The great Machine breaking down.
A review of the following articles from the columns of the New York Herald, of the 8th, says the Norfolk Day Book, of Saturday, will convince the reader that the great bubble is about to burst in the midst of its glory. The banks are all broke, and so is the national Treasury. With 600,000 men, with arms in their hands, and no money to pay them with, the North is not likely to have the ‘"good time coming"’ just now, and its cities may come in for being sacked and plundered by its own unpaid minions. The Northern commercial and manufacturing interests cry for direct taxation, but the West--the great West--says no, Emphatically, no! As a preface, we annex an article from the editorial columns of the Herald:Financial condition of the country.
Whilst Congress is wasting the precious hours of the session in the discussion of questions which belong to the executive business of the War Department, and the situation of which can be of no sort of benefit at the present time, the financial affairs of the country are in a condition which excites the utmost anxiety and alarm. In another week the Treasury will be without a cent, and in financial and commercial business of every kind the prospect is fast precipitating matters towards a panic. Those who have anything to dispose of, and who can realize it, are investing the processes in gold or in foreign exchanges, so as to be prepared for what seems inevitable. It is evident that, unless Congress acts speedily and energetically, not only will we be overtaken by a financial revulsion, severer than any we have as yet encountered, but the credit of the Government will be destroyed, and our army, which is being brought into such fine condition, utterly demoralized. The issue of irredeemable paper money, so far from helping to extricate us from our embarrassments, will only render them less easy of solution. A nation that has recourse to such expedients is bent on suicide. In taxation alone can we find the means of providing for the burdens that war imposes upon us. Every article of luxury, every deed or paper relating to the transfer of real or personal property, promissory notes and bills of exchange — everything, in short, that is susceptible of being thus charged — should bear its proportion of them, in the form either of direct taxes or stamp duties. In this way a revenue of a couple of hundred millions could be raised to secure the interest on the heavy war debt that we are incurring, and to leave a large surplus to assist in providing for the wants of the Government. It Congress is animated by the least sense of patriotism, and is desirous to spare the country the humiliation of an annihilated public debt, as well as the disgrace attending the triumph of the rebellion, it will at once apply itself to the adjustment of the taxation necessary to accomplish these objects. The country was never in a better condition to respond to the calls that will be thus made upon it, and will the more cheerfully meet them, from the conviction now generally entertained, that they provide the only safe and legitimate remedy for the difficulties that are now crowding upon us.Financial and Commercial.
Tuesday, Jan. 7.--6. P. M.
--We have reason to believe that Congress has at last waked up to a sense of its duty to the country, and that a measure has already been or will at once be reported by the Committee of Ways and Means to the House, authorizing Mr. Chase to issue one hundred millions of Treasury notes in addition to those authorized at last session; declaring these new notes as well as the demand notes, authorized in July, a legal tender for all debts as well to the government as to individuals; directing that they may be funded in twenty year stock of the U. States at par at fixed periods, or redeemed in coin, at the pleasure of government; and, for the security of their redemption and of the due payment of the interest and principal of the bonds into which they may be converted, imposing a direct tax which is calculated to yield an annual revenue of one hundred and fifty millions of dollars.
We have no hesitation in saying that such a measure as it is will be satisfactory to the public credit.
The new Treasury notes will pass everywhere as money if their redemption is properly secured by direct taxes, and none of the evils which, in other countries, under less careful systems of finance, have attended heavy issues of paper money, need be apprehended on this occasion.
Much anxiety and loss would have been avoided if Congress had adopted this course a month ago, when it was first recommended in this column.
The speculation in exchange continues.--Sterling must be quoted 114 a 114½ and gold 3½ a ¾.
The government has been disbursing heavily within the past day or two, and people are investing their money in gold and exchange, in consequence of the non action of Congress upon the subject of taxation.
Gold is held for much higher premiums by the speculators.
The stock market opened vigorously this morning with a large amount of orders from the public; but, as the day advanced the street speculators began to realize profits and the market was not strong enough to take the stock thrown upon it. Hence the afternoon prices of many of the speculative shares show a decline, as compared with the closing prices of last evening.
Thus, Rock Island, lost to-day ½ per cent., Burlington and Quincy 1, Toledo 1, Galena Illinois Central 1½, Michigan Central Southern old ¾ guaranteed ¾, Reading ½.
The exceptions to the decline were U. S. 6's, which advanced ¼ and did not fall back; Erie, which closed ¾ better than yesterday; Missouri, Tennessee and Virginias, each of which gained ¼ to-day, and Pacific Mail, which advanced ¼ per cent.
The market closed very firm, with a general disposition to buy.
The bankers' conspiracy in Philadelphia.
Philadelphia, Jan. 7.
--Some of our banks refuse to take Treasury notes on deposit.
A very bad feeling is getting up towards the banks, and if they do not alter their course there will not be a dozen banks in the United States in a year from now. The cry is being raised, ‘"Down with the banks, and give us a national currency."’
The Boston Post of yesterday says: ‘
Bank specie, $3,975,700. Late in the day the banks were called upon to pay the government $100,000 in coin, to supply, perhaps, some temporary deficiency.
It is to be hoped that a fair system will be speedily adopted by which the government shall receive bank bills for subscriptions to the loans.
The bills of the Boston banks are as good as the demand notes of the United States--they can be used as readily and conveniently — and the Government itself has stopped specie payment, except for interest and debt overdue, and as specie is at a premium of 1½ to 2 per cent., it follows that the coin paid by the bank to the Government does not return to them.
Every coin payment, therefore, diminishes the specie aggregate of the banks, to sustain which these institutions agreed to suspend.
Moreover, the vote of suspension made no exception in favor of Government, and the banks, therefore, are not justified in favoring it beyond their other customers.--Liberal payments of United States demand notes to public creditors would furnish some temporary remedy for the present difficulty, for thereby the banks would soon obtain enough of these notes to cancel their remaining obligations to the Secretary of the Treasury. ’
And another extract from the Herald's editorial columns: ‘
We are fighting to put down Southern white rebels, and not against the hundreds of thousands of Union men throughout the South who are awaiting the day of their deliverance from Jeff. Davis; we are fighting to save the South, not to destroy it; our object is to restore the blessings of our Federal Constitution to the rebel States, and not to transfer them from one irresponsible military despotism to another.
We have an army and a navy sufficient for the immediate work in hand; we have our army and our navy so organized and distributed as to indicate the inevitable overthrow of this rebellion, and in a very short time.
But the money question is assuming an alarming shape.
Sixty millions of cash receipts make a sorry figure against six hundred millions of expenditure.
The receipts of the Treasury must be increased to the extent of a hundred and fifty millions, and that right soon, or we shall be deluged by a general outpouring of shinplasters, and the fearful revulsion of 1837, ten times magnified in its evils, will again come upon us.
The solvency and safety of the Treasury, our currency, our credit, our commerce, as
a people — our very existence as an independent nation — are all now depending upon the action of Congress on this all important money question.
We have plenty of money and means in the country — they are at the service of the government; but if Congress shall fall to adopt the necessary measures of taxation, and such acts for the regulation of the currency and commerce of the country, and for the encouragement of its suffering business classes, as the crisis demands, we shall before long be suffering all the evils of a sweeping financial revulsion.
We earnestly call upon the House of Representatives, therefore, to drop the ‘"almighty nigger"’ for a while, and to devote a few weeks to the ‘"almighty dollar." ’ It was the long purse of England which conquered the great Napoleon, and the heaviest purse in this contest will be more than a match for the heaviest artillery.
But we have both, and Congress having provided the artillery, should now leave it in the hands of the army, and turn with special attention to the relief of the Treasury and the country upon the money question. ’
