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nuisance and an evil, we may confidently pronounce its utmost limit, at about thirty or forty millions more than this is pernicious, because this is about the sum of our surplus industry; the latter is rather less than the former, if any difference obtains-this is proved by the mass of current bullion not exceeding thirty millions of dollars.

Close upon the invention of banking, followed the system of borrowing money, in anticipation of revenue and taxes, to defray the expenses of government, or meet the wasteful exigencies of war. In time this system of borrowing assumed the shape it now bears, of funded debt, for which the certificates of government are issued, bearing an annual interest, until at last, it has become so familiar to every mind, that it would indeed appear an unpardonable ignorance to be unacquainted with the public funds, or what, in this country, is more commonly denominated the national debt; a debt, which in respect to a country, imposes on it a most onerous and calamitous burden; and in relation to trade, manufactures, agriculture, and commerce, is beyond calculation pernicious and destructive.

In this country, the Revolution, and the wars of '97 and 1812, brought upon us this public calamity, to pay the interest of which we have ever since been so heavily taxed, through the indirect means of imposts, or duties on the imported necessaries of life, which have stripped the mass of the producers of millions, as a bonus to the idle stockholder, and luxurious capitalist. Its operation upon labour is to depress, harass, and impoverish, to create inequality of fortune by the artificial excitements of speculation and stockjobbing, without the agency of talent, or the intervention of in

dustry, to the exclusive expense of those who toil, and those who produce.*

* On this point, Alexander Hamilton, who in all his reasonings argued on the fundamental doctrines of the WORKING PEOPLE, has the following pertinent observations:

"The emitting of paper money by the authority of government," says Mr. Hamilton, "is wisely prohibited to the individual states, by the national 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 even be affirmed, so certain of being abused, that the wisdom of a government will be shown in never trusting itself with the use of so seducing and dangerous an expedient. În times of tranquillity it might have no ill consequence, 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 mischievous. 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 the employment of 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 the political economy.

Among other material differénces between a paper currency issued by the 'mere authority of government and one issued by the bank payable in coin, is this, that in the first case there is no standard to which an appeal can be made, as to the quantity which will only satisfy, or which will surcharge the circulation-in the last that standard results from the demand. If more should be issued than is necessary, it will return upon the bank. Its emissions, as elsewhere intimated, must always be in compound ratio to the fund and the demand:-Whence it is evident that there is a limitation in the nature of things; while the discretion of the government is the only measure of the extent of the emissions by its own authority."

In another view, they are equally detrimental, and assume the same pernicious character as bank bills ; the funded debt possessing the quality of money, and having a currency equal to gold and silver. In this manner it tends to raise the price of commodities, and throw a great obstacle in the path of our home industry, by augmenting as well the price of labour as of materials. Besides, foreigners will always be tempted to its purchase, and thus impose upon us the tribute of interest, to be abstracted from the metallic currency of the country, to its impoverishment and degradation. As they tend, also, to banish gold and silver from circulation, of which they become the substitute, they are highly pernicious. The last blow given to our metallic resources during the late war, was by the issue of treasury notes. A funded debt also begets a monied interest, distinct from the general interest of society, and which aspires to rule the people, and engross the government, because they constitute an IDLE CLASS of society, which generates aristocratic ideas, and leads them to imagine that because they do not work, they were necessarily born to rule.

It must never be forgotten, that the whole wealth of society proceeds from labour, and that the stockholder grows rich by absorbing the wages and profits that rightfully belong to the industrious. Public credit, then, as well as commercial credit, is more frequently pernicious than beneficial. Let us inquire further into this subject.

The extension of paper credits has produced a competition in trade so great, that credit is universally granted to all persons without inquiring into their means, industry, or resources. The consequence of this diffusive credit is a relaxation of labour, as well as

a deterioration of morals.

Debt is contracted, with

out consulting the ability to pay; so that extravagance, idleness, and vice, become the natural features of an age of extended commercial credit, public funds, and chartered banks.

The corollaries to be drawn from these positions are of the most vital consequence to the happiness of individuals, as well as the destiny of nations. To avoid the contraction of debt, is the grand secret by which the citizen attains to fortune, and the nation advances to prosperity. Public debts paper credits, and all the variety of indirect taxation, operate upon industry to depress and check it. Insolvency in individuals, not only impairs their usefulness and destroys their energies, but leads to a general depravation of morals, and all the train of evils which inevitably attend on the total perversion of the first principles of the social compact.

An illustration of the oppressive nature of a FUNded DEBT, will not be out of place. Suppose government borrows ten millions, at five per cent. interest. In twenty years, the interest paid will amount to the capital! Twenty years is but half a generation, so that the labourers of one age, will have paid from their earnings ten millions of dollars interest-and leave posterity, or the next age, to pay the ten millions capital. As the government can only expend the ten millions capital, it is apparent that the producers of wealth, are losers by at least that amount, admitting the doctrine, that the capital has returned into the stream of circulation for the common benefit of industry. Ten millions of paper credits in banks, will produce the same result; only greater in degree, the interest in their operations

being seven per cent., which will reduce the period of burden to about thirteen years, instead of twenty.

Owing to the credit system, we are indebted for the enlarged and pernicious relations of DEBTOR AND creDITOR, and tha tconsequent remnant of the system of feudal tyranny, termed imprisonment for debt; which means the surrender of the body of the debtor to the vengeance of the creditor, to be tortured according to the degrees of malignity that glow in the heart of the Shylock, who seeks his pound of flesh, reckless of the blood that may follow the stroke of the knife, and who provides no surgeon to cure the wound, or stanch the blood, unless it is so specified in the bond.

The "continental money" of the confederated states will never cease to be quoted as an awful admonition, to avoid the mischiefs of a national paper currency. Nothing, not even the wild creations of imagination could equal the pernicious depreciation of this paper currency. In a few days, a few hours, the most opulent men were suddenly reduced to beggary. Five hundred dollars in that paper money, would not suffice to purchase even a pair of shoes. The country was inundated with the rag-riches of Mr. Gallatin, and which ought forever to be called "Gallatin money," in order to designate the counterfeit, the fraud, and the imposture.* The government issued the credits, but they had neither money nor property to redeem them. The moment they saturated the market, that moment they depreciated to nothing. The illusion of public faith was dissipated by the reality of a bankrupt nation.

* Mr. Gallatin contends that a paper currency is wealth! The theory must no doubt have been invented for a very honest and laudable purpose.

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