a few points
and a single fund;
the risk
of a depreciated, depreciating,
and finally
worthless paper money;
the immeasurable
evils of dishonored public
faith and national bankruptcy:
all these were possible
consequences of a
system of government
circulation.” . . . 1
Page 240.
1
The reflections of
Mr. Hamilton on this point
are too full
of wisdom to be omitted:
“ The
emitting of
paper money
by the
authority of Government
is wisely prohibited
to the individual
States by the Constitution,
and the spirit
of that prohibition
ought not to be disregarded
by the Government
of the United States.
Though paper emissions
under a general authority
might have
some advantages
not applicable, and be
free from some disadvantages
which are applicable
to the like emissions
by the States separately,
yet they are of
a nature
so liable
to abuse—
and, it may
be affirmed,
so certain
of being abused—
that the wisdom of
the Government will be
shown in
never trusting itself
with the use of
so seducing and dangerous
an expedient.
In times of tranquility
it might have no
ill consequences;
it might even perhaps
be managed in
a way to
be productive of good;
but in great
and trying emergencies
there is almost
a moral certainty of
its becoming mischevious.
The stamping
of paper
is an operation
so much
easier than the
laying of taxes,
that a government
in the practice of
paper emissions
would rarely fail,
in any such emergency,
to indulge itself
too far in that
resource, to avoid
as much as possible
one less auspicious
to present popularity.
If it should
not even be carried
so far as
to be rendered
an absolute bubble,
it would at least
be
likely
to be extended
to a degree
which would occasion
an inflated
and artificial
state of things,
incompatible with
the regular and
prosperous
course of political economy.”—
(See Alexander Hamilton’s
“ Report on
a United States Bank.”)
Page
243.
Mr. Chase, submitted
House bill No. 240,
“to authorize the issue of
United States notes, . . .
and for funding the floating debt of the
United States.”
Page
245.
House bill No. 240,
“did not command the
unanimous support of the friends of the Administration,
and was solidly opposed by the Democrats.
It encountered a violent hostility and opposition
in both Houses; the harshest denunciations
being showered upon it by
leading Republicans.
Some of these will now be read with interest.
Page
246.
“Mr. Justin S. Morrill, of Vermont
(then in the House
of Representatives):
‘ I should
feel that I utterly failed
in the discharge of
my duty, if I
did not find a
stronger prop for the
country than this measure—
a measure not blessed
by one sound precedent,
and damned
by all! ’
‘ I protest against
making any thing
a legal tender
but gold and silver,
as calculated
to undermine
all confidence in
the republic.’ ”
“Mr. Roscoe Conkling, of New York
(then in the House):
‘ It will
proclaim throughout the country
a saturnalia
of fraud;
a carnival
of rogues.’ ”
“Mr. Owen Lovejoy:
‘ it
is not in the
power of
any legislative body to make
something out of
nothing.’ ”
“Mr. Thaddeus Stevens:
‘ The measure is one of necessity
and not of choice.
No one would willingly issue paper currency
not redeemable
on demand
and make it a legal tender.’ ”
Page
247.
“Mr. Fessenden,
in the Senate
‘ It is, in my judgment,
a confession of bankruptcy.’ ”
‘To say that,
notes thus issued
shall be receivable
in payment of all private obligations is,
in its very essence, a wrong,
for it compels one man
to take from his neighbor
in payment of a debt
that which he would not otherwise receive
or be obliged to receive,
and what is not probably
full payment.’ ”
“Mr. Sumner,
in the Senate
‘ Is it necessary,
to incur all the unquestionable
evils
of inconvertible paper,
forced into circulation
by act of Congress—’
‘ to teach debtors
everywhere that contracts
may be varied
at the will of
the stronger? ’ ”
Page
248.
House bill No. 240,
with provisions added by the Senate,
“Became a law
on the
25th of February, 1862.”
The “oldest authentic copy
of the Constitution of the
United States”
was discovered
“In the winter of 1983.”
“This document included a 13th Amendment
that no longer appears on current copies
of the Constitution.”
“The principle intent of this
‘Missing’
13th Amendment,
was to prohibit lawyers from serving
in government.”
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Judgement:
Vice
or Virtue?
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Isonomia.US
LandGrab.US
Eminent Domain - Condemnation:
reduces Private Property to a priviledge,
and creates Nomads.
Why the Republican Party
Elected Lincoln
Kenny saw—
Big Shanty!
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