2310 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, ment and cultivation of lands granted them by act of Congress, the gress ha£1 the power of disposing of the public lands and prescribing the roles and money to be loaned for six years at not more than 3t per cent., to the regulations concerning that disposition, but that illinois possessed it. That would · tt f W d M be to make the laws of lllinois paramount to those of Congress in relation to a sub· C omml ee o ays an eans. ject confided by the Constitution to Congress only. And the prn.cticn.l result in thiR By Mr. RIDDLE: A paper relating to the petition of Mrs. Laura very ca~e would be, by force of State le~islation, to take from the United States M. Lessessne, to the Committee on the Post-Office and Post-Roa(ls. their own land, against their own will, a.nd against their own laws. We hold the By Mr. SINNICKSON: The petition of David Griner and other true:tJrinciple to be this: that whenever the question in any court, State or Fed citizens of Cumberland County, New Jersey, that the tariff laws re- eral, 1s whether a title to land which had once been property of the United Stat~.s bas passed, that question must be resolved b~ the laws of the United States; bn.t main undisturbed, to the Committee of Ways and Means. that whenever, according to those laws, the t1tle shall have passed, then that prop. By Mr. SMITH, of Pennsy1 vania : Memorial of tobacco man nfac- erty, like all other property in that State, is subject to State l:Sgislation, so far as that tnrers of Cincinnati, Ohio, and Covington, Kentucky, for the rednc- . legtslation is consistent with the admission that the title passed and vested accord- tion of the tax on tobMCO to sixteen cents, to the same committee. ing to thu laws of the United States. - Also, the petition of envelope manufacturers, printers, stationers, ·It is competent then for Congress to pass this bill, at least in ita I and lithographers of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, for a change of the prospective character. There is a necessity for this bill. Every law ') law by which the Government secures a monopoly of printing stamped yer understands that in the ordinary modes of acquiring title to land envelopes and cards, to the Committee on the Post-Office and Post- from the Government, the legal title or fee-simple does not pass until ~ Roads. the patent issues; certificat.es of entry under the pre-emption and l By Mr. THOMPSON: The petition of Goodrich & Porter and others, homestead laws, and under the laws authorizing sales, only convey an \, of Haverhill, Massachusetts, that duty on English lastings and serges equity or equitable title. (Carroll vs. Safford, 3 Howard, 441; Frisbie be changed to an ad valorem duty, to the Committee of Ways and vs. Whitney, 9 'Vallace, 187; Bagnell vs. Broderick, 13 Peters,' 450.) :Means. It is equally well settled that while the legal title remains in the Also, the petition of L. Johnson & Co. and others, of Haverhill, Government the statute of limitations does-not run in favor of a party Massachusetts, for an amendment of section 30'20 of the Revised Stat- in possession ·of land. This results from a well-known principle, u tea, by inserting the words " boots and shoes " after the words "Nttllunt tempu.s occurrit t·egi." The resnl t of this is sometimes pro " United States," to the same committee. ductive of gTeat evils, great wrong, great hardship. Let me illns- By Mr. WHEELER: The petition of Mrs. Peter Stryker, chairman trate: A party makes an entry of land and procures a certificate of of the executive committee of Woman's Christian Temperance Union entry from the proper land office. By this he is the owner of an of New York, and of 6,000 temperance and Christian men and women equitable title to the land. He neglects to procure a patent, and the of that State, that Congress appoint ~ commission of inquiry to inves- legal title remains in the Government. He sells the land, receives full tigate and report upon the eftects of the alcoholic liquor traffic on ·payment, and makes a conveyance to the purchaser. The purchaser pauperism, crime, revenue; taxation, and the general welfare of the goes into possession, occupies, improves, and sells to others, who do country, and that the liquor traffic may be prohibited in the District likewise. When the land has been occupied for half a century the of Columbia and the Territories, to the same committee~ heirs of the party who originally entered it procure a patent and By Mr. WOODWORTH: The petition of Ed. McGinnis and 576 other bring ejectment, and at law they may recover, so far as any protection citizens of Youngstown, Ohio, for the repeal of the resumption act of can arise under the statnt.e of limitations. The statute of limitations January 14,1874, that national-bank notes be retired, and that a bond gives no protection~ I know a court of equity might, in so.ch case, bearing a rat.e of interest at 3.65 per cent. per annum, payable in na- afford relief to the occupant. But suppose the first purchaser from tional legal-tender notes, and interchangeable at the option of the the party who originally entered the land has lost the evidence of his \ holder for national legal-tender notes, be issued, the proceeds to be purchase, or never, in fact, procured a deecl of conveyance. In such applied to the payment of out-standing gold-bearing bonds, to the same case a court of equity would afford no relief to the party in possession, committee. unless it be upon the doctrine of a "presumed grant." If, in such case tl1e patent had issued at the proper time, the legal title would have _passed from the Government, and the party in possession could protect himself against an ejectment suit by pleading- the statute of HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. limitations. His defense would be at law. He woula not be required to go into a conrt of equity for relief. SATURDAY, April 8, "1876. In the Virginia military district in Kentucky and in Ohio it is no ' I unusual thing for entries an.d surveys to be made and the issuing of I Tho Honse met at twelve o'clock m. Prayer by the Chaplain, Rev. the patent to be delayed many years. I know of cases where entries I. L. TOWNSEND. ancl surveys have been made eighty years and yet no patent is issued. ORDER .OF BUSINESS. I have heard it said that in the Virginia military district in Ohio, only ) The SPEAKER. By order of the Honse made yesterday the session a few counties of the State, there are more than 40,000 acres covered { of to-day is to be devoted to debate only, without the t.ransaction of by ancient entries and surveys occupied by parties whose possession l any bnsiness. 'fhe gentlem:tn from Illinois [Mr. EDEN] will resume and ownership date back from twenty to seventy-five years, and yet { the chair. they ~re unconscious of the fa.ct that a patent may suddenly issue to QUmTING L~'D TITLES. some adverse claimant who will or may barrass them with a lawsuit, '·, Mr. LAWRENCE. On the 12th of January I introduced a bill (H. or extort money to secure a H compromise." R. No. 844) relating to land patents, which was referred to the Judi In all such cases I believe that either a court of law or equity should ciary Committee, by whom it has been fully considered and directed and would afford relief to the occupants by " presuming a grant" t.o be reported to the House with a recommendation that it be passed from the original owner of t:he entry and survey after a posse sion by-this branch of Congress. The bill is in these words: which the statute of limitations would protect, if the patent had been That all patents for land which have been or may be issued shall in all actions issued at the date of the survey which perfected a right to a patent. hereafter commenced to recover the title or possession of said land tor all purposes The reasons for this and the authorities which support it have been of any statute or law limiti.ng the time · for commencing actions have effect as if stated somewhat fully in an article which will be found in the Phil issued to the party entitJetl thereto at the time such party was or may be author ized to ma.ke any proof of a. right to such patent. adelphia American Law Register for February, 1874, pages 69 to 76 inclusive. I will not repeat now what is there said. I will state in brief the ground upon which the authority to pass But there are some other rea ons why this bill should pa.ss. It will this bill rests and the object of and necessity for it. quiet land titles without the aid of the courts, at least to such an ex There can be no doubt of the right of Congress to pass it. In Bag tent that those who seek to speculate against occupants by "com nell vs. Broderick, 13 Peters, the l::;upreme Court said: promises" will fincl "their occupation gone." It will settle the ques That Congress .lllvl. the sole power to declare the dignity and effect of a. patent tion, so ihat it will be no longer subject to controversy, that the courts issuing from the United States; that a patent carries the fee, and is the best. title can aml shall afford proper relief. It will be eminently just. It will known to a court of la\V. prevent parties from profiting by the mere delay in procuring patents. This doct;rine is well supported. (Martin vs. Waddell, 16 Peters, 367; It will give repose and security to many land titles. This is essen Hooper vs. ScheimerJ. 23 How-.'1rd, 249; Morton vs. Green, 2 Nebraska, tial to the securit-y and proper improvement of homes and to the pros 441; same case in :supreme Court of United States, October term, perity of their occupants. It will encoura.ge indnstry. It is right. 187 4; l"'enn vs. Holms, 21 Howard, 481; Bennett vs. Butterworth, .11 It will put an end to fraudulent and rascally claims. It bas the·sanc Howard, G69.) In the case of Wilcox vs. Jackson, 13 Peters, page 516, tion of the Judiciary Committee. By direction of that committee the Supreme Court said: - this bill is t.o be submitted to the House, and I hope it will pas8. · It has been said that the State of lllinois has a right to declare by law that a title In further explanation of the necessity of 1his bill I present extracts dmived from the United States, which by their law~s isonlyinchoateandimperfect, from two letters from the General Land Office, as follows: shall be deemed as perfect a. title as if a patent had been issued from the United States; aml the construction of her own courts seems to give ihat effect to her DEPARTlmr..'T OF THE INTERIOR, GENERAL LA:SD OFFICE, statute. That State has an 1muoubted right to legislate aa abe may ple~e in re· Washington, D. 0., FebruarrJ 12, 1876. garfl to the remedies to be prosecuted in her courts, and tQ regulate the disposition Sm: In compliance with your application of the lOth instant, received through of the property of her citizens by descent, devise, and alienation. But the prop Hon. WILLLUI LAWRKNCE, of the House of Repre entatives, I transmit herewith: a. erty in question WM a part of tho public domain. of the United States. Congresa certified COP}' of page 6!), volume 10, of the Rccor(l of Virginia Military Patents. is invested by the Constitution with the power of disposino- of and makin~ neeclful As you will porceh~e, this transcript is very defective, but is an exact counter rules and regulations respectin.g it. Congress has
records of -patents. Thus, in the re-port of 1856: "Authority from Congress is de ent. I Jrnow and am frank to confess its errors, while I mourn over _ sired t{) perfect anum ber of the Vh·~inla military records filed in this Office, in its blunders; I know its history and exult in its achievements; I am whlch the snrvevs of the land -patented are merely posted (pa-sted) in the records, and in somo instances not inserted at all; consequently showing an imperfect re proud of its record and glorious triumphs in the cause of honest goY cital of title. As the lands so granted are valuable, and this Office is the sonrce ernment, of civil liberty, and equal :rights. And, sir, while I hold a from whith parties interested can alone obtain official evidence of their title, it is seat upon this floor I will not allow any man, however high and ex important the records should be perfected." The same recommendation was made alted he may b~, withimpunitytovilify and defame that party, which in the report of 18j7. But nothing has resulted .therefrom, and all that can be done in such matters is to give an exact transcript of the volume and page, with the con is composed of the noblest men, inspired by the purest principles ant.! tents thereof, where the patent purports t.o have been recorded . having the most illustrious history, of any party that ever existed on .A.s these errors and omissions occurred in and about the year 1823, the present earth. administration of tho Office can in no wise be heM reAponsible therefor, especially What spirit or feeling actuated or moved the honorable gentleman when repeated efforts have been made to remedy the defects in question. Very respectfully, your obedient servant, to make such a speech it is not for me to say, whether it was a de L. K. LIPPINCOTT, sire to become notorious or to show his new democratic friends how / Acting Oommisaioner. zealous and enthusiastic young converts always are. j E. J. HOWE ·sTINE, Esq., Whatever may have been the cause, it is perhaps enough for ns to { Bellefontaine, Oh.io. know now that the republican party has lost this "blazing star" In another letter from the Commissioner of the General Land Office from its constellation, and that it now sparkles and glows in the cor (- there is this statement : onet which adorns the darkened brow of modern democracy. DEPABTMEI\'T OF THE INTERIOR, GENERAL LAND OFFICE, Every statement ma-de by the gentleman with reference to the re Washington, D. C., February 14, 1876. publican party as connected in any manner with the question of the Sm : * * * Tile patent in question pur-ports to have been issued in 1823, and currency is overwhelmingly contradicted by the fact~:~ of history. Sir, I find from examination that several hundred others are in like condition as to the recorcl thereof. there is no saue man North or South who dares for a moment deny As stated in my letter to Mr. Howenstine, attention has repeatedly been called that the present unfortunate condition of the country is the direct to these defects and authority asked to remedy the same, but without result. result of our legal-tender irredeemable greenbacks, and that the de In the case of the records of patents for services in t-he war of 18l2, under the preciation of our currency is the bitter fruit of treason, the loss of act of Congress of May 6, 1812, manY. t~1ousands were only sibrned with th~ initial letters of the Presi!lent's and Comnuss10ner's names. nut these defects, m cases more than 250,000 men, a public debt of two billions and a half of dol of the exemplifications thereof, were curell by the act of Con~ess of Marc.b 3, lars, the loss of the productive labor of two millions and a b alf of men for 1843. (See United States Revised Statntes. § 891.) Nothing, nowever, bas been four years, 213,000 pensioners, with woes unnumbered, and that these done to cure the omissions, &c., in the case of the defective records of patents for calamities are all due to rebellion and our civil war, and that the war lands in the said Virginia military district. The letter of Mr. Kowenstine is herewith returned. The fees, $2, were received. was precipitated upon _us by the democratic party, of which the dis I am, very respectfully, your obedient ~ervant, tinguished member from New York is now a bright and shining light. L. K. LIPPINCOTT, Seemingly filled with malignant hate toward the party he has left, Acting Oo1nmisBioner. ashamed no doubt of his new allies, knowing that the people see ant.! Hon. WILLIAM LAWRENCE, House of Representatives. understand their factious schemes and hollow-hearted hypocrisy, aml goaded to madness by their signal defeats and blunders during the Mr. Speaker, I submit these remarks now in order to save the time present session,· the gentleman pours out his denunciations forgetful of the House when the bill is finally reported from the Committee on of the truth of history or the honor of his country, and, like Samson the Judiciary, which it will be when the_committee is again called. of old, attempts in his desperate struggles to pull down the ma,jestic SPECIE PAYME~TS 1 REPUBLICAN POLICY, ETC. temple of liberty in order that he may be buried in its ruins. In his Mr. JOYCE. Mr. Speaker, ou the 29th of last month the republicans ·wild frenzy and audacious impudence, he declares that the republican of Vermont met in State convention at Burlington and, true to their party in this Honse ''have opposed_retrenchment at every step " and history and principles, unanimously resolved- that "they have attempted to defeat every economic endeavor." That the best interests of all citizens, of every condition ancl pursuit, impera Now, sir, what are the facts f I undertake to say directly there tively demand the speediest return t.o a specie basis of -values and currency, and verse of what the gentleman has stated, and the records and journals we bail with gratifkation the act of a republican Congress definitely providing of the House will show it. \Vhy, sir, how ~oes such language as this for that enu, aml we are Urmly opposed to the repeal thereof or to any step back sound coming from the lips of a man whose days have been spent and ward in the matter. whose political education ha-s been acquired in a city which can boa-at This clear, bold, and manly declaration by the republicans of that of such men as M:cCunn and· Barnard and William l\I. Tweed f noble State I proudly adopt as the key-note to my remarks to-day. ·while the republicans in this House are fully aware, as the coun The present depressed and languishing conditian of business in try is, that there is no honest purpose on the part of the democratic ~ every department, the utter stagnation of trade in all its different party in making these reductions and pretended reforms, but that I I branches throughout the entire country, and our waning commerce this "economical spasm," contrary to every other act of their whole I with foreign nations, reaching back nearly three years and continu lives, is all for political effect and to create capital for' the coming I ing without abatement to the present time, have given distinguished presidential campaign, yet in all cases where it baa appeared that prominence to the snbject of tbe national currency, and the import reductiOI,lscould be fairly made without rob bing honest labor of its hard ance now a signed to it in the popular mind is well measured and earned wages, as in the case of many of the clerks and employes in the attested by the fact that it i& the o';llY real question now occupying different Departments of the Government, impairing the efficiency and any considerable sha~·e of the attention of the people and can hardly working power of its different branches, or tending to the manifest fail to be the one on which the next presidential contest must be injury of the people; these bogus reformers and retrenchers have re fou,..,.ht out. . ceived the hearty co-operation of every man on this side of the House The sul>ject of t.bo national finances, as p·resented to us to-day, is through his voice and vote, and no man has more perfect knowledge in no sense a party question, and no true patriot and statel:lmau would of that fact than t.be honorable gentleman from New York. for a moment seek to drag it down in discussion from its conceded Mr. AINSWORTH. If the gentleman will permit me, I desire to lofty plane to the degrading level of partisan politics. inquire of him what reduction the republicans have favored f The great problem now submitted to us for solution is not, what l\lr. JOYCE. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman pays strict attention man or what party is most to blame or is to be held responsible for be will find out before I get through. the condition of the country and the crushing evils under which we 1\fr. AINSWORTH. I understood him to say that every reduction - are now suffering f because the absolute demonstration of that isl:lue proposed here has been favored by the republicans. I deny it; and would not relieve the people or mitigate their calamities; but the I ask him what single reduction they have favored in any case f great work to which this Congress should apply itself is to inaugu :M~. JOYCE. I have only to repeat that if the gentleman will pay rate and adopt such measures as will lift the burdens from the people strict attention he will find it all out before I get through. and build up a highway of industrial enterprise upon which the 1\Ir. AINSWORTH. Can the gentleman give me any instance in people, redeemed from the curse and thraldom of a depreciated cur which the republicans have supported a reduction t rency and all its att.endant evils, may once more walk in peace and Mr. JOYCE. I do not desire to be inteiTupted any further. The security. gentleman can get all the information he desires if he will only wait It is to us the people are now looking for redemption, and we shall and keep as quiet as possible. criminally fail of our duty if we refuse or neglect at this session to 1\>Ir. AINSWORTH. Certainly; if the gentleman does not want to mature such legislation as will, in connection with the act of 1875, yield, that is all right. · appreciate our currency and enable us to redeem our pledges and re l\Ir. JOYCE. ~u·. Speaker, upon these questions of "retrenchment" sume the use of good money on the 1st of January, 1879. and "economical endeavor," as demonstrated by th~ democratic party Now, Mr. Speaker, I should not have referred in this discussion to upon this floor during the present session, the republicans are willing parties or politics, or said one word upon that subject, bad it not been to stand upon the record; and if the gentleman from New York and for the very remarkable speech made the other day by the honorable his party can satisfy the people of this country that they are honest gentleman from New York, [Mr. ·WILLIS,] in which the republican reformers, and that they have spent the four months of this session 1)arty il:l not only held responsible for the present financial condition already gone in making honest and successful "economic -endeavors" of the country, but is saddled with all the frauds and sins committed for" retrenchment" instead of in bitter wranglings among themselves against tho Government and the people by everybody for the last fif- over the spoils of office, demoustmting in the history of their caucus teen years. - bill their total inability to grapple with the question of the currency,· Sir, I have been a republican since 1854; I helped in my feeble way and deciding who should be honored by their brief smiles, then I shall to organize the party in my State in that year; and I have labored believe that their powers of persuasion and legerdemain are equal t.o for the welfare and prosperity of it from that time down to tile pres- their inconsiderate assertions and theil' brazen and insolent mendaci ~y. 2312 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8 ' Sir, I have not the time nor desire to follow the lE\arned gentleman The plain, unvarnished statement of the case is that we are attempt through all his devious wanderings or to answer all his reckless and ing to run this Government without any recognized standaru of val fallacious a-ssumptions regarding the policy of the republican party ues, with a vast volume of depreciated, fluctuating paper currencv upon the qqestion of the national finances, and shall therefore con much more tJ:an .is .required by the wants and de~ands of trade, every tent myself with the comforting a-ssurance that the temple which the dollar of whwh 1s IITedeemable; and the questwu now presented is gentleman labored so hard to destroy is yet standing firm and erect, ~het~er w~ shall lie still :;tnd float with the current,.plunge into unlim a.od that" the flag is still there;" while the honorable gentleman him Ited mflatwn, or by a. WlSe and gradual contraction appreciate our self and his democratic allies, "sickened with their defeats, mourn greenback currency, and thus in the only way possible brinrr it to ing" their "falsity to true democratic rcrinciples," having" belied the par with gold. _ b trust of the people" and blasphemed 'the memory of Jefferson and The conilition of the country which led to the legal-tender lerrisla Jackson and Wright/' now lie buried beyond the hopeof anypolitical ~ion of 1862 and 1863 and the overpowerl.ng necessi~y which justified resurrection beneath the righteous indignation ·of all honest and It are very folly and clearly set forth by Mr. Justice Stronrr in the candid men. opinion of the Supreme Court, delivered by him and reported in 12 Why, sir, if I had the time I would like to call the attention of Wallace, in which said legal-tender acts were declared by a. majority this House to some few of the multitude of good things that the re of the court to be constitutional. · publican party has done within the past ten years. I would like to After discussing at great length the constitutional question involved call its attention to the bet that within that time it has reduced the a.nd disposing of that, he then proceeds to speak of the circumstances public expenditures over one billion twenty-two millions; that it has in' which the Government was placed when Congress attempted to ]laid more than five hundred and forty millions of the public debt; make Treasury notes a legal tender in the following terse and em that it ha-s reduced the interest on that debt nearly forty-one millions; phatic language: that it has saved to the Government annually five millions in inter Suffice it to say that a civil war was then raging which seriously threatened the est by funding a portion of the debt ; that it has reduced the in overthrow of the Government and the destruction of the Constitution itself. It ternal-revenue taxes nearly two hundred millions, the customs taxes demanded the equipment and support of large armies and navies and the employ sixty millions, and other taxes, by special a.cts of Congress, three ment of ~oney to an .extent beyond the cap!l{Jity of all ordinary sources of supply._ hundred and four millions. .Meanwhile the public Treasury was nearly empty and the credit of the Govern ment~ if not stret-ched to Us utmost tension, had become nearly exhausted. Mon Now, sir, above and beyond all this, the republican party has always eyed institutions bad advanced largely of their means, and more could not be ex· shown, and shows to-day, an honest zeal in exposing and bringing to pooted of them. They had been compelled to suspend specie payments. trial and punishment every man within the pale of the party who bas Taxation was inadequate to pay even the interest on the debt already incurred and it was impossible to await the income of additional taxes. ' in any manner betrayed its confidence or violated the laws of the Re The necessity was immediate and pressing. The Army was unpaid. There was public. I challenge comparison of its course during its whole his then due to soldiers in the field nearly a score of millions of dollar11. The requisi tory with the conduct of the democratic party down to the present tions from the War and Navy Departments for supplies exceeded fifty millions moment, and then let the people say into which scale they will cast and the current expenditure was over one million per day. The entire amount of coin in the country, including that in private hands as well as that in banking in· their in1lnenae and their votes. stitutions, was insufficient to supplv the need of the Government three months Sir, I fumlybelievethattherepublicanparty, with its brilliantrecord bad it all been poured intothe'l'reasnryatonce. Offorei~ credit we had none. W~ of grand achievements, marred, as I am compelled to confess it is, here say nothing of the overhanging parafysis of trade and of bUBiness generally, which and there with blunders and errors, stands refined and purified before th.reatenecfloss of co~dence in the ability of the Government to maintain its con tinued existence, and therewith the complete destruction of all rcmaininrrnational the country to-day stronger than ever before in its great and noble credit. It wa~ at such a time and in such circumstances that Congress ~as called principles and as the only party in whom the people have confidence upon to devise means for maintaining the Army and Navy, for securing the lat·ge or in whose hands they dare to trust the control of this Government, supplies of money needed, and, indeed, for the preservation of the Go''ernment and to which they confidently and proudly look as the hope and sal created by the Constitution. It waa at such a time_arulin.such..au.._emergency that vation of the ri
four hundred millions in all, and provide in said act that the right to limits of four hundred millions and saving us from the shame and fuml all of the outstanding legal-tenders which had been issued under disgrace of national repudiation. and by virtue of the acts aforesaid should expire on the 1st of July In view of the situation, can there be a reasonable doubt or a seri following. The re11eal of the provisions of the statute giving the ous question as to what is now our high and imperative duty as wise holder of the f>reenl>acks the right to ftmd them at pleaaure resulted, legislators and patriotic citizens J . as has been sa1d, in making ''financial orphans" of them. It at once Mr. Speaker, I believe it is the duty of the General Government to severed their connection with and isolated them from all other Gov furnish to the country a uniform currency,'' one that is based upon the ernment currency and obligations, and their rapid depreciation be world's great standard of values, and which shall at all times be equal came at once as sure and certain as their existence. in value to that used by other na,tions; a currency which has a value The abandonment of· the funding policy at a time when, aa I be abroad as well as at home, and by which foreign as well aa domestic lieve, it ought to have been tenaciously adhered to, led the people in debts and obligations can be paid and satisfied." The failure of the time to look upon the greenbacks as money, and to forget that they Government to perform this duty to its citizens, or the slightest de • were the mere evidence of a debt which the Government had sol parture from this fundamental and vita,l rule, will always be attended emnly pledged itself to pay in coin. with the most serious and da,ma,ging results. In order to check the increasing depreciation of the currency and History, tne teachings of wise men, and our own experience for the stay np the credit of the Government Con~ress, on the 30th of J nne, past fifteen years, furnish undoubted authority in support of this 1864, pa.ssed an act providing that the total amount of United States wholesome and universal maxim. The great Massachusetts Senator notes issued or to be issued should not exceed four hundred millions, and statesman once said when discussing this important subject in con which gave the people to understand that the Government was not nection with the removal of the Government deposits, that "a sound / committed to unlimited inflation, and that the greenbacks would in currency is an essential and indispensable security for the fruits of time be redeemed with gold or its equivalent. industry and honest enterprise. Every man of property or industry, Mr. Speaker, the distinguished gentleman from Maine [Mr.BLA.Di'E] every man who desires to preserve what he honestly possesses, or to said the other day : obtain what he can honestly earn, has a direct interest iu maintain When the war was over and the Union saved, on!\ of the first duties of the Gi>v ing a safe circulating medium-such a medium as shall be a real and ernment was to improve its credit and restore a. sound currency to the people. substantial representative of property, not liable to vibrate with The administration was deeply impressed with this policy, and the opinions, not subject to be blown up or down by the breath of spec Secretary of the Treasury, in his report for December, 11:365, expressed ulation, but made stable and secure by its immediate relation to that the opinion that the legal-tender acts were war measures, and ought which the whole world regards as of a permanent va,lne. not to remain in force one da,y longer than should be necessary to ''A disordered currency is one of the grea,test political evils. It un enable the people to prepare for a return to the gold standard. And dermines the virtues necessary for the support of the social system the House of Representatives during the same month passed a reso and encourages propensities destructive of its happiness. It wars lution, by a vote of 144 yeas to 6 nays, "cordially concurring in the against industry, frugality, and economy, and it fosters the evil spirit views of the Secretary of the Treaaury in relation to the necessity of of extravagance and speculation. Of all the contrivances for cheat the contraction of the currency, with a view to as early a resumption ing the laboring classes of mankind, none bas been more effectual of specie payments as the business interests of the country will per than that which deludes them with paper money. This is the most mit." . And in order to carry into effect this resolution, Congress, by effectual of inventions to fertilize the rich man's field by the sweat of an act approved March 12, 1866, again authorized the funding of the the poor man's brow. Ordinary tyranny and oppression, excessive legal-tender notes, and under the operation of that act more than taxation, these bear lightly on the happiness of the mass of the com $7~,000,000 were retired. But in January, 1868, for some reason un munity compared with a fraudulent currency and the robberies com known to me, tho tide turned, and any further reduction of the vol mitted by a depreciated pa,per. Our own history has recorded for our ume of legal-tender notes was prohibited, the amount then remaining instruction enough, and more than enough, of the demoralizing tend outstanding being $356,000~000. ency, the injustice, and the intolerable oppression on the virtuous and On the H:!th of .Mat·ch, 1869, an act was passed in which the United well-disposed of a degraded paper currency authorized by law or in States Government "solemnly pledged its faith to make provision, at any way countenanced by Government." the earliest pra~ticable period, for the redemption of United States Had Mr. Webster been inspired 'vith the spirit of prophecy he could notes in coin," and the act of June 20, 1874, limit-ed their amount to not have more fully or truthfully foretold tho monetary history of $382,000,000. our country during the past twelve years than he did in the great · The act of January 14, 1875, provided for free banking, the redemp speech to which I have referred. tion of legal tenders to the amount of 80 per cent. of t.he amount While capitalists a,nd speculators have often escaped, the storm has of notes issued to the nationa,l banks, and for a full and complete re spent its whole force and violence upon the unprotected heads of the sumption of specie payments on the 1st of January, 1879. laboring-men. The man who buys and sells under a depreciated cur Thus it is conclusively shown by the decision of the Supreme rency can by due care and shrewd calculations so manage his busi Court, the opinion of the Secretary of the Treasury, and the declara ness as to make his profits baJance his losses, to save as much when tions of its a,uthors, that this legal-tender policy was born of an abso he sells as he loses when he buys; but the poor man cannot do this ; lute necessity; that it was understood by all, when ac(}opted, as a war he buys to consume, and not to sell, and, therefore, has no way iu measure, demanded by the pressure and exigencies of the times to which to balance the ends and make up his losses. While the mer save the life of the Republic, and with the solemn promise of the chant and trader can daily regulate the price of their goods by the Government that, at the earliest practicable moment, thenotesshould quotations from the stock exchange and the g:old board, the laborer be redeemed in coin. cannot adapt the price of his labor to the da1ly, ho.urly, and weekly When Congress passed the first a~t authorizing their issue, it was rise in gold. To be sure he receives for his labor the premium on gold, done by what t.hen seemed to be absolut-e compulsion, although wise which may be 10, 12, or 15 per cent., but for every article he buy& he men now think some other course.would have been better, and no is compelled to pay 40, 50, and even 70 per cent. more than be would one then was so insane as to suppose they would become the perma with such a currency as I am now contending for. The palace and nent currency of the country, or be kept in circulation seventeen or the royal exchange may escape, the gamblers of Wa,ll street, the mer eighteen years before they were redeemed. chant princes of Beacon, and the nabobs of Chestnut street may be But} Mr. Speaker, notwithstanding all these hopes and expectations saved and go unscathed, but the workshop and the poor man's cot and p edges, we find ourselves to-day with three hundred and eighty tage are crushed and swept away, and their inmates exposed to all two millions of irredeemable legal tenders in circulation, each one the fury of the storm. bearing upon its face the evidence of the nation's broken promise, During the war high prices and cheap money filled every man's business prostrate, values unsettled, labor unemployed, the arm of in pocket with currency, the res~lt . of which was extravagance, dissipa dustry paralyzed, corruption and crime increasing, and commercial tion, wild and reckless speculation, contraction of debts, and a total faith and confidence well-nigh destroyed among the people. disregard of every rule and principle of prudence and economy. Large Now, sir, it is charged that for aU these evils the republican party manufacturing establishments, the fungus growth of inflation, sprung is responsible and should be held to a strict account. While I would up allover the North and West, built and carried on with borrowed cap not seek to shield that party from the force of a single obligation ital; men rushed into extensive business operations without thought which rests upon it·, yet I cannot forget that at every step toward or reflection, and bought whatever they could get trusted for, regard rcsnmption republicans have been met by the obstinate and deter less of the price or the day of payment. Apparently men were pros mined opposition uf the democratic party, and that to-day it is :Baunt pering, but business was not healthy; everything was vadllating, un !ng i~ the face of a. di~tressecl. an.d suffering peo~le the black :Bag_ of settled, and blown up like a balloon. But as long as the country wa.a mtlahon and repndtat:wn, whlle 1tsleaders on thl8 :Boor are plottmg :flooded with deprecia,ted paper and all had a supply, they rushed on the repeal of the act of January, 1875, because it contains the solemn regardless of the end or the consequences. In the mad excitement of r1romise of the Government to redeem these notes, instead of aiding by the hour men lost their reason ancl their judgment; gold had become auxiliary legislation the patriotic purpose contemplated in t.hat law. their object, and natm·e had quickly fallen into revolt. They did not In traveling this unbeaten path without the lights of history and heed the voice of history and the experience of other nations aud peo experience the republican party ha-s made mistakes, but it has ever ples, that they were deluded, that the business of the country was un shown an honest desire to du right; and although it has not yet quite sound and morbid, and necessarily must be with a circulating medium accomplished the full measure of its ambition in the restoration of which coulcl only be usecl at home, and there even at a discount. national credit and sound money, yet it has done much in staying the Their seeming prosperity was a cheat and a sham, and, when the lmb mad waves of intlation, confiuing the greenback currency within the ble finally burst, all the u~ly deformities of this disastrous infbtion 2314 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8,
system of finance were exposed to the disgust and indignation of the The money of the count.ry now lies in the vaults of the bankr~, be people. cause there are no borrowers to call it out; there are no borrowers, The evil effects of this depreciated paper currency early became because it is not safe to engage in any kind of business; and it is not manifest in the hatching out of a swarm of greedy speculators and safe, because we are affiicted with a curre-ncy "unstable as water," swindlers, at all our business and money centers, who were always going up to-day and down to-morrow, and can never "excel." watching and ready to seize upon every opportunity to embarrass the . Money alone cannot bring ns business, but the revival of business Government and increase their own profligate and ill-gotten gains. will bring us money. If the forge or them ill stops and men are thrown They made corners in gold hy which they reaped rich harvests to out of employment, of what avail is a bank full of money to their themselves, while the Government was hindered and impeded in its dependent and starving families f It is not a greater volume of cur operations, the business interests of the country prostrated, credit rency they want then, but the fire rekindled in the forge and the gate inflated, ''a false value fixed upon every man's property, a spirit of hoisted again at the mill. That will bring them labor, and the labor lawless and reckless speculation and gambling engendered, the rnles will bring them money and all the necessaries and comfort.<:J of life. of honesty and integrity entirely ignored or dangerously relaxed," This result can only be brought about, in my opinion, by a gradual and the people in the end driven to the very verge of bankruptcy. redemption of the greenbacks until they are at par with gold; this These speculations and gambling transactions at one time embraced would place the business of the country upon a firm and stable foun a large share of the money capital of the country, completely crazed dation, and restore trust and confidence among the people. ancl bewitched the men engaged in them, diverted the money from the This, it seems to me, is the only royal road to success, and is what legitimate avenues and channels of trade, and threatened to make our the people now demand of us; and, depend upon it, the people will name a by-word anrl reproach among the nations. see to it ~hat no party advocating or even suspected of entertaining ·wit.h a depreciated medium of exchange, in all commercial trans the humiliating and abominable doctrines of a .depreciated currency actions wi t.h foreign nations the losses are all on our side and the mar and unlimited inflation shall ever have the control of this Govern gins and premiums are all charged in our account, because, no mat ment; and ere the ides of November, 1876, shall have passed, the ter what may be the value of our currency at home, all our products great public voice of the freemen of this country will have settled it aud manufactures are there measured by the gold standard. forever, and vindicated before the world the honor of the Republic. If we purchase of them in the payment our currency is reduced to When that voice, the first note of which has been beard from the gold, and the balance is made up with money from our pockets. If Granite State, shall have been uttered at the polls, it will, in my hum we exchange with them the same results follow, and we are the losers ble judgment, be no uncertain sound, but will dispel every doubt; by the bargain. Not only this, but the country is at the same time it will sweep as with a political cholera every inflationist and rag drainecl of gold, which increases the premium, depreciates our paper, money repudiator from the national deck, tear down the base paper and opens the way for corners, gambling, and every species of vice ·banner of repuiliation, and throw to the freshening breeze the Amer and corruption which the cupidity aud avarice of mankind can con ican patriot's ensign, brilliant with the great record of past achieve ceive of or invent. We are also the losers if we invest our money in ments and sparkling in the blazing light of this new victory. the building of railroads or in any other great public enterprise in The panic of 1873, which shut up the mills and the factories, threw our own country where bonds and mortgages may become necessary thousands out of employment and brought all business to a sta.nd to complete the work and put it in operation. The bonds must be still, was the legitimate but bitter fruit of our existing financial sys made payable on time, put into the market, and sold at a discount or tem. Inflation had unsettled all values, put an embargo on all legiti below par for currency ; but when pay-day comes we shall be com mat-e trade, and paralyzed all our industries. Self-protection led con pelled to count out the gold at a loss of from 20 to 40 per cent. to the sumers everywhere to stop buying on credit; the currency remained i dubtor. A depreciated currency is a double loss to the honest laborer undiminished, but capital subject to loan waa entirely exhausted. who earns his brea{l by the sweat of his brow; be very often loses The people-had livecl beyond-theirme.ans; their fancied riches van t.he margin or difference between gold and currency when he receives ished like a shadow; the debtor and creditor were both alike bank pay for his labor, and loses it aga.in when he purchases with it the rupt, and the poor laborer was turned homeless and penniless upon comforts and necessaries of life. It is one of the most skillfully the world. wrought contrivances to cheat the laboring classes; it is the most The effect of the panic upon the business of this country was over effectual of all inventions which tyrannizing capital and avaricious whelming and terrific. We have not recovered from it yet, and in greed have ever invented "to fert.ilize the rich man's field by the my opinion we never shall, until the financial policy of the hard sweat of the poor man's brow." To the man who is doing business money party is adopted and carried out, and gold beco111es the stand on borrowed capital the burden is oppressive and crushing, because ard of values in this Government. While it spread desolation and the interest on his loans is reckoned on a gold basis, when the money ruin through every branch of trade and commerce and shut up a large he borrows is worth perhaps only two-thirds as much. share of the manufacturing establishments in the country, throwing If we attempt to compete with foreign nations in the world's great out of employment thousands of men and exposing to suffering and markets in articles of our own manufacture, we fincl ourselves at starvation the families depenclent upon them for support, yet I be once shut out, because our labor costs so much more than theirs, in lieve it will in the end, in one aspect at least, be seen to hav& been a consequence of the depreciated condition of our currency, that they blessing in disguise; for nothing short of just such a financial convul can aftord to unclersell us and yet reserve a fair margin for profits to sion woulcl ever have stopped the people in their mad career1 driven themselves. . them to repentance, and pointed out to them the way of salvation; In addition to all the burdens and woes I have enumerated which and it is one of the encouraging signs of the timeijt that may serve it brings upon the country, it keeps business of all kinds in an unset to cheer and support us while we are suffering the woes of this terri tled aml vascillating condition, destroys all confidence in the Govern ble calamity, that it has indeed had the warning and awakening ment, breeds crime and immorality, and neutralizes nearly one-half effect upon the people that I have described. The moment they of the productive power and capacity of the country. Thus in every recovered from the stunning effects of the overwhelming concussion form and direction in which this subject can be approached or inves and got upon their feet, they commenced the work of reform and tigated, we find that loss and financial ruin are the inevitable results preparation for their final deliverance, which they have pursued evor · of a base standard of values and a depreciated currency. The history since with an earnestness and constancy which is comforting and of European nations that have attempted it, and the sad experience commendable. of our own country for the past few years, abundantly authorize the Driven by necessity to an overhanling and iMpection of their finan statements I have made and confirm their truthfuluess. cial affairs, men soon discovered that they bad covered too much Never returning to specie payments and bringing our paper money to a. par with ground ; that their business, like their currency, was dangerously gold woulcl be the perpetual robbery" of honest labor, the demoralization of busi. inflated; and that in order to avoid bankruptcy and utter ruin, they ness, the debauchment of the pnblic conscience, national bankruptcy, repudiation, must curtail their business, circumscribe their operations, and call in and disgrace. · _ their scattered and weakened resources. They found that they had One of the most demoralizing and worst features of this system of been living too fast, andfarin advance of their salaries and incomes; depreciated paper money js that it destroys all confidence among that a spirit of wild and reckless speculation, engendered by the va-st business men, and they shrink from making an investment or going quantity of depreciated currency with which the country had been into business of any kind. The merchant and manufacturer do not flooded, had led them into all manner of extravagance and dissipa know whether to buy light or heavy, or not at aU, because they are tion, had buried them in debt, and driven them unconscious to the at t he mercy of the speculator ~nd gambler. If gold should chance brink of financial ruin; and that the only way out was to diminish to go up, they may be all right; but if the :r:everse, they lose their expenses, adopt a system of rigid economy, pay up old debts and con profits and perhaps in the end their capital. Says a wise man: tra~t no new ones, purchase nothing except what was absolutely re With what safety can men embark in enterprises tbat look to the future for r~ quired, abandon all wild-cat schemes and foolish speculations, make sults when they cannot predict with any degree of certainty what wi1l be the value no investments unless known to be safe, discard all unnecessary and of legal-tender notes one year or two years bence ~ How can any man venture to costly luxuries, stay at home and patronize our own institutions and engage in any far-reaching business while the currency upon which his transac tions are based is constantly changing in value 1 Especially bow can he risk the domestic manufactures, and strain every branch of productive indus future when the currency, now greatl.v depreciated, may be still more depreciated try to its utmost capacity. by further issues' It is uncertainty in regard-to the future of the currency: that In 1874 the people, who attributed their distresses to a lack of cur is de troying confidence, and without a restoration of confidence there will be no rency,and who therefore favored inflation, complained that they bad improvement in our fin ancial and industrial condition. What healthy business requires is a stable basiR. Let men of capital and enterprise feel that there is been unfairly dealt with in the distribution of bank tapital, andre to be RtabilHy in tho legal measm-e of value; let it be understood that tho hlgber ferred their miseries and afflictions largely. to this cause, and asked bw whieh ma kes gold and silver the only trne measure is hereafter to be recognized for more. Congress very readily complied with their request, antl and oocycd, and the existing lethargy will disappear and the country will rapidly recover from its prostration. The reme(ly is not in the maintenauce of the present increasecl the banking capital of thecountrysomemillionR, and placed volume of irretleerua.ble paper, and oortaillly not in an increase of it. it at the disposal of those who claimed they most needed it. If the .....
1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. ·2315
theory of inflation and more money had been sound, every dollar of once, withdraw all their circulation, and collect the $1,000,000,000 due this new issue of banking capital would have been anxiously sought to them, no human power could predict and no patriot would care to for and eagerly taken by those for whom it was in fact issued. But, contemplate. instead of this, nearly e\Tery share was taken in the Eastern and Mid Wbep the ci vii war came on, business very soon began to be de dle States, at the great business centers, where most of the previous pressed, credit was impaired because the Government was not respou l;l i stock had found a market, and but the smallest possible amount called ble for the redemption of any of our money, and it was not until Con for or taken in those sections of the country from which these com gress, in 1864, passed the present banking act that our credit revived plaints bad emanated. and that our paper stood at par in the commercial and money mar .Mr. Speaker, it is a commercial and :financial fact that the city of kets of the world. The widows, orphans, and pensioners in this New York is the great t.rading and money center of this country. country have, in pensions and deposits in savings-banks, a capitalized I From thence the money is called out to move the crops in the autumn investment of $1,700,000,000, and the repeal of the national-banking I and for all other business purposes, and to that point it returns when Jaw or the further inflation of the currency would work "instant and it has accomplished its mission. .Money can no more be confined lasting injury" to them, by reducing the value and impairing the pur j within city limits or State lines than the sun's great light or the air chasing power of every dollar of their little store, which has come to we breathe. Wherever business demands or securities and rewards them through pinching economy or valiant service in the field. { invite money flows, regardless of location, distance, or color of bor Mr. Speaker, no proposition in geometry was ever more clearly ) rower. If the people of the West and South have the securities for demonstrated than the fact that instead of a deficiency of currency f loans, they can obtain them as well with the bankin~ .capital in Bos we have too much: "too much machinery for the amount of work ton and New York as they could if it waa all iiJ. Cnicago and New we have to do with it;" $200,000,000 hoarded or lying idle in the Orleans. If there are no buyers to pay money for what they have to banks and no chance or opportunity to use it, is an argument which sell, and they have no securities with which to entice investers, they no sophistry can refute. It has been truly said upon this floor that would have no bank-notes though bank stock was unlimited and the markets of the world are filled with good money, and if our cur banks were locat-ed in every village in the land. Bank-notes are not rency was really deficient it would be made goQd out of those stores given away i. they are obtained by loans or by exchanging for them as soon as the cable could flash the news. something e se of equivalent value; and the man who has neither of If we are to have resumption, how can it be brought about except these very handy and convenient facilities, whether he lives in the by a contraction of our greenbacks until our currency shall come up North or the South, the East or the West, will not be likely to be top~' . weighed down with money or be troubled with bank bills. Legislat.ion gave u.s too much paper au~ legislation mnst retire it. Thi8 illustration demonstrates most forcibly and clearly the utter fallacy of inflated currency and this cry about an increase of banking The cause of its depreciation is its redundancy, and this can be ' capital. . overcome only by its reduction. Instead of there being a lack of currency, there has never been a Sir, I verily believe that it is as impossible to ever arrive at a sound time when there has been so much money lying in the vaults of the standard of values and honest money without a limited contraction banks waiting for borrowers at a low rate. of interest as now. of the currency aa it would be for the surgeon to remove the cancer These practical lessons drawn from experience and the every-day without using the knife. For this reason it was a vital mistake, in life of our people ought to convince any candid, unbiased man that my opinion, when Secretary McCulloch's scheme of gradual contrac it is not an increase or inflation of the volume of depreciated paper tion was abandoned; for if it had then been persevered ·in the green that is required to relieve us at the present time, but we want legis backs would have been appreciated and we should have resumed lation in aid of the act of 1875, together with prudence, industry, and specie payments long ere this without shock or derangement of the economy on the part of the people ; then business will revive, hard industrial interests of the oountry. times will vanish, confidence be restored, and prosperity follow. But that, sir, is no argument in favor of unlimited inflation, or But, sir, I have already said enough upon this question, and I shall against a re-adoption of the same policy without delay, as don bt and therefore proceed with my argument upon the assumption that the uncertainty will do more damage than some settled policy looking in evils under which we are now suffering and their cause stand fully that direction, even if it does not fully meet all the requirements of proved, and that the only duty which remains to us is to discover and the situation; because during every month's delay millions of gold are apply the remedy. exported, w bich the Government ought to retain by exchanging bonds The lion which to-day stands in the path to resumption is the spe for it at a rate of interest which will command the market. cious and artful policy of the opposition, who, while they claim, many Having now said all I desj.re to upon the evils of our pre..~ent system of them, to be in favor of a return to sound money, yet bend every of currency, and the solemn obligations we are under to return, at effort and exert every power to prevent it and force a further inflation the earliest practicable moment, to specie payments and a sound of the currency. measure of values, I shall now for a few moments examine the differ To prove this beyond the power of contradiction, it is only neces ent remedies suggested, and indicate what seems to me as the most sary to examine the propositions they submit and the measures they feasible of all the plans proposed for appreciating our currency, re advocate. storing confidence, and reviving the languishing industries and pros Those who are most shrewd and cautious propose the drifting proc trate business of the country. And, sir, allow me to say that while ess, or the policy of masterly inactivity. This has been tried ten years I have my own opinions in reference to this question, I have no pet and has utterly failed. They demand the repeal of the resumption sch~me, but ~ill heartily join hands _:with any man in any measure - act of 1875, because it was passed by a republican Congress. That whwh shall g1ve reasonable assurance of success. means inflation, because while that law remains upon the statute-book The policy of hoarding gold with which to purchase two or three there can be no further expansion of the currency. · hundred millions of greenbacks is, to my mind, not only objection Those who are bold and reckless would compel the payment of im able, but absolutely absurd. Even if it was possible for the Govern port duties and the interest on the public debt in currency, thus on ment to accumulate such a quantity of gold, it would take years to the one hand violating the solemn obligations of the Government, accomplish it, and during all· this time the interest on the coin thus cheating it out of the difference between gold and currency, reducing hoarded would be lost, not only to the Government but to the world. the customs revenues to the same rank as our paper, compelling us to If it should ever be deemed expedient to redeem the greenbacks by bny gold to pay interest on the public debt and for the sinking fund, saving gold, the Government should do aa any wise and prudent and, on the other, degrading onr Government and debasing our people. business ma,n would do, as fast as it gets the gold, instead of hoard Some of them propose the wild scheme of having the Government ing it, use it to take up this unfunded greenback debt, thus saving issue all the bills and carry on all the banking operations of the coun the interest on the coin and appreciating the notes left outstanding. try, with a currency covered aU over with broken pledges and vio The theory of purchasing greenbacks with surplus revenue hardly lated promises; while others advocate the policy of repealing the na need be considered aa affording any hope, because, altbouO'b it is en tional-banking act and plunging us into the cess-pool of State banks tirely unobjectionable and perhaps worthy of consideratkm, yet we and wild-cat currency. . have no surplus at present, anfl in all human probability shall not Our present system of banking has been in operation thirteen have for long years to come. This seems to leave but two modes of years; it works admirably; the bills are well secured and pass current appreciating the greenback currency and resuming specie payments, in every State in the Union, and the only objection to them is that which seem t-o offer auy reasonable grounds of success: first, to au they are not redeemable in coin. During these thirteen years about thorize the Secretary of the Treasury to gradually fund it into long twenty-one hundred and fifty banks have been organized, and only bonds at a low rate of interest; and, second, to sell the bonds and with a bout thirty of them bave suspended, and these with no loss to the bill the gold purchase the legal-tender notes for cancellation. In addition holders. A comparison of this result with our experience under the to this, any surplus coin in excess of tb.e wants of the Government, State-bank system for the same length of time, during which nearly if any could be saved, might be used for the same purpose. one-third of them failed and the bill-holders lost $50,000,000, ought The President, whose loyalty to sound values and honest money to be a conclusive argument against the change they propose to has never been questioned, in his last annual m~ssage suggested- make. That the Secretary of the Treasury be authorized to redeem, say, not to exceed The national banks now organized and in operation have a paid . 2 , 0~,000 monthly of legal-tender notes, by issuing in their stead a"long bond, bear up capital of $493,751,679 and a circulation of $3207000,000. They pay mg mterest at the rate of 3.65 per cent. per annum, of denominations ran gina from the Government annually over $7,000,000 in taxes and the States in $50 to $1,000 each. This would in time reduce tbe legal-tender notes to a .;'oiome which they are located nearly $10,000,006. What the result would that could be kept afloat without demanding redemption in large sums suddenly be of forcing twent.y-_oue hundred banks to wind up their affairs at The Secretary of the Treasury, who has given much time and con~ 2316 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, sideration to this subject, and whose opinions have great weight with the country; _c~nfidence will be re-establisbed,-commerce I'evive, prices me, ·recommends in his last annual report that- find a healthy level, values become settled, manufactures will again Authority be given for funding legal-tender notes int(l bonds bearing a. low rate of spring into life, the sweet music of honest industry will again be heard, interest. * * * It seems probab1e that n. bond bearing interest at the rate of 4 and peace, plenty, and prosperity will once more smile upon our be per cent. would invite the funding of a sufficient amount of legal-tender notes to loved country. lessen materially the sum of gold which, in the absence of such provision, must be accumulated in the Treasury-by the 1st of January, 1879, to carry out the impera RESUMPTION OF SPECIE PAYl\:IENTS. tive requirements of the act of January 14, 1875. If it be apprehended that au thority ro the Secretary to fund an unlimited amount of notes might lead to too sud Mr. BUCKNER. Mr. Speaker, I indulge the hope that the act of den contraction of the cun-ency, Congress coulcl limit the amount to be fund eel in January 20, 1875, providing for the resumption of coin payments will any given period of time. The process being in no sense compulsory as to the.bolders be repealed by the majority of this House. If there were no other of United States notes, and the rate of interest on the bonds being made low, it is reason for its repeal than that it prescribes a time for resumption not probable that currency which could find profitable employment would be pre I sented for redemption in such bonds. Only the excess of notes above the needs of without. the slight-est evidence that permanent resumption can then l business would seek such conversion. Authority to t.he Secretary of the Treasury take place, it would suffice to justify our action. Legislation at any to redeem and cancel two millions of l~~al-tender notes per month by this process time, fixing a period for resumption so long in advance, is not only would greatly facil.itate redemption at me time now fixed by law, and besides would have the advantage of publicity as to the exact amount to be withdrawn in any given useless but positively mischievous. It is as idle for Congress to l month. Bonds issued for this pufllose should be of the denomination of fifty aml name a day for resumption as it would be by legislative enactment one hundred dollars, ancl any multiple thereof, in order to moot the convenience of to prescribe the number of bales of cotton that will be grown or the all classes of holders of United States notes. amount of grain that will be exported in 1878. The resumption of Now, Mr. Speaker, I would, in addition to the power of funding specie payments by the Government and the banks depends so much the greenbacks, authorize the Secretary of the Treasury to issue, sell, on the condition of t.he industries of this country, as well as the pros and dispose of, at not less than par in coin, bonds of the United States perity of other countries, between now and the 1st of January, 1879, redeemable after forty years, bearing interest at a rate of not exceed that auy attempt to unduly hasten it by such legislation cannot bnt ing 4 per cent. per annum, and use the proceeds in the purchase or re be productive of evil. Wben the country is ready for resumption no demption of legal-tenders; the redemption of said notes not to ex legislation will be needed prescribing a period for its inception, and, ceed a given amount per month, either fixed by law or left to the llll'til that period arrives, any legislation prescribing a time for re discretion of the Secretary, and said notes, when redeemed, to be sumption is not only vain and nugatory, but positively mischievous. canceled and withdrawn from circulation forever. This is a part of I can recall but one instance where legislative power has thus in the plan presented by Senator MORRILL, of my State, and supported by terfered, and the results of that interference were such as to warn ns a masterly speech by him in the Senate on the 6th of January la..st. In from imitating an example fraught with such dire calamities. I the mean time the national banks should be required to accumulate allude to the act of Parliament of April, 1820, compelling resumption and hold a portion of their reserve and of their coin interest in gold, in full by the Bank of England in 1823, to which I will horeafte; or coin certificates, in order to do their share and to be in readiness to refer. The 13ank of France has been in suspension since the hegin act in concert with the Government on the 1st of January, 1879, in I1ing o'f the Franco-German war, in 1870, and I have not beard that redeeming their own bills and any greenbacks then outstanding. the French Parliament has appointed a time when it shall redeem its The first of these plans, the one I would most urgently press upon notes in coin. In this country, when the banks have suspended cash the attention of t.he House, as it would enable us to keep these bonds payments, resumption, like suspension, has been their own voluntary at home, is recommended by the President and Secretary in their last act. No 8tate bas ever attempted to determine for the banks when annual communications to Congress, as I have shown, and both plans and bow they should resume. And if we are to judge of the next three are warmly commended by learling bankers and financiers through years by the past twelve m.onths, every considemtion of private inter out the country, among whom I am pleased to mention Hon. John A. est and of public policy demands the repeal of this mischievous act. Page, State treasurer of Vermont, and Sidney W. Rowell and Henry The country ba.d reason to complain of the depression of busine s, }.,, Field, bank-cashiers of long experience and high standing in that the stagnation of trade, the increa..se of bankruptcy, and of the uni State. versal shrinkage of values for some years before the passage of this The only serious objection which is made to the propositions I act; but bow vastly these grounds of complaint have been multiplied have stated is that it will contract the currency and thus still fur since is known and read of all men in all sections of the Union. ther depress and paralyze the l>usiness of the country and increase This act was passed not in the interest of resumption, but in the the burdens of tho people. - interest of party. It was the offspring of supposed party necessities, The history of this subject from January, 1875, down to the pres and it became the law of the land not to restore specie payments, ent time, refutes every argument of that kind and proves t.hat the but to advance partisa~ ends. It was devised to heal the divisions slight contraction I advocate would be so gentle and gradual that it in the republican party-concocted in secret conclave-and enacted would not even provoke a ripple upon the sea of business and that nnder the imposition of the gag, without discussion and without the people would not know that any contraction was going on only amendment. It has served the purpose of its enactment, and is from the published reports of the Secretary. therefore j1tnctus officio. Why should it be retainecl longer upon tho From January 14, 1875, the date of tho passage of the resumption statute-book f If it was designed to bring about resumption in 1879, act, down to March 20, 1876, the national-bank circulation increased what are the ways and means by which this result is to be reached f $13,989,340. . There are none provided adequate to tlris end. The whole scope and During the same time the legal-tenders retired llDder that act intent of the act is to substitute the obligations of the national banks amounted to 11,056,608, leaving a net inflation of the currency in for those of tho Government. Its chief a.nd paramount purpose is to that period of 2,932,732 by that method of figuring. faste~ upon the country and to perpetuate the national banks at the But,.to get at the fa.cts and the true state of the currency, we must expense and by the withdrawal of tbe cheap and inexpensive issue of remember that a large amonnt of national-bank circulation was sur the Government. If specie resumption was its real purpose, how does rendered and that during that time $36,202,864 in legal-tenders was it happen that no provision is made for the national banks redeem (leposited for the redemption of the national-bank notes so surren ing their proiJijses to pay in coin f The act gives the Secret:ny of dt\red. Says the New York Tribune in an able article upon this sub- the Treasury power to sell bonds wit.h which to accumulate gold to ject: · redeem the greenbacks and fractional currency, ancl for that purpose Thus it appears that while tbe free banking of 1875 has permitted an increase of be is also authorized to use auy surplus revenue not otherwise appro circulation amounting to $2,932,732, the "laws of trade" have caused a contraction priated. He has already sold bonds and purcba..sed and coined silver of the circulation amountin~ t.o $36,202,864. The net result is prac-tically a with exceeding $15,000,000, and which is locked up for the redemption of drawal of $33;270,132 from that circulation, which the inflationists insist is much tho fractional currency when he shall find it able to take care of itself too small for tho wants of trade. in the channels of circulation. The national-bank circula.tion now Now, sir, let Congress meet this question squarely and manfully, amounts to three hundrecl anu forty-eight millions, and is destined with an honest determination to surmonnt all obstacles and settle it to be increased to over four hundred millions under the operation of forever. this act. This circul:'l.tion is now redeemable in legal-tenders, but in I would not only invest the Secretary of the Treasury with the 1879 they will have been either funded in bonds, redeemed in gold, powers I have indicated, but I would by law prohibit him from call or will be made equal with gold. Are the national-bank notes not to ing in any more of the bonds already issued till such time as t:be Gov be redeemed in gold after January, 1879 f Or are we to havo resump ernment shall be prepared to pay all of its matured obligations in tion by the Government and not by the banks f If by the banks, how, goJu. and by what process f Sir, we must take no step backward. We must not suffer the act Where is their coin reserve to be kept-in the Treasury at Washing of January 14, 1875, to be repealed. · \Ve have already taken one step ton, in the vaults of each national bank, or at one of the redeeming in advance in the passage of the silver bill, and this must be followed agencies f 'Vbat percentage of its circulation is each bank 1·eqnired up by otl1ers, until tho e-nd is reached and the victory is achieved. to keep on hand to redeem its notes t There is no provjsion what If Congress will obey the voice of the people and mature the legis- ever made for the redemption of the notes of the national banks, in lation I have urged, it will not be long before the margin between coin or anything else. · As to everything tonching tJ1ese institutions, gold and greenbacks will begin to disappear, foreign exchange will except their absorption of the greenback, this act is as silent as tho turn in our favor, helping us to keep the products of our mines at home, grave. If it was intended that these bauks should pay their notes gold will flow in upon us from abroad, and in this way the Government, in specie after January, 1879, the act fails so to d.ecJare, aud we the banks, and the people will all be prepared for resumption at the thus have an act to resume that does not resume, and makes no pro same time, each bearing a share of the burden, which will come so vision t.o resume. Instead of an act for resumption of specie pay gradually and quietly as to provoke no di~turbance of the business of ments, it ~s au act to extenu and perpetuate the national bauks, and . '
1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2317
give them the monopoly of issuing an irredeemable currency, and were not satisfied with the theory of Ricardo, one of the most influ filling the channels of circulation with "rag money." And what is ential of the economists, that specie resumption would not affect the still more worthy of remark is that neither the President in his late value of all commodities over 3 per cent., but their resistance was message, the Secretary of the Treasury in his annual report, nor the to no purpose. And -if the directors and officers of the national banks Comptroller of the Currency in his elaborate defense of the national believed that these institutions would be compelled to redeem their bank.e, offers a suggestion or makes a recommendation which looks circulation within three years from this day, the corridors and lobbies to compelling the national banks to rede~m their notes in anything of the Capitol would have swarmed with these gentlemen when but lawful money of the United States, that is, greenbacks, of which this act was under consideration in caucus, and they would be here there will be none in circulation in 1879, or, if in circulation, will be now hnploring this Congress to erase it from the statute-book. They at par with gold coin. But to show conclusively that the object of made no opposition to its passage and make no appeals for its repeal this legislation is not resumption but rag money, in the shape of na because they understand that, so far as it may appear to require spe tional-bank notes, both the President and Secretary Bristow recom cie redemption of their circulating notes, it is a fraud and a sham. mend the funding of the legal-tenders, one in a. long 3.65 gold bond They appreciate at its proper value the franchise of a too liberal Gov and the other in a 4 per cent. bond, which shall be a basis for the is ernment, by which they are paid by the people as well as the Govern sue of national banks. This would at once convert 90 per cent. of the ment to furnish circulating notes for the vast and increasing popu i outstanding legal-tender circulation into national-bank notes, and lation of America; but until the field of circulation is cleared of all / thus increase the. capital invested in these banks by at least thre~ competition, until the greenba{}k is forced out of existence and they hundred millions. It is, therefore, a mere pretext that this act of become sole monarchs of all they survey, they willingly join in the / January 20, 1875, means resumption of coin payments. It means no game of deception and fraud by which the people are to be hood such thing. It means the wiping out of the greenback currency, the winked and cheated into the belief that specie resumption and coin increase of the interest-bearing debt of the Government by the sum payments by the Government and the banks will be inaugurated in v of 413,000,000, and the increase of its anhual interest by the sum of 1879. at least seventeen and a half millions, and last, but not least, the sur Mr. Speaker, I denounce this hard-money clamor as a bold, bare render of the entire paper circulation· for 40,000,000 of people to a faced, and wicked deception, and instead of desiring resumption of comparatively few capitalists, with no obligation on their part to specie payments, the chief end and purpose of the eastern moneyed redeem their promises to pay in gold coin, or a.ny provision of law power is to enlarge and perpetuate the national banks, and to secure compelling them to do so. the uninterrupted reign of "rag money" and the "rag baby." Nor is this the result of. oversight, but of deliberate, well-consid Beyond question there are many and grave, if not insurmountable, ered purpose! All the wild, unreasoning clamor for hard-money spe difficulties in th~ way of resumption by the Government or the banks. cie resumption, honest money and against "inflation," rag money, The unprosperous condition of the industrial classes; the immense bur and "repudiation," which, emanating from that large colony of east den of debt, individual, city, county, corporate, and State; the largo ern agents domiciled on Manhattan Island, is echoed and re-echoed amount of capital sunk in unprofitable works of improvement; the by the subsidized press of the country, east and west, never was in heavy drain entailed upon the resources of the country by its contribu tended to apply to the rag money of the banks. Under the guise and tions to the payment of the public debt and interest since the war, mask of specie payments and hard money the sole object has been exceeding in amount the total value of all the taxable wealth of the and is now to extinguish the legal-tender currency and to fill its Union in 1820; the decline in the productive wealth of the late slave place with the irredeemable notes of national banks, while the power States; the inefficiency and thriftlessness of their laboring popula and number of these institutions will be so augmented, enlarged, and tion; and the maladministration, profliga.cy, and offieial corruption ramified as to make them omnipotent in the legislation of Congress which have characterized the governments of many of these States for and in the control of the press and politics of the country. It is most years past, all combine to present a most formidable barrier to a suc obvious to the slightest reflection that the owners and stockholders cessful and permanent resumption. It may be doubted whether n.ll of the national banks would not have been indifferent to the passage these ca'!lses aggregated offer such serious obstacles to maintaining per of the act of Jannary 20, 1875, if they had believed that they were manent specie payments as the national debt, amounting on 1st of requh·ed to ~egin coin payments within the next three years. It July last to twenty-one hundred and twenty-eight millions and the would be a refleetion upon their financial sagacity to suppose that interest-bearing debt being the sum of seventeen hundred millions. they consider it possible that these two thousand banks, scattered What proportion of this debt is held abroad cannot be ascertained all over the Union, could redeem their promises to pay in gold in 1879, with any ~xactness. It is esthnated by good authorities that the an either at their own counter or at the Treasury in Washington or else nual gold mterest due by the Government and payable abroad, to where. While it must be admitted that the security of these banks gether with interest due by States and corporations, and which is a for the ultimate payment of their circulation is undoubted and be yearly drain upon the refrources of this country, does not fall short yond question, it is equally clear, as well from reason as experience, of two hundred millions. If we have no exportable productions with that they ha.ve less capacity than almost any other kind of banks to whichtopaythisinterestitmustbepaidingold,andinadditiontowhat 1·edeem their circulation in coin. 'l'he bonds which a most generous ever balance of trade that may be against us must be taken into the Government pays these banks to take and deposit for the security of ·account in ascertaining our ability to successfully maintain specie their circulation is their capital; and whatever means the bank has payments. It would seem to be the extreme of folly to increase this is exhausted by the purchase of the bonds. Unlike the old chartered gold drain and at the same thne increa-se our interest-bearing debt banks, after their investment in bonds they live and move and have by funding n. non-interest-bearing debt, unless overruling neces their being in cretlit and nothing else. If they issue their. own cir sity demands it. But this is just what the pretended resumption culation it is but borrowing from the people. Their deposits are debts act of last year does or provides for doing. It looks to a conver to their customers, and all their cap1tal having been exhausted in sion of the greenback and fractional currency, aggregating in rouml buying their bonds, and they being beyond their control, how can numbers $413,000,000, into bonds bearing from 4 to 5 per cent. gold they be expected to keep a sufficient coin reserve to redeem their cir interest, and thereby makes an addition of at least seventeen and a half culation f From foundation to turret the national banks are built millions to the burdens of the people annually in the shape of interest. upon credit, nothing else. Atsimpleinterestthepeoplewillhavepaid$52S,OOO,OOOininterestalono This fatal defect of the system-! mean their want of cash-paying at the end of thirty years, and both principal and interest b{lcomo power-was fully illustrated and tested by what was called the stock a continuing bar to the successful maintenance of coin resum~tion. • banks of 1853 and 1854. The general organization was the same as What possible justification can there be for thus placing additional the present national banks, the bonds of the States being pledged for impediments in the way of resumption! Is not our interest account their circulation instead o£ United States bonds, and these bonds, large enough, and its payment difficult enough, without adding to as compared with gold, then were as valuable as the bonds of the its volume T If resumption be so important for the prosperity of United States are now. But when the financial storm came, when the people, and their advancement in wealth and material production, depositors and bill-holders wanted the cash for their deposits and for why put obstacles unnecessarily in its way! Does any sane man the notes of the bank, its vaults were innocent of specie ·hand great doubt that specie payments can be more certainly effE:'cted and main was the fall of that bank! And while this was true of a the stock tained by the Government than by the banks f And is there a banks, many of the chartered banks came out of the storm unscathed shadow of doubt, but for the relentless war of eastern bankers and and unhurt and redeemed all their cash obligations. In truth, t.he money kings a~ainst the issue of the Government, that, with a tithe central idea of the national-banking system is credit as contradis of the legislatiOn they have secured for the bonds of the Govern tinguished from cash, and a convertible currency and a national ment, the money of the people would be at par with gold instead of bank circulation are wholly incompatible and incongruous. n.t a discount of 10 to 15 per centt ·When, at the close of the great struggle between France and the It may be asserted without the fear of successful danial that the allied powers of Europe, it was proposed in the English Parliament immense indebtedness of the Government, of tho States, and of cor that t.he Bank of England should resume specie payments after a sus porations, municipal and public, offers the great impediment to suc pension of nearlyaquarterof a. century, the" currency question" was cessful and permanent resumption-if, at present, and for many years the overshadowing topic of discussion throughout all England. Pol to come, it does not form an absolute and insurmount.able barrier. iticians and philosophers, theorists and "economists," school-men For myself, I do not hesitate to assert that there is but one road to and book-worms, were generally then as now for immediate re resumption, and that road leads to the .extinction or recall of ou: sumption; but the sagacious directors of the Bank of England pro national debt. So long as a large proportion of our debt is held tested against it as a mea-sure "fraught with great perils, and which abroad we are at the mercy of our foreign creditors, and it is just as would compromise the universal interests of the empire in all its re true among nations a.s it is among individuals that the borrower is lations of agriculture, manufa debtor people, providing for the payment of its obliga.tions in the unfortunate as not t.o belong to the creditor class. llut how much world's currency, which at the same time performs the functions of more appalling the picture, if from any cause the 4 per cent. bonds money and is an article of merchandise and commerce in the same by which the three hundred millions of greenbacks are to be absorbed sense that wheat, cotton, or tobacco is. Like other articles of mer and canceled shall not become the basis of another brood of national chandise, it is governed by the same law of supply and demand-its ban:Ks. The paper circulation will then stand at the sum of four hundred abundance in one country rendering it cheap there, and causing it to and thirteen millions, against seven hundred and sixty-two mijlions flow to other countries where it is more in demand and dearer, because on the 1st day of November last. I have no fear that any public man, of its local scarcity. We have the authprity of the. great financier, party, or administration will ever have the hardihood so to contract :Mr. Biddle, so long the president of the Bank of the United States, the volume of currency; and yet in my judgment, if we are to reach that the universal suspension of the banks in this country in 1837 resumption by contraction of the paper circulation within three years, was caused primarily by the short crops of grain in Great Britain, this amount of contraction is absolutely necessary to reach that end. which were supplemented by purchases on the Baltic, and paid for in Whether resumption reached by a reduc~on of the circulation in gold extracted from this country in payment of debts by our mer three years of 45 per cent., involving a still more disastrous fall in chants. A war in Europe or a great political disturbance on that the prices of all commodities, the closing of factories, of ship rotting continent-a short crop of cotton here or a superabundant crop of at our wharves, of labor unemployed, of store-houses deserted, the grain in Europe, so that there could be no profitable shipment of our public revenues decreased, and the pressure of debts between indi cereals, would produce a similar drain upon our gold reserves. viduals trebled, would be worth the sacrifice, I leave to those whose We mayconceiveof the existence of astateof things liable to occur at reverence for the golden god is much more developed than mine. I any time, either here or among any of the great commercial nations of think it much safer to assume that the circulation of paper money Europe, that would cause large amounts of our gold bonds to be sent will not be reduced to less than the sum of $683,0007000. And the home for conversion and the proceeds remitted to the holders. It must question arises, what amount of gold will be needed to enable the banks be apparent that the increase of our bonded debt, which ft·om the rate to makethis amount of cireulation convertible! We can only arrive of interest as well aB the time the bonds have to run will find their at a correct conclusion on this subject by the experience of our own way to Europe, is a step not in the direction of permanent resump and other countries. tion, but in the direction of suspension and financial collapse, with In 1857 the aggregate paper circulation of the United States was all their attending calamities. And I cannot but look with suspicion two hundred and fifteen millions, and the Secretary of the Treasury and distrust upon any attempt needlessly t9 increase that debt, es in his report of that year estimated the amount of coin in circulation pecially when it comes in the guise of hard money and cash payments. and in the vaults of the banks and the treasuries of the United States It is impossible to resist the conviction that some other motive than at two hnndre£1 and sixty-five millions. Here we have. according to the one professed is at the bottom of this effort to increase our foreign the best authoritie on the subject, more coin than paper money to debt. I am safe in saying that the real motive grows out of a deter sustain this circulation; but we know as a matter of fact that it was mination to supplant our greenback circulation with that of the not sut~tained, but convertible paper money, as it seldom fails to do, national banks. lost its convertibility, the banks all suspended, and a monetary panic I have thus far, :Mr. Speaker, considered the question of the cur swept over the country like a tornado, prostrating commerce and in rency as if the resumption of specie payments, especially by the banks, dustry and carrying ruin and bankruptcy to thousands. The Direct was a mask and disguise, and as if it was neither expected nor desired or of the Mint estimates t.he amount of coin in the country at this to resume at the time indicated in the act of January 20, 187G. I time at 142,000,000; but if the banks failed and went into suspen have treated this act as having no other purpose than to saddle upon sion in 1857, with more gold in the country than there was paper by the country the most odious, the most expensive, and the most dan fifty millions, it certainly will require all of four hundred millions t.o gerous monopoly that ever had an existence in the history of the sustain a paper circulation of six hundred and eighty millions in world, with enlarged and constantly augmenting powers of mischief. 1879. Does any one believe that we shall have that sum in the coun It is my: purpose now to assume that the real purpose of this act and try in January, 1879, or that we can retain it if it were here? whatever supplementary legislation it may require to enforce re If we go to Great Britain for her experience on this subject it will sumption is what it professes and purports to be, the restoration of be found that the aggregate paper circulation of the Dank of En specie payments by the Government and the national banks within gland and all other banks of issue does not exceed $'2'25,000,000, and the next three years. In this aspect of the subject, is it possible or the estimated amount of coin in circulation is $525,000,000, exclusive of I practicable to resume specie payments by the banks and Government that held by the bank. Speaking of the bank reserve, (some twelve \ the 1st of Janu:u·y, 18791 Aml what I may have to say is not predi yea1·s ago,) the author of the Science of Finance says when "the stock l cated upon a temporary or illusory resumption, but an actual bona of gold in the bank is at its ordinary sum (say $70,000,000) the export fide and permanent resumption, a resumption that resumes in fact, of ten or fifteen millions of ~old suffices to produce a dearth of money and will not cost the country more ~han it is worth and will not crip and a serious commercial cn:;is." This extreme sensitiveness of the ple and destroy every other interest than that of capital and money. bullion market was illustrated while Secretary Boutwell was at the The Secretary of the Treasury evidently places no reliance upon the hea-d of the Treasury, both in the payment of the Alabama award and plan of selling bonds for golcl, and by this means providing for the when he had sold United States bonds in London amounting to 1·edemption of the three hundred millions of legal-tender notes which $21,000,000. In both cases he says that the Treasury Department was will be ·outstanding on the 1st day of January, 11379. He says," it "compelled" to le.ave the gold in London and to invest these sums in may be doubted whether the process of accumulating a lar~e amount American securities by th~ influence of the bank and "by diplomat.ic of gold by a given time could go on withoat meeting opposition from arrangements here operating upon the Treasury Department.. " the financia\ powers of the world," and instead of relying upon this It is well known that this bank reserve is watched with t.be. most means(whichisalone provided by the actof January, 1875)to redeem jealous care, and Reveral times this "wonderful organization of credit," the greenback circulation, he recommends a. 4 per cent. long bond by within the last thirty years, has been upon the verge of suspension, which to absorb the three hundred milliona of greenback circulation. notwithstanding its heavy reserve and notwithstanding the large If the hoarding process is a{lopted, or if the 4 per cent. bonds absorb sum of metallic money in the bands of the people and in the channels and take up t.he rrreenback circulation, as is contemplated, the only of circulation. Even when it baa escaped suspension, it has been by paper circulation Yeft to the country January, 1879, on the supposition the exercise of sovereign power in increaaing the rates of interest as . that ilver takes the place of the fractional currency, would be the much as from 3 to 10 per cent. within a few weeks, and thus indirectly national-bank circulation of 348,216,902, with the possible increase prohibiting the export of specie, and while saving itself has brought of eight-tenths of $3 2,000,000 of legal-tenders, less 82,000,000, say ruin to thousands of merchants and traders, and scattered panic, con $65,00f1000; making the sum of $413,216,902. sternation, and commercial distress throughout the kingdom. Shall This is the programme whereby, if either of these means be adopted, we arm our national banks with this power to save themselves at the the greenbacks are to disappear altogether. If the 4 per cent. bonds, as expense of the public interest t And if they were vested with such recommended by the Secretary, should become the basi~ of national authority, is it likely that they could protect themselves against sus- bank issues, which is more than probable, this sum of paper circula pension and insolvency f. . tion would be increaaed by the sum of $-270,000,000. This would give The latest an cl most reliable statement of the condition of tho Bank of aa the sum of paper circulation 683,000,000 on the 1st day of January, France accessible shows tha.t about a year ago it.s paper circulation stood 1879, less by seventy-nine millions than that circulation amounted to at 509,500,000, and the specie reserve at two hundred and sixty-fortr on November 1, 1875, and equivalent t.o a contraction of twenty-six 'millions, or more than 52 per cent. The amount of gold and silver and one-third millions annually for the next three years. ·when it is coin in circulation, inclusive of the bank reserve, is variously esti recollected that within the next three years we shall make an increase mated at from ten to twelve hundred millions, and according to of population of not less than two millions and a quarter, that in des American ideas of banking it would appear that the Bank of France pite of financial mismanagement our productions fl,re keeping pace could resume specie payments wit-h safety at any time. It is, how with the growth of our population, farms are multiplying, towns and ever, still in suspension. It is not improbable that a remarkable cities are being bunt and populat.ed, and there is growth, expansion, event in the hist.ory of this bank may have taught its managers a and increase in almost every branch of industry, while the means and lesson which our financial ma.nagers could study with profit. Ou the instruments of exchange are thus decreased., such a turn of the con 12th of 1\Ia.y, 1854, the coin and bullion held in the vaults of the bank tracting screw may well strike terror into the stoutest heart. were eighty millions, for the redemption of a note circulation of one Contraction of the currency bas been the only means brought into hundred and thirty millions. lly the month of October, 1855, its requisition by the devotees of gold in order to bring the country to specie had been reduced to forty-five millions, and in March follow resumption, and it will no doubt be carried on to the end of the ing the paper circulation stood at one hundred and twenty-five mill chapter, let the consequences be what they may to those who are so ions,.aud the bullion at forty-two millions. It appears from the pub- 1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2319 lisbed accounts of the bank that from July, 1855, to December, 1856, a in 1820 to £4,672,000, and in 1821 t.o £2,676,000. The effect upon prices wru~ not less immediate or appalling. They sunk in general, within six months, to half their period of about eighteen months, the bank purchased and imported former amount., and remained at that low level for the next three years. Im into Fmnce, at a coRt of $2,150,000, the enormous sum of $136,800,000, ports sunk from nearly £36,000,000, in 1818, to £29,769,000 in 18'21; exports, from in order to sustain its paper circulation, and the figures show that as £45,000,000 iu the former year to £35,000,000 in the latter. Distress was universal fast as it was drawn into the bank it was drawn out and exported. in the latter '!Donths of the year H!l9, aml that distrust and discouragement were felt in all branches of industry, which is at once the forerunner and the ~use of I have collated these facts and submit them to the House to show disaster. / the impossibility of our maintaining specie redemption in 1879 by any means at our command. If we contract the paper circulation In a· debate in the House of Commons in 1821 Mr. Baring thus even to the amount of the present bank-note circulation it would be speaks as to the effects of t.he contraction of the currency : a perilous experiment, fraught with ruin and destruction to every Looking at the fact-s growing out of the contraction' of the currency, it is mate. rial to show what is the sta.te of the country lD this the sixth year of the peace. Pe interest but that of the bondholder and money-lender; and as when titions are coming in from all quarters remonstrating against the sta.te of suffering Secretary McCulloch began to carry out his programme of resump in which so many classes are involved and none more than the agricultural class. tion by bard, relentless contraction, the people from all parts of the When such is the state of the country in the sixth year of peace, and when all the country called a halt upon his policy, so now if this Congress shall idle stories abont overproduction and underconsnmption and such like trash have been swept away, it is natural to inquire into the state of a country placed in a sit. again try the hAroic treatment this Hall will never know us again nation without a parallel in any other nation or time. No country ever before forever, and every vestige of this resumption act would be effaced presented the continuance of so extraordinary spectacle as that of ilving under a from the statute-book by another Congress. And with a larger pa progressive increase in the value of monev and decrease in the value of the pro per circulation than I have stated, the experience of Great Britain ductions of the people. It appears clear that from the operations of the currency we have loaded ourselves not only with an immense public debt, but also with an and France, as well as· our own, shows conclusively that resumption increased debt between individual and individual, the weight of which continues to . in 1879 will result in a disastrous and calamitous failure. press upon the country and to the continuance of which pressure no end can be .Mr:. Speaker, it has often been a matter of wonder and astonish seen. - ment that in our servile imitation of so many things English we In the Firiancial, Monetary, and Statistical History of England, by should go so far as to copy even her mistakes and the blunders of her Doubleday, we have the following summary of the effect of this statesmen. We adopt English ideas of banking, finance, and taxa legil:'lla.tion : tion, and blindly accept the theories of her "philosophers" and her As the memorable 1st of May, 1823, drew near, the country bankers as well as political economists, and we refuse to be warned of their .errors or the Bank of England naturally prepared themselves by a gradual narrowing of their sophistries. That the return to specie resumption by the Bank their circulation for the dreaded hour of gold and silver payments "on demand," of England by virtue of what is known a-s Peel's bullion act was a. and the withdrawal of the small notes. We have already seen the fall in prices p~duced by this universal narrowing of the paper circulation. The effects of the mistake fatal to almost every interest in Great Britain, is now nniver distress produced all over the country, the consequence of this fall, we have yet sany conceded. Greville, in his Memoirs of George IV and William to see. IV, volume 2, page 145, speaking of Sir Robert Peel, says: The distress, rnin, and bankruptcy which now took place were universal, affecting both the great interests of land and trade; but among the landlonls whose estates If we look back through the lon it. Four hundred years of debasing servitude hacl effaced from their poses. The general adoption of paper money among the most com minds all idea of a spiritual, invisible God, and with .false and blas mercial and civilized nations of the world for the purposes of domes phemous lips they cried out before the idol of Aaron's hand, "These be tic circulation, not as a representative but as a substitute for coin, thy gods, t) Israel, which brought thee up out of the land of Egypt." would seem a practical confession that the metals are inadequate"for I say we cau find some palliation for this act of daring wickedness the business purposes of the world, and are only useful to liquidate and impious sacrilege in the gross darkness ancl deep degradation of balances amonfr nations and peoples. the weary, wandering, and unbelieving descendants of Abraham and The theory that the circulating medium of a country must posse s Isaac. But what apology can be offered, what justification can be intrinsic value is comprehensible when applied to an exclusively me made for the folly and wickedness of our financiers and their blind tallic circulation or to a paper circula.tion such as that of the bank itlolatry of gold, in closing their eyes and ears to the experience of of Amsterdam, which was a certificate of deposit of so much coin in England, and forcing the American people to travel the same road to its vaults. But the commerce and monetary arrangements of the commercial ruin, to t.he destn1ction of all their industrial interests, world have progressed far beyond thia point. Paper money has and to the aggrandizement of wealth and capital f Have we not wor cea-sed to be a mere representative of coin, but an actual substitute I shiped at the slnine of the golden calf long enough T Have we not for it, and its convertibility into coin has become a financial fiction. 5 tasted sufficiently of the fruits of contraction f Have we not drank It passes current purely and simply on the credit of the is uer, and < of the waters of bitterness long enough to satisfy th~ avarice of the the idea that it can be converted into coin rarely enters into the inincl nsnrer and the capitalist, as well as the crudities and crotchets of the of those among whomit circulates. The use of the precious metals theorist Y Is there to be no end to the insane attempt to bring ns to wa,s no doubt a great advance on tho barter of barbarism and the . an impossible specie basis f Are we to be forever fed on delusions, cattle money of Abraham and Lot; and the certificates of the gold shams, an(l cheats T Are we to sacrifice all the great interests of the smiths of London and of the banks of Venice anti Amsterdam in(li lI country to. the selfishness and greed of the money-dealers, bankers, cate a still higher civilization and a greater adaptation to the needs and capitalists of the country, in the vain effort to secure a mere fic of society and commerce. Paper money is the outgrowth of a con tion-an unsubstant.ial "ideality"-a convertible currency f We dition of things in the state where order reigns, rights are respected, should be warne 1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2321 abroad at high prices, would ordinarily bring to us a heavy flow of passage of the resumption act, so called, of last January; while the the precious metals. This i~ turn produces a decline in the value of actual amount of aggregate bank circulation is diminished by little gold here in comparison with other commodities from its superabund niore than fonr millions within the same period. When the high ance, and immediately it is shipped abroad. The same effect takes price of United States bonds is considered, and the addit.ioual fact place when we have a short crop or large crops with•low prices, or that many of the banks have been compelled to realize on their bonds when there is a heavy demand for gold abroad from any cause. It and withdraw their circulation in order to meet losses sustained by matters not whether we have plenty or scarcity, good crops or bad; them in the general stringency of money and the disordered financial whether we have domestic prosperity or foreign disaster, the drain condition of the country, it is a little remarkable that the amount of of the world's currency will go on; and if from any unusual cause it new circulation is so large and the sale and withdrawal of bonds not becomes intensified, monetary panic and commercial distress, if not larger. The fact still remains that ~n act pretending to provide for bank suspension, will surely follow. So common have these seasons resumption and hard money in reality provides for an indefinite of pecuniary distress become that they are beginning to be regarded augmentation of rag money, in the shape of bank paper; and it only as inevitable as death, and we resign ourselves to our fate in hopeless requires"'the issue of the 4 per cent. bond recommended by Secretary I despair. Never in our history has this country been so free frolll such Bristow to be made the basis of national-bank circulation, or a fall I l panics as within the last fourteen years; and it must be obvious that, in the market value of the five-twenties and other bonds held as. I with~ a currency convertible into gold, the export of so large an security for bank issues, to find banks multiplying rapidly. { amount of gold and bullion during the last fiscal year as reported by Mr. Speaker, I cau well comprehend how this conflict between I the Secretary of the Treasury would in all probability have produced Treasury notes and those of banking corporations should be accom ./ a suspension of the banks with all its attendant calamities. I do not panied with such deception, such false clamor, and with such stmlied doubt but our true policy is to establish and maintain a non-export concealment and avoidance of the real gist of the controversy. The able and a domestic cnrrencr, for many long years to come at least. or~anized wealth and capital of the Union has large interests at stake The solution of our finanCial problem is full of difficulties and em in it; the vast army of bondholders and stockhol4ers, directors and barrassments in its best aspects; but it must be apparent to any who attorneys, of two thousand banks are not indifferent spectators of it, . I have given the subject even a cursory consideration that these diffi and the whole eastern and northern sections of the Union, who have culties are vastly multiplied by the presence of tw:o kinds of circu controlled and directed the finances of the country for the last fifteen lation, each endeavoring to supplant the other. If we had but one, years in the interest of money and capital, are aroused and excited in undisputed possession of the field, the problem would be greatly about it. Selfishness, cupidity, and avarice furuish the weapons of simplified. But we have in this currency question another illustra this unholy warfare. The question whether a small and privileged tion of the inferior attempting to supplant the superior, of the bot class shall furnish the circulating medium for this vast and growing tom rail taking the place of the top ; and it is this conflict between country and its forty millions of people and its diversified and expand opposing and conflicting interests which excites class, sectional, and ing industlies in perpetuity, not only without compensation to the individual animosities, obscurt.s the judgment, confounds the real Government or the people, but that they should receive a bonus for issues involved, and adds greatly to its real embarrassments. If the their liberality, or whethe1· this circulation shall be furnished by the people of the United States were called uJfon to pass upon the real Government not only without cost, but at a saving of millions every question at issue, which in the natural order of things must first be year to a tax-burdened people, is sufficient ·to arouo:Je all the baser passed upon and finally adjudicated before other extraneous questions passions of those so vitally interested. Not only is the value of four are considered; if they were required to make up ajudgment on the hundred millions of circulation to be duplicated in the near future elaborate argument of the Comptroller of the Currency in behalf of the involved, but the use of the taxes collected of the people as a basis national banks, presented to the country with all the zeal of an advo of loans and discounts, on which high rates of int~rest are to be cate with a fat retainer in his pocket, and the argument of my distin charged, as well. In addition to this the moneyed interest of the guished friend from Pennsylvania [Mr. KELLEY] in behalf of the green country and the men of invested capital look with favor to any plan back and his interconvertible scheme, the currency problem would that centralizes the Government; that steals power from the many be greatly simplified and its solution ~omparatively easy. But this, to the few, and enables them t.o control the legislation and political unfortunately for the cause of truth, is not permitted to them. Be a~tion of the Government. yond doubt the primal question to be disposed of,by Congress is who Never befoN in the history of America has there existed such a vast shall furnish the paper circulation of the United States f Shall t.he combination of organized wealth, welded and consolidated together banks or the Government furnish itT Shall we pay a few indi vid by the "cohesive power of public plunder;'' and it is not a matter uals to supply 1 he instruments of exchange for our people at a cost of wonder or surprise that resort is had to every deception and de of twenty millions per annum, or shall it be furnished by the Gov vice that cunning and cupidity can sug~est. Following in the wake ernment for nothing T This is the first question to be passed upon ; of this mighty army of greed and selfishness is an inconsiderable and yet it is studiously kept out of view, covered up, and concealed band of well-meaning men, wedded to the traditions of the past by others of secondary grade. It is driven into the background by afraid of experiments, enslaved to prejudice, and unwilling to trust simulated efforts at resumption and by false clamors for specie pay the convictions of their reason and judgment. To them the exercise ments and hard money, when resumption by the banks is an impossi of the power of the Government to supply the people with a uniform bility. and safe circulation for the business wants of the country is of doubt Again, the real issue is covered up and concealed by the raw head and .ful expediency. They say that it has always been given to a cor bloody bones of" inflation." No more remarkable instance of shameless poration; it is opposed ·to all experience; it is a dan~erous power hypocrisy and unblushing impudence can be found in the history of to intrust to the representatives of the people. But IS its exercise partisan warfare. It is another attempt to steal" the livery of t.he more perilous, or does it require a wiser discretion, than the power to court of heaven to serve the devil in." This resumption act, which its borrow money and to issue the Government'sobligationsforit f There frie~ds claim is a step in the direction of " honest" money and cash is no limitation on the power to raise revenue, either in the imposi payments, is the most gigantic inflation scheme that ever received tion of external duties or internal taxes-to declare war or to make the consideration of Congress. It makel!! the issue of "rag money" pea~e. If Congress can be intrusted with the exercise of such im and the birth of "rag babies" free to ev.erybody who is the fortunate portant p.owers, can it not be intrusted with power to determine owner of national bonds, or who can borrow, beg, or steal them to when and for what sum the Gove.-nment shall issue its notes to the the amount of $50,000. The only limitation to the issue of thA irre people f The power to borrow money is one of the specific powers deemable notes of the national banks is the amount of the interest intrusted to Congress; shall it be said the representatives of the bearing debt of the Government, which is to be increased by the people can mortgage the resources of the present and future genera withdrawal of the fractional currency and the legal-tenders, to over tions for the payment of debts bearing interest, and yet cannot bor four hundred millions. By this prete~ded resumption act 90 per cent. row of the people without interest f So far as governments have of the entire debt, interest-bearing and non-interest-bearing, may exercised this power it has been as often exercised with success as be converted into lamp-black and rags for circulation. This is the otherwise. It failed during the Revolution bepause there wae a large hard money, specie payment, anti-inflation feast t.o which all the excess of circulation, put in circulation by an unstable government, organs of Wall street invite us. Inflation in their vocabulary means and there was no t.axation levied with which it could be redeemed. the increase of blackbacks without limit, and resumption means the We have not only the faith and resources of the Government on _ total extinction of the greenbacks. If you are favorable to a substi which to bottom it, bot we have over three hundred millions of tax tution, dollar for dollar, of the bank issues for the direct obligations ation by which to redeem it, in addition to the State, city, and county of the Government, and in favor of making the greenback equal in taxes of the several States of the Union. value to gold by appropriate legislation, you are branded as an infla 'fhe assignats of the French revolution is another bugbear thAt is tionist; but if, on the contrary, you are for getting rid of the legal always raised up by those who seek to give the banks a monopoly of tenders by an increase of the annual interest of the Government in the Government credit. Like our continental money, they were issued the sum of seventeen or eighteen million dollars, and for an indefi beyond all hope of redemption. Their sum exceeded $!:J,OOO,ooo,ooo, nite expansion of bank paper, with no obligations on the bank to re more than three times the amount of the whole debt of the United deem its notes at its counter or elsewhere, with no provision of law States and equa.l to about $360 to each inhabitant of France." They requiring such redemption, and with the almost absolute certainty were not based on the revenues, the faith, or resources of France, but that they cannot make such redemption, you are entitled to a high on the estates of the church and the nobility, confiscat.ed by a. gov seat in the synagogue of money-changers and bullion-brokers, hard ernment in a state of revolution at the time. Real estate of unques money, and honest currency! . tioned title is indifferent security for a circulating medium at any The increaae of national-bank circulation from June, 1874, to No time; but bore the Stlcurity was not only doubtful, but the government vember 1, 1875, was $15,721,175, most of this increase being since the itself had no stability, and with the best security and under the best IV-146 . 2322 CONGRES_SION.A.L RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, government the large amount issued would have depreciated it in 3nd overburdened people. Without the national debt we could have definitely. In a speech delivered by Mr. Calhoun in the Senate, Sep no national'banks such as now exist. It constitutes their foundation, tember 19, 1837, in which he then advocated the duty and power and is the meat and bread on which they subsist. They 1i vo and of the Government issuing the paper· money necessary for the busi m?ve and h~ve ~heir be~g in natio~al indebtedne. aud in high tax ness wants of t,he country, he thus spoke of the success which had atwn. Thetr existence 1s a confessiOn that a national debt is a na attended the issue of Government paper by the State: tional ble sing, and by their continuance we give form and life to a ·It may throw some light on this subject to state that North Carolina, just after party and au interest inimical to the well-being of the Government, the ReYolution, issued a large amount of paper, which was mace receivable in tlues supported from exactions upon the labor and industries of the coun to her. It was also made a legal tender, but which of course was not obligatory after the adoption of the Federal Constitution. A large amount, say between four try, and dangerous to r13publican institutions. and five hundred thousand dollars, remained in circulation after that period, and No greater curse can be inflicted upon the people of this country, or continued to circulate for more than twenty years at par wit.h gold and silver dur republican government itself, than a permanent public debt. No party ing the w,llole time, with no other advantage than being received in the l'evenue of in this country, not even the republican party of this generation, has the State, which was much less than 100,000 per annum. * * * regarded a public debt other than a pubbo calamity, to be extin On t.he same point, in the same great speech, he made the follow guished _as rapidly as po sible. And yet we are countenancincr and ing statement of facts: giving strength and vitality to a banking system whose centra~ fun \' t We are also told that there is no instance of a Government paper that did not damental idea is a permanent nation a). debt, with its necessary attend depreciaoo. In reply. I affirm that there is none, assuming the form I propose, that ants-profligate expenditures, high taxation, and corruption in all } ever did depreciate. Whenever a paper receivable in the dues of Government had departments of the public service. The autocratic power which must anything like a fair trial, it has succeeded. Instance the case of Nort,h Carolina, \ referred to in my opening remarks. The drafts of the Treasury at this moment. necessarily be vested in the head of the Treasury Department under with all their incumbrance, are nearly at parwithgold and silver; and I mi~~tadd this sys~m, ~he supervisory control whicJ;t t~e national-banking law ' the instance alluded to by the distinguished Senator from Kentucky, in wnich he necessarily gtves hrm over the banks and mdirectly over the bu iness admits that as soon as the e:.-cel!S of the issues of the Commonwealth Bank of Ken of the country and the fortunes of iud iduals, the discriminations tuuky were reduced to the proper point, its notes rose to -par. The case of Russia might also be mentioned. In 1827 she had a fixed paper mrculation, in the form of and favoritism of the law in favor of cities and sections, the consoli b:mk·notes, but which were inconvertible, of upward of 120,IJOO,OOO, estimated in flation of the political and moneyed power of the country which is the metallic ruble, and which had for years remained without fluctuation, having effected by this system, are all grounds of serious objection; but they nothing to sustain it but that it was received in the forth yield them interest. It would be allowing them the privilege brief saying a text which epitomizes much of the argument in behalf of exchanging their pl"omissory notes without interest for the prom of this great movement. It is expressive of a principle which under issory notes of other men beari.og interest. Such are banks of issue lies the whole of human progress in whatever is wise and good. De in their best and simplest form. But is it any the less an enormity velQpment is one of the grand ends of physical as well as moral life, and an outrage upon the rights of the many that this franchise of and advancement is as much the duty of a people as of an individuaL issuing its notes for circulation and making them receivable for hun And in the line of material development, that is, of the latent treas dreds of millions of Government dues is granted to a corporation ure~:~ of soil and of opportunities for the use of capital and labor, thus· called a national bank f Is the injustice and wrong of the thing giving range and impetus to the progressiveness and energy of Ameri sanctified by this valuable privilege being made over for a genera can spirit, the good results that will follow the success of this or some tion to an artificial instead of a natural person; to five men and their such enterprise are beyond estimate. There is a grandeur in the successors, instead of to one and his administrators or assigns f But thought of filling the wilderness with the appliaBces of progress and national banking is a still ~reater enormity than this. It is a prop the blessings of civilization. But it is not t,he sole end of this great osition to the capitalist Jf he will invest his money in· United ~cheme to people the wilderness and civilize the solitude. Its advan States bonds the Government will not only pay him 6 per cent. on tages will be immediate and tangible in every quarter of the coun his investment but give him the additional privilege of issuing his try. And the fact that from the construction and operation of this notes to t.he extent of 90 per cent. of the par value of his investment, road benefits and advantages will accrue to the Government which without interest, in exchange for other promissory notes bearing any it has not now and which are well-nigh indispensable, should be a rate of interest he can bargain for. . leading consideration in all our discussions of this subject. To ap I do not doubt that in the .extremity in which the credit of the preciate the gain that the Government will derive we must understand Government was placed during the late unnatural conflict the na something of its necessities. A vast area of country in the Southwest tional banks served a good purpose in absorbing and fl.oating the now requires aid and protection; and on account of the absence of national debt; but the credit of the Government needs no such adven proper facilities this aid and protection can be provided only at vast titious aid now, and justice to the Government and to a tax-ridden expense. andoverbunlened people demands that we should put these institutions In the year 1873 a dozen regiments of cavalry and infantry were into a course of liquidation and adopt a more just, cheaper, and less stationed in Texas, New Mexico, antl Arizona to furnish protection burdensome system of currency. . against the danger of hostile incursions. And yet with all. this force, No question of greater moment to the country, and especially to its comprising nearly one-h:Jlf of the effective strength of the United industrial cla8Be8, has ever occupied t.he attention of Congress. Nor States Army, it is said that life and property were not adequately is it less importa.nt to the democratic party. From the days of Jef protected. A reasonable estimate of the cost of maintaining for a ferson to the present time it has been in opposition to national bank year a single regiment in those remote regions is a million for in ing. and it can ill afford to repudiate the teachings of its great founder fantry, and a million and a half of dollars for cavalry. Then more and go back upon its past history. "The field of circulation," which, than 12,000,000 must be expended annually in t.he matter of trans to use his forcible language, "has been filched from us by individuals," portation, equipment, and supplies for the military force stationed in must be restored to the General Government. We cannot permit a that portion of the public domain as ]ong as a force of such size may delegation of its powers to corporations or individuals. Much less can be necessary. If this expense can be obyiated or lessenetl, we ought we permit it to abdicate such an important function of its sovereign to hasten to do it. To be convinced that it can be very greatly less authority as that of supplying the people with the life-blood of circu ened, we need bnt inquire of those sections of country crossed by the lation. If we would preserve the integrity of our party and the purity present Pacific Rai.lroau which were formerly troubled by Indian in of its principles, if we would retain the confidence and support of the .cursions,aud where two regimentsarenowforcesnff:icient. In the latter great producing sections of the Union and of its industrial classes, we case the reduction of expense is due to railway commnnicati()n aud have no other alternative than to wage an unceasing war against facilities; in the former the magnitude of expense is due to their national banking, whatever disguise it may assume, whether that dis absence. I do not claim strict accuracy in ·these figures -they are guise be hard money or rafT money. A timid, hesitating, time-serving not mine-but I believe that if there is error in stating the cost of policy, that fears to do right and yields to the clamorous demands of military force in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, it is in an under- - money and capital, will expose us to the just indignation of our friends estimate. . and to the deserved contempt of our enemies. It is hardly necessary to urge that with railway and telegraphic LEAVE TO PRINT. communication to and through these regions, furnishing facilities for Mr. DmRELL was granted leave to print spme remarks he had pre speedy transportation and intelligence, Bavag.e incursions wonlll end, and the remote settler would realize the blessings of peace and se pared, in the RECORD, a~ part of the debates. (See Appendix.] curity. As it is now, he must lead a precarious life, and at great THE TEXAS AND PACIFIC RAILWAY. pecuniary cost to his Government, or turn back his gaze from the Mr. WILLIAMS, of Alabama. Mr. Speaker, for years the question boasted" star of empire," and leave to the savage and brute a laD 2324 CONGRESSIONAL RECOR~HOUSE. APRIL 8, that whole country were a wilderness, with no inhabitant but the abuse, and this is another reason for at least one more line of railway wild Indian, its exploration and discovery might be left to the hun to the Pacific Ocean. The country is too large and its interests are ter and his follower, the pioneer. But such is not the case. Already too extensive to be in the control of a single line, apart from the in New Mexico is knocking at the door of the Union for admission as a convenience of such a situation. And, if there were nothincr else, the sovereign State, and Arizona doubtless looks forward to the same matt-er of inconvenience is of itself sufficiently serious to d:mand the step. location of another line. I speak not now of the inconvenience to the But there is yet another view why the contemplated railway should Government in the ~atter of troops and supplies to the remote re be built. The country through which it will pass, taken as a whole, gions of the Southwest, but of the general inconvenience to both is full of such resources as snpply wealth to large populations. The Government and citizen in any section of the Southern States in ref line of construction will lie along the thirty-second parallel of lati erence to the use of the present road. A trader or traveler in New tude, which is the natural outlet and direction for the expansion of Orleans desiring to go to San Francisco has but one way. He must southern industries. It will connect directly and indirectly with the first go to Omaha, and then he is nearly as far from his destination as leading southern roads east of the Mississippi, and open to them new San Diego is from New Orleans. ·In other words, if the Texas and sources of strength and new opportunities for prosperous business. Pacific Railway were built he would be at San Diego, on the Pacific As the main line moves westward, penetrating new fields for enter coast, almost if not quite as soon as by the present, route he could prise, population will go with it. Agriculture will take possession reach Omaha. A thousand similar-illustrations might be made. { of the soil, manufactories will be built, an_d commerce in its multi This is not in any proper sense a question of party or sectional ( form shapes and relations will send the currents of busy life through difference, but if there be a disposition to oppose the enterprise be all the channels _of employment. Renewed vitality will be imparted cause the South will reap advantages, let me quote high republican \ to the languishing roads of the South, and their invested capital ren authority in its favor : dered valuable and secure. New hopes will quicken the energies of There are a dozen ari!Oments each sufficient in itself to warrant the construction a people, and business, shaking oft' the paralysis that has so long of a southern transcontinental line of railway from the :Mississippi to the l'acitic \ weighed it down, will arise from its prostration and cliffnse through coa.st. Such, for instance, as the »eells of a vast undeveloped te-rritory possessing boundless mineral and agricultural wealth, the addition to our stores of precious out the land the kindling influences of spirit and action. metals from Northern Mexico, New Mexico, and Arizona more than now comes It is not proposed that the Government shall subsidize this great from the silver mines of Nevada and the gold-fields of California; the substitu scheme. It is asked only that the Government, being first amply tion of civilization for savagery or barbarism ovm· a district larger than the thir secured, shall guarantee the interest on the bonds of the road at a teen original States of the Republic; the saving to the Governm£1nt (which means the people) eight to ten millions annually in t.he single item of border protection; given rate, thus enabling the road to procure money by sale of the the savmg of nearly as much more in Government und general transportation ; bonds as the work of construction proceeds. At an average rate of the addition of annual millions to the revenue from a district that is now only a $40,000 per mile, (which is an overestimate,) the cost of actual con burden; the giving of facilities for transit and transportation to twelve millions be of poo;>le: the doing justice to the whole West and South by giving them the same struction from Fort Worth to San Diego would a little less than facilities that have been provided at vast expense for t.he North and Northwest ; 30,000,000. The only liability the Goverp.ment is asked to assume is the restoration of prosperity to the whole country by stimulating all its industries fl per cent. interest on the bonds. This interest on the cost of con :S,nd opening new channels of trade. struction at the figures stated would be less than $3,000,000 per an A plenty of other reasons might be given for the prompt execution of this great enterprise, but one siuale argnment absorbs orovershatlows all the others. Thor~ num. In fact it is asserted that- is now in existence ana activo operation a huge monopoly as corr-upt as it is pow The utmost liability which the Gilvernment could assume is less than $2,000 per erful, which holds the only gateway to the Pacific, and levies upon all travelers mile per annum if all the bonds authorized were issued, and this liability would be and traders a tax: measured only by ita avaricious greed. lessened in proportion to the actual cost of the road. If this is true, Mr. Speaker, it is argument conclusive. And the Government is to be protected against loss in this way: If it be asked what will follow the construction of the Texas and The bonds are secured by a first mortgage co""erina the road, equipment, fran Pacific Railway, let me quote, by way of answer, from other authority: chises, and Government lands; these bonds are pl.ace8 in the United States Treas ury, and as sections of the road are completed the Government commissioner" must Some of the immediate and legitimaoo results of the inauguration and vigorous certify that they are properly constructed, and also as to the actual cost of the prosenution of this work may be stated as follows: same, and that the money has been properly expended. It will bring many millions of ford~n capital into the country to be who have not taken out license as dealers in leaf-tobacco. The dealer mit, though not uncomplainingly, to its hardships. If it could be in leaf-tobacco having paid 25 and taken out license can purchase in rigidly enforced, which it would be impossible t.o do except at a any quantities, but he can sell only to "other dealers who have paid greatly disproportionate expense, it would be extremely haras ing a special tax as such, aml to manufacturers of tobacco, snuff, or cigars, and obnoxious to non-pronucing consumers in tobacco-growing sec and to such persons as are known to be purchasers of leaf-tobacco for tions, and the impunit-y with which it can be evaded is all that ren ~xport." 'I'he1·etail dealer in leaf-tobacco is one whose busine888 it is ders it at all tolerable. It therefore appears that while the object of to sell leaf-tobacco in qtiantities less·than an original hogshead, case, the legislation seems to be to coerce the consumer to the use of the or bale, or who sells directly to consumers or to persons other than manufactured article upon which Government may asse s and collect licensed dealers in leaf-tobacco; and such retail dealer is required to ita revenues, its great if not leading tendency is to encourage what pay $500 for his privilege. . . wise· governments should guard well against---evasions, subterfuges, While no doubt the Government denves considerable revenue from ann covert infractions of law on the part of their citizens. the twentv-.five-dollar tax imposed upon the dealer, it is almost un I ask your attention now to hardships and inconveniences which the necessary 'to state to this House that very little revenue is derived law inflicts upon the producer and those who occupy toward him the from the five-hundred-dollar tax upon 1·etail dealers. relation of tenants and employes. A planter may have raised a to Your attention is invited to the following letter from the Commis bacco crop the past year, and, though ha.ving it yet in his barn and sioner of Internal Revenue, communicating some important informa under contract with tenants and employes to furnish them sup tion on this point: plies for the current year, he cannot lawfully furnish them the leaf TREASURY DEPARTMENT, OFFICE OF l..~TE~A.L REVEYUE, tobacco which he has and whi.ch they may nnd do generally prefer, Washington, January 27, 1876. but must buy for them the manufactured article at a cost of from 400 Sm: I have receivM your letter of the 26th instant, and in reply to the inquiries to 1,000 per cent. more. The leaf-tobacco which is bulked in the barns therein contained would state that * * · * no collections of special taxe.q of re. around which they work must be sold and transported to a licensed tail dealers in leaf-tobacco have ever been ma 187G CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 23~7 the law bears upon ·one who is dependent upon his little crop for the serve the various plausible schemes of internal improvemen"t which few common necessaries of life; luxuries indeed to him, but articles have had for their object the advancement of the interests of the of necessity to his more fortunate neighbor. He cannot exchange projectors, and not the interests of the community at large. . his tobacco for them unless the merchant, as is seldom the cMe, is a ·Naturally the first question that arises in the discussion of this sub licensed dealer.· Such dealer he must find, and must then submit to ject is the power of Congress to grant pec~iary aid· to private i~di this dealer's terms, whatever they may be. It is difficnlt for him to viduals or corporations in buildin~ railroads and canals. And here realize why it is that his Government places no restriction upon let me remark that, in all the arguments now advanced by the advo the sale of corn, or wheat, or cotton, or any of the products of the cates of this power, the instances of its discussion are taken only from soil which his neighbor may raise, but places his skill and his labor t.he periodt~ between 1803 and 1827 and from 1862 to the present time, at such a disadvantage by harsh and onerous restraints upon it; in leaving an interval of t.birty-five years during which the subject was effect, making the product of that skill and labor contraband and in discussed in Congress with ~reat ability by the most pro min en t states t.erdicting it as a subject for ordinMy commerce and exchange, as if, men ; and, as far as any pomt of constitutional law could be consid indeed, the business of producing tobacco were an unlawful and ered as settled, the general opinion of the people in 1860 was adverse ) criminaJ. one, deserving to be discouraged, if not suppressed, by Gov- to the appropriation of money by Congress in aid of internal improve ! ernment. . ments. Prejudice against the law has been greatly intensified in some sec The principle npon wbich the early measures making grants oflands tions of the country by the arbitrary, insolent, and oppressive manner alone was based is entirely different from that lying at the founda in which its enforcement has been attempted. I can but give the tion of the innumerable subsidy bills passed within the last fifteen ' House an idea of some of the complaints on this subject by submit years, commencing with the great act of 1862, which granted 35,000,000 ting an extract from a letter received from a. very intelligent and acres of land and $65,000,000 in bonds to the Pacific railroads. There public-spirited citizen of my district: is, I repeat, a grea.t and very perceptible difference between the early Our people a-re very much annoyed by a deputy United States marshal, who em measures and the audacious projects approved by Congress in 1862 and ploys detectives to go throu~h the country to buy a hand of leaf-toiJacco. • I and since as well as the colossal plans that are now being advocated. others who furnished our bands with supplit-s; including tobacco, have bad much At the present time it would hardly be profitable to crititJise the trouble and e~rpense in going to Memphis. This marshal employs and pays a bonus to all informants. • . . action of the Government previous to 1862; but while admit tin~ that Cannot a law be passed to allow a farmer to sell oobncco of his own production to Congress did not violently transgress any constitutional provisiOn in his neighbors without license, and also allow him to sell it in small quantities to granting lands in aid of road and canals, I hold that these prece any one for consumption 1 By all means let it be settled as to whether he can sup dents by no means justify the extravagant theory that the power tQ . ply his tenants and employes with it without first taking out the ~0 license. provide for the common defense and promote the general welfare This extra~t will serve to show, Mr. Speaker, how extremely vexa authorizes the Government to appropriate money in lavish profusion tious and annoying the law ha become in certain portions of the conn in aid of various enterprises which by some possibility may benefit try through the superserviceable zeal of irresponsible aurl unprincipled the people, but n,t. an expenditure double the amount necessary and . Government agents ; and I only express the opinion of thousands in out of ail proportion in comparison with the advantages conferred. the section of country in which I live, including all classes from the As for myself, I adhere to the old-fashioned, but as I believe correct., wealthy planter to the poor laborer, when I say that there is to-day doctrine that Congress is limited in its powers but supreme within upon the statute-book of this Govrnment no law which excites so its sphere of action, and that it possesses no powers except tho e ex much dissatisfaction, prejudice, and discontent as the Jaw under con pressly granted by the Const;itution or to be derived by necessary im sideration. It violates grossly their traditional and cherished ideas plication from that instrument. of freedom in the disposition of the fruits of their labor. It affects In these days of liberal and free construction, our hopes of pros injuriously their material welfare by circumscribing thdr markets perity can only be realized by returning to the old methods of th_ought and remitting them to the proverbial mercy of soulless monopolies. a-nd to that reverence for the Constitution which it is now the com It outrages their seuse of equal right aud justice by subordinating mon pmctice to ridicule and deride. tlleir weal to the prosperity of a favored manufacturing class to whose My adversaries in opposition·to the preceding views may cite there insatiable greed they are ruthlessly sacrificed. It should not, there cent opinion of the Supreme Court in U nit,ed Statesvs. The Union Pacific fore, be a matter of surprise that there is an emphatic popular protest Railroad Company, but that opinion confesses that the trailitional pol against it-a uui:versal demand for its repeal or modification in all icy of the country was opposed to works of internal improven;1ent built the tobacco-producing sections of the country. by or under the authority of the General GOvernment, and justifies While we would be gratified to see all restrictions removed from the incorporation and subsidizing of the Pacific railroads by a variety commerce in leaf-tobacco, it is not expected that this Congress is of insnfficien t considerations, but really on the ground that, the public· prepared tu go t.o that extent. I do, llowever, earnestly hope the mind being impressed with the necessity, demanded the construction, honorable Committee of Ways and Means in the exercise of its great of these thoronghfares without a regard to the particular means to be and responsible trust may find it neither incompa,tible with the pub employed, and the court virtually holds that under t.he circumstances . lic interest nor its sense of duty to relieve the law of at least its most a departure from the strict provisions of the Constitution was excus obnoxious features. Many bills are pending before them looking to able. But the court, in so many words, also holds that the United that end. One of them (H. H. No. 20u3) I had the honor to introduce, States Government has no constitutional power to incorporate com ancl my distinguished colleague, Mr. ATKINS, whose constituents are panies to advance private interests and to agree to aid them on account also deeply interested in thitS .subject, has embodied his views of the of supposed incidental advantages which would accrue to the public necessary modification of the law in another bill, and the attent.ion from the completion of the enterprises. of the committee is now invited to them in connection 'vith others In the incorporation of the Pacific railroads Congress is supposed upon·the same subject. I trust that in any event their deliberations to have acted, not for the benefit of private persons nor in their in may lead them to conclusions at least as favorable as those rea;ched terests, but for an object deemed essential to the security of the country by the Ways and Means Committee of the last Honse, whose chair as well as its prosperity. On this point, however, Congress and the man (Mr."DAWES) reported M.ay 25, 1874, a bill (H. R. No. 3491) t.he people were wickedly misled; and in my remarks I shall, as I think, laat section of which provided that from and after its passage any clearly prove that an·subsidized railroads are virtually incorporated farmer or plant.er might "sell at the place of production tobacco of for the benefit of private persons and to advance private interests, his own growth and raising, at retail, directly to consumers to an and tllat therefore, nuder the recent' decision of the Supreme Court, amount not exceeding $100 annually." Congress has no constitutional power to aid such projects on account Unfortunately it failed to become a law; and I simply refer to it of the supposed incidental advantages which may or may not accrue now, in conclusion, for the purpose of respectfully commending to the to the public. In proof of this position I have only to give a succinct present committee the liberal spirit which their predecessors charged history of the operations of the Pacific railroads, drawing my materials with the same delicate trust brought to the consideration of this im- chiefly from printed public documents, but supplementing this with portant subject. · a truthful account of the burdens under which the people of the Pacific coast are groaning by reason of the oppressions of these mammoth THE DANGERS OF GOVERNMENT SUBSIDmS. . corporations. Mr. PIPER. I avail myself of the present opportunity to address 'l'he operations of these various railroad companies are based upon you on a subject of great importance not only to the people of the tile act of Con~ess of July 1, 1862, (Statutes at Large, volume 12, Pacific States, but to the people of the whole United States. I mean page 489,) and Its various supplements. This act incorporated the the subject of subsidies, either of lands or money, granted by Gov Union Pacific Railroad Company, with enormous grant.s of land and ernment to railroad corporations. money, and admitted to similar privileges the Central Pacific" of Ca.l In making these remarks I shall be obliged to oppose the arguments fornia, the Leavenworth, Pawnee and Western of Kansas, the Pacific heretofore advanced in this body; but trusting to the inherent strength Railroad of Missouri, and t.he Hannibal and Saint Joseph of .Missouri. of my positions, I have no fear that I shall fail in proving that the The right of way through the public lands, two hundred feet in width projects of subsidies, either of money or lands, in aid of internal im on each side of the track, was granted, together with the grounds for provements, now pressed upon the attention of the House with so depots and shops, and the right tQ take from the adjacent public lands mueh perseverance, are, from the greatest to the least, unwise and timber, stone, and o'ther materials for the construction oi the road. improvident, will not produce a. tithe of the benefits promised by There were also granted five alternate sections of land per mile on their advocates, and will as heretofore promote the interests of the each side of said railroads wit.hin the limits of ten miles; all mineral corporators, and not those of the people. lands, with the exception of the timber thereon, being excepted. I shall endeavor not to comment unjustly on any individual or cor The Secretary of the Trea.sury was authorized to issue to said com poration, but at the same time I shall censure as severely as ·they de- panies United States bonds at the rate of $16,000 per mile, it being 2328 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, provided that the issue of said bonds and their delivery to the com gress on the Pacific Railroads; presented March 1, 1873, also throws panies should constitute a first mortgage on the roads and their eqnip great light upon the collusive proceedings of the directors of tho menta. It was also provided that all compensation for services ren Union Pacific, who were the managers of the Credit Mobilier. From dered for the Government should be applied to the payment of said that investigation it appears that the Credit Mobilier represented the bonds and interest, and that at least 5 per cent. of the net earnings cost of constructing eleven hundred miles of road to be $7 ,945,012, should be annually set aside as a sinking fund. or an average of $71,768 per mile. The railroad company, however, All lands within fifteen miles of any designated route were ordered paid $94,646,288 in stock and bonds under the contracts with Hoxie, to be withdrawn from pre-emption, private entry, and sale after a map Ames, and Davis, guaranteed by the Credit Mobilier; and tbeso con of the line had been filed in the Interior Department. tractors actually expended only $50,720,959, leaving a profit in stock Upon the mountainous portions of the road a bond subsidy was and bonds of $43,925,329, which, reduced to cash, produced at least granted of $3'2,000 a mile and $42,000 a mile, according to the difficul $~~,000,000. ~ies of construction, and 25 per cent. and on the mountain section 15 This brief account is sufficient to show that the schemes of the per cent. of the bonds were ordered to be reserved out of each install audacious projectors of the Union Pacific were conceived in rascality ment to secure the construction of the roads. and carried out in fraud. And while thus coining money by the To mincls of ordinary iotelli~ence these munificent grants would mere exercise of their wits in consequence of the improvident bounty seem sufficiently liberal, but tne terms were not satisfactory to the of the Government, the directors of the Union Pacific conceived the greedy speculators, and another act of Congress, that of July 2, 1864, happy idea of refusin~ to pay the interest on the Government subsidy was passed by which other and more immense privileges were granted bonds until the prine1pal became due at the end of thirty years. By to these companies. The number of sections of land granted was this miraculous conception the Government will actually be obliged increased from five to ten per mile on each side, the selection was to pay on these bonds, principal aud compound interest, $164,964,887, allowed to be made within twenty miles of the line, and all the lands while the company will only pay, principal and simple interest, within twenty-five miles were directed to be withdrawn from pre 78,400,000, and thus the Government will suff~r an actua,l Joss of emption and sale. The term "mineral lands" was construed so as to $86,564,887. But this outrage on decency I shall leave for the present, exempt from reservation all coal and iron lands, and thus the com intending to comment upon it more at length toward the close of panies were enabled to secure a monopoly of these valuable products, my remarks. The directors also refused to set aside 5 per cent. of the more valuable than those of the precious metals. The full amount net earnings as a sinking fnn With a desire to own every pass and natural avenue to the Pacific, have again been made against Mr. Huntington and his associates, anfl the directors, by well-known means, also t~ecured control of the Soot b instead of demanding a thorough investigation of his conduct, throw ern Pacific Railroad Company, a corporation formed October 11, 1870, ing open the books of his company for examination, be maintains an by t.he consolidation of the San Francisco and San Jose, the Southern impenetrable silence, and will not answer the simplest question, how Pacific of California, the Santa Clara and Pajar6 Valley, and the Cal ever remote, lest by any possibility it may give a clew to his mys ifornia Railroad Companies. The Southern Pacific Railroad t>f Cali terious course. In his recent argument and examination before the fornia should not be confounded with the Southern Pacific Railroad Honse Committee on Pacific Railroads be could not· give the name of Texa~, a corporation of which a great deal has been said. of any one of the officers or directors of the Contract and Finance In my remarks in connection with the just~mentioned railroads I Company, or its p·resent successor, the Western Development Com shall expose the operations of a ring of California speculators, who pany, bnt relied upon the memory of Judge Brown, who was equally since 1861 have been engaged in plundering the peopleofthe United oblivious. And here let me remark tha.t the late contest before the States &nd in oppressing the citizens of the Pacific coast. Committee on Railroads to control the wuthern route to the Pacific The schemes of these men to secure immense profits in the con has disclosed the secret maneuverings of Huntington and the plallij struction of roads to the Pacific were similar to those of the Credit by which he keeps on~ of the market all the Government lands and Mobilier of America; but as no real investigation of their conduct compels the settler to buy from his companies at exorbitant rates. has ever been made either in the courts or in Congress, the precise COST OF THE CENTRAL PACIFIC RAILROAD. particnlars of their projects can only be conjectured. This fact, how ever, is certain, t.hat five of the confederates having resolved to cheat I have already given a statement of the condition of the Union one of their innocent and honest stockholders, he was obliged, June Pacific, and I shall now present a similar statement in regard to the 21, 1870, to commence a snit to protect his rights; and the disclosures Central Pacific, taken from their annual report for the year 187 4, the in his complaint at once aroused the attention of the people of California latest source of information: tot he serious dangers threatened by the plots of the autocrats who were Fil'8t·morl~tage bonds . • • . . • . . • • . . • • . . • • • • • • . • • • . • • • • • . • • • • • • • • • . • . • • • • t25, 883, 000 Convertible ruort.gage...... •.. .•.. •.. ••••••.••.••. .•..••.. •... .•.•.• 1,483, 000 resolved to rule or min the State. Although the suit was never brought Land·graut bonds ...... ••. ·········-··...... 9, 049, (;00 to a hearing, yet the facts alleged were so strongly supported by affi Western Pacific bonds...... 2, 735,000 davits of respectable persons a.nd were so convincingly presented, California. and Oregon bonds . . . . . • . . . • • • . . . . • • . • . • . • . . . • . • • • • • • • . • • • • • 6, 000, 000 that the defendants at once admitted the· truth ot the charges by Central Pacific, (C. and 0. division)...... •••••.••••••• 1, 291,000 San Joaquin Valley bonds ...... 6, OSO, 000 compromising the case. San Francisco and Oakland...... 500,000 Under these circumstances the account given by Samuel Brannan, State-aid bond.s ...... • . . . . • . . • • • . • . . . . . • . . . . • • • • • • • • . . • . . • . • • • . . • • . t, 500, 000 the plaintift' in this suit, may be considered as substantially true. Capital stock, (paid in) ..••••••• :...... 54, 275, 500 He asserts that C. P. Huntington, Leland Stanford, Mark Hopkins, Total bond.s and stock .•••••..••••.•••••.•..••.••••••••••••••••• 108, 796, 500 Charles Crocker, E. B. Crocker, and others, being a majority of the United States subsidy bonds...... • . . • . •. . • •• . ••.. •. • •• .•• • •• •••• •• 27,855, 680 directors of t.he Central Pacific, formed themselves into a company --- styled the Contract and Finance .Company, for: the purpose of taking Grand total .••...••.•.•..••••.•.•••..••••.•••••..••••••••••• ~ _.. 136, 652, 180 contracts for the construction of the road at rates largely in excess The actual cost of the road and equipment.s is placed at $140,803,789. of the sum at which the work could have been let out to responsible The company claims that under the grant of 12,800 acres per mile parties. The s~id directors then entered into a contract with them for 1,033 miles of road it is entitled to at least 11,72'2,400 acres, worth selves, as members of this fictitious corporation, for the construction at the minimum p1ice $29,543,000, and says that these are its most of the Central Pacific, and transferred to the Contract and Finance va,luable assets. It owns in addition the undivided half of 60 acres Compa.ny the entire subsidies of land, money, and bonds granted by in Mission Bay, San Francisco, 500 acres water-front at Oakland, and the United States, the States of California and Nevada, and various 140 acres and the water-front at Sacramento, the estimated v:alue of municipal corporations of California in aid of the enterprise. They all which, exclusive of improvements, iB $7,750,000. These valuable also granted to Wells, Fargo & Co. the exclusive right of running assets are therefore worth $37,293,000. express trains for the transportation of freight, packages,. and bull ion over the Central Pacific, and received as pay for the concession SOUTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD. stock in tha't company. They also bought up the stock of competing I shall now turn my attention to the Southern Pacific Railroad. railroads, and, receiving the subsidy bonds from the United St.ates, ap This road is the favmite bantling of Huntington, Stanford, and their propriated to themselves the profits of said roads. By means of associates, and although the former gentleman has nominally with fraudulent devices, they so mana.ged their operations, principally drawn from the direction and taken the comparatively bumble posi through the Contract and Finance Company, a~ to earn immense tion of purchasing agent in New York, he is the ruling spirit of the . profits, recklessly increasing the cost of building the Central Pacific combination, and his operations for the last ten yea-rs in this connec to double or treble the amount necessary. · tion present striking proofs of .be multifarious projects born in his In order to obtain these immense grants of land and money, and to fertile brain. procure the re-organization of the competing railroads purchased by The Southern Pacific Railroad of California wa.s incorporated No them, and to secure their re-election as officers thereof, they expended vember 29, 1865, under the general railroad act of that State. The vast sums of money in lobbying, and in carrying out their schemes articles of association provided for the construction of a continuous generally they rode rough-shod over the people of the Pacific coast, liner from San Francisco through the counties of Santa Clara, Mon using every conceivable mode of oppression. These grave charges are terey, San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Tulare, Los Angeles, and San substantially confirmed by the reluctant testimony of Richard Franchot Diego, to the town of San Die~o; thence eastward to the east line of and C. P. Huntington, given in the early part of 1~3 before. the special California, there to connect With a contemplated line from the Mis committee of this House appointed to investigate the operations of sissippi River. Not a single mile of this road had been constructed the Central Pacific. when on July 'J:I, 1866, an act of Congress incorporating the Atlantic As all the records and books of the company were in Sacramento, and Pacific Railroad authorized the.Sonthern Pacific of California to ·- and as most of the persons concerned in t.he construction of the road connect therewith, and in aid of its construction made large granta lived in California, the committee were unable to make a complete in of pn blic lands as well as of the right of way. vestigation before the Forty-second Congress expired; but they ex On January 3, 1867, this Southern Pacific of California filed in amined the two witneBJ!eB just mentioned, who seemed to have lost the General Land Office a map of the route which had been selected. their memories and were bright and shining specimens of the "don't But in fact this line was not based upon actual surveys; for the in recollect " class. terval of time was too short for the work, and it is believed that . Richard Franchot, the lobbyist, testified that he was employed in Huntington or someone by his direction had drawn ared,.pencilline watching over the interests of the Central Pacific at Washington and on a map of the State of California and had sent the same to the other places, subject to the call of the president of the road; but he General Land Office. The line so selected and so filed did not corre would not specify any one act of the services he performed at a salary spond with the chartered line, as it did not touch the connties of San of $20,000 per annum. · Luis ObispQ, Los Angeles, and San Diogo, and did not approach the Huntington, the vice-president of the road, in his examination, with town of San Diego nearer than ono hundred aml fifty miles. The crafty obtuseness forgot the particulars of his numerous transactions, filing of this spurious survey, however, accomplished the intended ob limited alllilil answers by the vague phrase "I am under the impres ject, for it caused the withdrawal and reservation _of all the odd sion," professed ignorance on every point on which he was questioned, numbered sections of public lands in California on a bfllt sixty miles and had no distinct recollection of any one thing. Persistently pur wide from San Francisco to the Colorado River, containing an a1·ea sued in all his windin~s through a maze Of eva~ions, when at last of 6,000,000 acres. It also enhanced the price of the even-num brought to bay he admLtted that persons active in the management bered sections to $2.50 an. acre. At this time not a single mile of of the Central Pacific had received considerable values ns profits on road had been built, and only $1,829 had been expended for surveys. contracts for its construction; be also admitted that the practical The first annual report was filed by Huntington, who transmitted it control of the Central Pacific and of the Contract and Finance Com to Washington from the New York office of the Central Pacific. On pany was in the same parties at the time of the signing of the con being informed of these irregularities on Jnne 14, 1868, Secretary struction contracts and during their execution. Browning ordered the reserved lands to be restored to the public do The same committee reported that the capital of the Central Pacific main; but Hlln tington interposed, and in 1869 the order of restoration did not represent cash, but profits on construction, and that the prop was suspended to await the action of Congress. erty of the road had pa~sed largely into the hands of its own officers, The Legislature of California on April4, 1870, permitted the South who made contracts in the company name with themselves. ern Pacific to file new articles of association and validated the change During the prescnt.session of Congress. similar damaging charges of route and location. Congress also came to the rescue; and by a ·. 2330 CONGRESSIONAL REOORD-HOUSE. APRIL · s~ joint resolution of J nne 28, 1870, (16 Statutes at Large, 382,) permitted tering gold and silver to inflnence and bny votes for this municipal the Southern Pacific to construct its road on the route indicated by subsidy. This is the way in which they have succeeded in drawing the map filed January 3, 1867, and validated the previous irregular these vast snms from the people. proceedings. About t,his time the Central Pacific, having previously The Southern Pacific Company in 1870 procured the passage through been working in the dark, now came forwardopenly and bought out the California Legislature of an act authorizing the voters of San the line then actually constructed between San Francisco and San Francisco to decide whether the city should grant a subsidy of Jose, and entered into an agreement for the extension of the line to $1!000!000 to the company. When the election came off, some of us, Gilroy. The company then set up a claim to a belt of land lying thmking that the railroads had got about enough from the public, along the line of this route, and a bitter legal war with the actual opposed and beat them at the poll; but what was our surprise when settlers ensued. they demand~d a rec~u~t by the canvassing board.! Presto, change, The land cormorants, however. were not' yet satisfied, and on Octo they. ha~ cru:ned a maJonty of the votes for the subsidy. But upon in- ber 11, 1870, the San Francisco and San Jose, the Southern Pacific of . vest1gation It was so apparent that the returns h~~:d been opened and California, the Santa Clara and Pajar6 Valley, and the California changed, that the railroacl men-the penitentiary staring them in t.be Railroad were consolidated under the name of the Southern Pacific face-abandoned their efforts to secure this million-dollar snbsidv 4 Railroad Company. • from the people of San Francisco. These two instances are evidence A contract was made with the Contract and Finance Company, of their mode of operating. and subsequently with the Western Development Company, to con These railroad speculators always become alarmed at the prospect struct and equip the whole line of road, for which they were to re of the election to office of any one whom they cannot control, from ceive mortgage bonds at the rate of $40,000 a mile and the balancfl a supervisor to a governor or President. If they had earned their. in capital stock. These immense tlonations, however, did not come va-st fortunes by legitimate means, they would certainly not be afraid \ up to the expectations of Huntington, and the act of Congress of of the election of honest men. March 3, 1871, (Statutes at Large, volume 16, page 579,) was passed, These people have controlled the Legislatures of the States throuO'h authorlzi.og the Southern Pacific to construct a line from Tehachapa which their roads are located, and also the assessors and supervisors0 of Pass, by way of Los ·Angeles, to the Texas Pacific Railroad at or near the counties. And by these means they are relieved from· the bmden the Colorado River. On April3, 1871, or within thirty clays, a map of of their just proportion of the public dues. They pay no taxes on the additional line was filed, and the lands on each side of the road their enormous land grants, as patents are not taken out until they withdrawn from private entry. The Southern Pacific has received have made contracts for the sale of the lands. By these dishonest 11,926,600 acres from the United States, and it is asking for more. means they evade their liability to pay their just proportion of the Time fails me. to speak of the Northern Pacific, with its domain of public burdens. Their mode of influencing a public officer who has 47,000,000 acres; of the Atlantic . and Pacific, with 40,000,000 acres, not been elected as their tool is to undermine his probity by gradual and of the Texas Pacific, with 17,000,000 acres. I shall therefore con advances. If the.y think an officer can by any means be tempted to clnde_my remarks with a general exposition of my views of the im violate hisduty,immediatelyaner he is elected he is apprbachedand policy of alienating such immense portions of the public domain in sounded by their emissaries-for they keep up a corps of a~ents as favor of these grasping corporations. · well organized as that of Fouche under the first French empue-and if he is at all pli.:1>ble he will be presented with a complimentary free DIPOLICY OF A.Ll.EYATING IMMENSE PORTIONS OF THE PUBLIC DOMAIN. pass over all their roads from San Francisco as far east as Omaha. Ii In the world's history no such donations of national propert.y were he happens to be a member of the legislative department of Gov ever made to individuals. No Roman Cresar ever lavished on a favor ernment, he is a.ccommodated with a special car. ite who ministered to his vices and pleasures such imperial gifts as This is only the beginning of the down ward course, and it is not have been lavished upon the few individuals composing these corpora difficult to foretell what will follow; for a public officer is already tions, and that, too, by the representatives of the people of a Repub half corruut when he condescends to accept gratuities. lic in which each and every citizen is supposed to be equal and to be The president of the Cent:ral Pacific, Leland Stanford, as be has equally entitled to the benefits flowing from Government. I suppose always done, remains in California with his corps of lobbyists to• it can only be• accounted for on the principle of placing stock" where corrupt arid manage the State Legislature. But this year, it is to be it would do the most good," as was declared by a former member of hoped, be will be foiled; for so far he bas been defeated in the lower this House when speaking of the disposition of the Credit-Mohilier house, and he will probably meet with a similar disaster in.the upper stock. It is clearly demonstrable that the Jaws, both original and m:iless he Fmcceeds in deluding three or four senators into the belief supplementary, creating these corporations were enacted simply in that he will make them governors or United States Senators in case the interests of the companies without interposing any safeguards t.o they will maintain their allegiance to him. protect the rights of the people or Government. Surelynomancould The other partner in iniquity, tho" laehrymose" Huntington, oper have voted for these laws unless he wnB grossly deceived as to their ates here in Washington with a corps of lobbyists in his train equal to ~ effect, or had other than the public interests in view. that of an Indian nabob-men some of whom, I regret to say, have The system of Government subsidies in aid of persons or of corpora held high positions here. This corps is supplemented by a band of tions is fundamentnJ.ly vicious, and is us unjust as was the granting lawyers, who are acting professionally, it is true, and who would be of monopolies and franehises by the despotic governments of the Old offended at the intimation that they ~e lobbyists; but it is hard to World before the people had any voice in the management of public determine where the lawyer ends and the lobbyist begins. affairs, and when they were considered mere chattels. However strenuous may be the denials, the Southern Pacific is un I am more especially conversant with the workings and the bale doubtedly the Central Pacific under another name and in another ful influences of this system through my knowledge of the workings guise. A mere fraction of the Southern Pacific, it is true, may be of the Central Pa-cific Railroad and its adjuncts heretofore spoken of. owned by outside parties, who have recently been taken into the This great corporation; as I have previously stated, is owned in the company, but only taken into the ring to do their dirty work and main by four men, to wit, Leland Stanford, C. P. Huntington, Mark swearing, since the four ''original Jacobs" have ah·ead;yo sworn to Hopkins, and Charles Crocker, and these four men also own the con such an extent that long since no one would believe them. trolling interest in the Southern Pacific. I have no reasonable doubt These railroa{lspecnlators have-also organized a complete system of that t.hey own three-fourths of. tho last-mentioned road. Could any black-mailing. They invariably ask to be paid for running their roads one ever have supposed that in a Republic four citizens could have through any town that may happen to lie near the projected line, and ever been the recipients of such bountiful gifts from the Government! in case their demands are refused they threaten to locate the route It may not be considered exactly chivalric to comment on individ some distance off, and start an opposition town on their own land uals upon the floor of this Honse when they have not an opportunity and go into the." lot and hotel business." This they have done in to reply here; but as B untingt.on, "the lachrymose," be.fore a commit numberless instances. In one case in Los Angeles County a gentle tee of this Congress complained of the persecutions his companies man who had a tract of land, through which the Southern Pacific were undergoin~ and of the ingratitude of the public, alter he and was running their road, generously offered them the right of way and his friends bad nsked theirfortunes in this doubtful enterprise, wast twenty acr(ls for deppt purposes. But this liberal offer waa not sat ing the best part of their lives in this patriotic work and only receiv isfactory, and they demanded four square miles of his best land. ing a dividend of 13 per cenli. upon the capital invested, as a return Upon l1is refusal to comply wirh this very modest request, they set for their great labors and hazardous risks, I believe I shall be justified their satellites to work in the Departments here at Washington, and in explain~g the ·means they used, and what and how much they have succeeded in getting an order from the Secretary of 1;he Interior risked. 1 doubt whether these men, all told, were in the ::~rggregate instituting proceedings to vacate a patent re~nlarly issued by Gov worth more than $150,000 when they embarked in this railroad enter ernment officerS over eight years ago. And they have also publicly prise; and now after twelve or thirteen years their agg1:egate wealth boasted that they will get possession of half the rancho after they amounts to as many millions as they then posoessed thousands. So have succeeded in setting aside the title and patent. How indecent these ''poor" men have been tenibJy maltrea.ted by the Government I is it. for such people to talk of fraud and corruption when the life Now, as to t.he means they have used to accumulate this colossa.l blood of their existence springs from such sources! sum. About the time they commenced this enterprise they procured Under the unwise system of subsidizing corporations, the gift of land the passage of a bill through the Legislature of California submitting is, I think, tenfold less defensible than that of money. Land is a to a vote of the people of San Francisco the questjon whether the necessity for animal existence, and legislation which gives such vast city should issue $600,000 of bonds for their benefit. Wben the elec domains to a few corporations.must be destructive of the very highest tion toolf place there was some opposition on the part of the voters, interests of the people and Government. and I was an eye-witness of a humiliating sight. The brother of Since 1861 there has been legislated into the hands of corpora this Leland Stanford was openly going about the polling-places scat- tions a tract of nearly 235,000 square miles of territory-a domain 1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2331 larger than France or the German Empire, over five times greater necess::try in this period of financial depression to facilitate their a:tlo than Pelllll3ylvania, six times as large as Ohio, and three times in European markets. larger than the island of Great Britain. This immense territory has The bonds are not to exceed $40,000 per mile in the mountains, and been granted to five cgrporations, yielding to ea section is controoted for. Besides, the bill provides that there shall be no accumu· support armies, provide and maintain a navy, and to call forth the lation of interest, because, whenever the company shall fail to pay the annual cou militia to repel invasion, Congress had the right to grant lands or pons of interest, the Government at once has the right to sell the property of the company and the road itself. Hence the Governnient would not, could not, be in money, .or both, to aid in the construction of a Pacific railroad. Yolved for only six months' interest before it would have the right to sell and in The grant of about thirty-five million acres of land and tho loan or demnify i t$1£. And o.s the bonds are only issued o.s the road is constructed, no large nearly $65,000,000 in bonds to the Union and Central Pacific Com amount of bonds would at any time be upon the market. panies, in 1862; the grant of about forty-seven millions to the North I invoke especial attention to this point and challenge refut.'ltion. Observe~ in oriler that the Governmf'.nt shall be certainly protected, the company is requireu to ern Pacific, in 1864, and the still later grants to the Atlantic and Pa pav the interest every April aml October; that i.<4, overy six months. Now, suppose cific and the T~xas and Pa-cific companies, together with the fact that t.he company shall build as much as one hundred miles in six months, which. that the legality of these grants· have never been questioned, affor(\ is, p erhaps, a large estimate, and should fail fA> provide for theintere8t, amounting the strongest evidence that Congress does not override any constitu ro t\87,500, when due, it is the privil~~e of the Government to foreclose the mortgage ancl sell enough of the property of t..n.e company at once to re-imburse itself for any tional provision in granting the boon demanded by this bill. payment it may have made. It appears from a report of the Secretary of the Treasury made to Before Congress chartered the Union and Central Pacific raHway the Senate January 7, 1874, that there was expended upon public companies~ the cost of Army transportation alone was 7,357,7!:!1 per works of the National Government in the United States and Terri annum, which has now been reduced to about $500,000, t.he reduction tories from June 30, 1865, to June 30, 1875, and by the United States being largely in excess of the amount necessary to pay the interest on in aid of construction of canals, railroads, and wagon-roads, from the greatest amount of bonds that can _be issued. As there are about 1789 to 187::J, the sum of $207,999,664.77. l. forty military post-s and eleven regiments of troops that will naturally The recent decision of the Supreme Court in the cases of the Union draw their supplies from the line of the Texas and Pacific road, there Pacific Railroad Company, rlist.inctly recognizing the right of Congress can be no doubt, in the event of its construction, that the GQvernment to construct works of internal improvement national in character, in \ would annually save more than its maximum liability under the pro addition to the precedents already a.{lclnced, ought to be sufficient posed bill. As additional testimony that the security offered to the warrant for our support of this measure, if we believe the speedy con- Government is more than ample to protect it against loss by reason struction of the road is a national necessitv. · of its guarantee, I call your a;ttention to the recent report of the Union To prove that the construction of the Tex.as and Pacific road is nec and Central Pacific companies, which shows the net earnings of that essary to meet the demands of increasing trade and commerce, and line of twenty-two hundred and fifty miles in length to have been that public sentiment on the Pacific slope is in it.s favor, I desire to 6,279 per mile during the last year. introduce in evidence a few extracts from the argument of Hon. PE Th~ report of the Secretary of the Interior for 1875 shows that for TER D. WIGGINTON, member from the southern district of California~ the year ending June 30, 1875, the net earnings of three hundred and a gentleman for whom I have the highest regard, recently delivered twenty-six miles of the Texas and Pacitic, now in operation, amounted in opposition to this measure before the House Committee on the Pa to 1,742,000 per mile; only $8 per mile less than the interest on the cific Railroad. He said: -proposed bonds. · I recognize that to the people of San Diego and San Bernardino Connties the The Railroad Committee of the last House of Representatives, re building of a direct line from Texas to the Pacific seaboard at San Dierro is a ques tion of grave moment. I recognize fully their wishes and desires in the matter, porting on this subject, say: but I do not believe it can be any better, and certainly not as I'ea(lily accomplished It is evident that the construction of this road (the Texas and Pacific) will en upon the plan contemplated in the Texas and Pacific bill as by other plans which able t.he Government ro withdraw thres-fourths of the troops DOW stationed in the have been or may be suggested; but the whole people of my dlstrict feel the need • country traversed by it and rendertheremaining fourth far more efficient than the of another transcontinental road, and that too below the snow belt. whole force now employed there. .Again he says: Who can doubt that the Texas Pacific road, traversing a region The speedy construction of a transcontinental railway from California to Texas, unsurpassed in agricultural resources, with a climate unexcelled, to connect tliere with the vast railway system of the East, is, I will venture to say, and pre.gnant with the ore of every precious metal, will not derive a of far more importance ro the people I represent than ro those of any other con much larger annual revenue than the Union and Central PacificT gressional distriot in the country. I venture the assertion, Mr. Speaker, that few of the honest oppo Now I find in the same argument that the gentleman's district com nents of this measure have ever maturely reflected upon its provis prises the nineteen southernmost counties of the State of California, ions. Opposition ought to vanish when the fact becomes apparent as and is more than one-half the size of the second largest State in the the noonday sun that the Government will reap a golden harvest in Union.. It ha-s an area of one hundred thousand square miles and a stead of incurring a pecuniary liability. Its passage would be fol population of two hundred thousand souls, and has taxable property lowed by an immense immigration into the States and Territories of of t.he value of $275,000,000. Taking it for granted that the people the Pacific, which must augment not only the revenue from imports, of the nineteen southern counties of California are unanimous in favor but also the revenue from the increa-se in the sale of public lands now of the construction of the thirty-second parallel road, let \J.s ascertain almost worthless because inaccessible. The mines of Arizona, Lower how the remaining portion of the population of that State feel upon California, and Mexico, now unproductive, would be developed, and the subject. would doubtless produce as much gold and silver annually M Cali Last fall the democratic party of California adopted a platform fornia and Nevada. To aid the· construction of the road at this par of which the following was one of its planks: ticular time would be the wisest economy. Moneyt material1 and Ruolved, That we favor the speedy completion of a transcontinental railroad on labor are cheaper now by 50 per cent. than when the Union and Cen the thirty-second parallel, subject to such limitations by the Federal and State tral Pacific roads were built. It would restore a healthy business governments as shall protect the rights of the people. confidence, would furnish employment to thousands of laborers and Now, I undertake to say that that resolution had direct reference mechanics, and would do much toward restoring prosperity to the to the construction of the Texas andPacific road, in the manner pro 00~~. • vided by the pending bill. This measure had been agitated during Mr. ~peaker, it is contended that this bill is object,ionable for the the last session of Congress, and for a long time had attracted the reason that the grant of the aid demanded is in violation of the or attention of the people of California. They were familiar with the ganic law of the land, which we have sworn t.o maintain. nature of its terms and well knew that it was the only railroad bill I do not intend to discuSij at length the constitutionality of the ever presented to Congress for consideration which contained ample grant, nor do I consider a profound knowledge of the provisions of and explicit provisions for the protection of the rights of the people. the Constitution at all necessary to guide my judgment upon this They were aware of the fact that the Texas and Pacific Rail way question. I deem it sufficient to tread the beaten pathway of prece Company, in consideration of the aid demanded to further the con dent carved out by the wisest st:•tesmen of this country. The par struction of their road, gave the full control and management of it liamentary history of our country for the last forty years contains to the Congress of the United States. abundant evidence that even the apostles of the doctrine of a strict That plank in the platform could have no reference to the Southern construction of the Constitution favored liberal appropriations for Pacific Railway Company, for up to that time they never made any the construction of canals, the improvement of the rivers of the in offer to the Government to construct the thirty-second parallel road terior, and the harbors of the great lakes. Constitutional scruples subject to any greater limitatioll8 or restriction in favor of tbe rights should vanish when we are admonished that the great Webster, Cal of the people than is imposed in the charters creating the Union and houn, Monroe, Dougla.s, and Benton recognized the right and duty Central Pacific companies. of the Government to appropriate money to coll8truct roads and The democrats, with that plank in their platform, carried California canals of a national character. by 301000 majority. In the great presidential struggle of 1856 the democratic party in The democratic party of California has been uniformly an anti convention assembled at Cincinnati solemnly resolved that 1t recog rv,ilroad or anti-monopoly party, and when they adopted that resolu nized the great importance in a political and commercial point of tion it was in deference to public opinion, which loudly ca11ed for view of a safe and speedy communication between the Atlantic and relief fro:q:1 the monstrous exactions of the Central and Southern Pa Pacific Oceans, and that it was the duty of the Government to exer cific companies, which I will hereafter show are identical in interest. cise all its coll8titutional power to the attainment of that object. Why, sir, on the very day +,he railroad convention assembled in The republican party the same year, in Philadelphia, asserted by Saint Louis the Alta California, one of the leading newspapers of San resolution that the Federal Government ought to render immediate Francisco, and a recognized organ of the Central Pacitic, bowing assistance to the construction of a road on the thirty-second parallel gracefully to public sentiment, declared in a well-written editorial to tho Pacific, and at that time no warning voice was raised in either that the country needed the Texas and Pacific road and that the Gov party against a threatened invasion of the Constitution. Buchanan, ernment should aid it to the extent of at least ~,ooo,ono, but that a Rtrict constructionist, in his inaugural address laid down the doc Leland Stanford should be permitted to take all he could build from trine that under the constitutional power to declare war, to raise and the west till he should_meet Scott coming from the east. 1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2333 It would seem strange indeed if public opinion were otherwise in not keeping step to the music of progress than that her circulating California when we consider somo of the causes most instrumental in medium is gold and silver instead of paper. He might have asserted its creation. It is a notorious fact, that since the completion of the without fear of contradiction that, with all her unrivaled advan Central Pacific roa,d many of the great political struggles in that tages, she can never enter the lists of competition with many of her State have been determined by the magnitude of its corrupt influence. sister States until every branch of her industries, now lai,Jguishing be Its directors and agents have uniformly attempted to control State neath the exactions of this monopoly, shall be stimulated by the con- legislation in their favor; they have subsidized newspapers of prom struction of an opposing and competing line. . inence, and visited their vengeance on independent journals of r~ I hope I have not incurred the ~spleasure of my brother members spectability that dared to warn the people of their a~gressions. from California in referring to matters in their State. I trust they I will cite one instance, that of the Sacramento Umon, not long ago will not deem me guilty of encroaching upon their high prerogative one or the most prosperous a.nd influential newspapers in the West. by undertaking to prove the condition of the public mind there. It was found in the cabin of every miner of California and was ~ Such a course was necessary to prove the justice of my cause, and garded all the great molder of opinion. It refused to bow to the was prompted by the belief that public opinion on this question was behests of the magnates of the Central Pacific, and was consequently crystallized and unmistakable. marked for destruction. . Believing that I have shown beyond all reasonable doubt the abso They who enjoyed the favor of the mighty corporation withdrew lute necessity to the people of California of an opposition line to the tbeir advertisements and stopped their subscriptions. Its general Pacific Ocean, I desire now to enter the protest of the constituency distribut.ion was interdicted by an arbitrary mandate prohibiting its I have the honor to represent against the discriminating policy of the sale on the cars or at any of the stations along the entire line. This Central Pacific company, unrelentingly enforced in the State of Ne persecution was kept up for four years, until the Union fell beneath vada, which is traversed from east to west by their line of railroad. it. Its property, which had been valued at$300,000, was. sold at auc Nevada aa well as California has been liberal in her donations to tion for 45,000, the Central Pacific corporation being the purcha.ser. the Central Pacific, and ought to be entitled to some consideration. But, Mr. Speaker, there are graver reasons than any yet presented Her people united with those of California in rejoicing over the com which influence the people of California in favor of the construction pletion of the road, believing it was intended to facilitate and of an independent and competing road. They are easily discovered cheapen transportation and develop her hidden treasures. But by an inspection of the schedule rates for freight and fares between hardly had the shriek of the first locomotive been heard on the sage New York and San Francisco, and by the system of unjulit discrimi~ brush than we were doomed to a most bitter disappointment. It was nation on roads controlled by the Central Pacific within her borders. the signal for the inauguration of an arbitrary and exorbitant sys In this I am partially corroborated by tl!e gentleman from Southern tem of freight tariffs, remarkable for discrimination between locali California, [Mr. WIGGINTON,] who in the argument to which I have ties, a.nd in favor of California as against Nl'vada. before alluded said that "there is much complaint that these rail To illustrate: I live, sir, in Virginia City, the largest city between roads are permitted to charge what seems to be too much for freights Denver, Colorado, and San Francisco, and perhaps the wealthiest in and fares over their lines, and I am of -opinion that in some cases the the world in proportion to its population. complaint is just." From Virginia City we connect by a focal railroad fifty-one miles The following freight tariff for the year 1875 indicates what the in length wtth the main stem of the Central Pacific at Reno, two hun people of the Pacific coast may expect if the routes by land and sea dred and ninety-eight miles from San Francisco. Our merchants liv are controlled by the Central Pacific. ing in the shadow and awe of this grasping monopoly dare not have On the tariff of Februanr 3, 1875, their rates were, per one hun their merchandise purchased in New York consigned to the city of dred pounds: Jt'irst class, !l.25; second class, $2; third class, $1.90; Virginia, for the freight rates are higher than they are clear through fourth class, $1.80, with special classes aa against sailing-ships around to San ~,ran cisco and back again. Cape Hor:p. for low-grade freight running from $1.70 to $1.40. If a merchant desires to ship one hu_.,_dred pounds of goods from On the 4th of March, 1875, the day Congress a{ljourned, they ad New York to a local station on the Central Pacific road in the State vanced their tariff to-First class, $5; second cl~, $4; third class, of Nevada, say Winnemucca, which is four hundred and sixty miles $3; fourth cla86, 2.50; showing an advance of from 40 to 100 per cent. east of San Francisco, he is compelled to pay the through rate to San On the 29th of March, 187'5, they made their rates-First class, $5; Francisco, $6 per hundred, and in addition to that the local rate from second class, $5 ; third class, $4 ; fourth class, $3. San Francisco to Winnemucca, $2.29, making $8.29 per one hundred Owing to the establishment of this tariff, though forty millions of pounds. 1,ounds of through freight less than in 1874 passed over the road, its But discrimination in freight is not all the people of Nevada have earnings were $13,300 per mile; an increase of 15 per cent. to suffer. The fare from San Francisco to New York is $1!l8. We in I wish to call the attention of the democratic members from Cali Nevada are from three hundred to five hundred miles east, yet if we fornia to the t·eport of the committee on corporations of the Califor desire to take a trip to New York we a,r_, compelled to pay at any of uia Legislature, made on the 15th day of February, 1876, by its chair the way stations on the line the full rate of fare, $138. man, L . .Archer, one of the purest men and brightest intellects in that Such is the brief outline of the system of discrimination that ie State. That committee made a thorough investigation of the conduct preying upon the vitals of our people and eating out their substance. ofthe Central Pacific and other roads within t.heStateforthe purpose For years it bas been vehemently but vainly denounced by every of comparing their tariff rates with those of eight of the great rail journal in the Stat~. Judging by the past and the present, there is roads of the country. The report, as it appears in the San Francisco no shadow of hope in the future if this measure be defeated. Post, shows that by the Stanford and Huntington monopoly the We have been told by Leland Stanford, the presi~ent of the Cen charges on all through nnd local freights per ton per mile are- tral Pacific and the head and front of the Southern facific, that the More tb:m the Union Pacifte, 98.3 per cent.; more than the Lake Shore and Mich· main feature of his grand continental railway system is discrimina igan Southern, 67.8 per cent.; more than the Pennsylvania CentraL 338.0 per cent. tion in favor of the c~ty of San Francisco. more than the New York Central, 111.1 per cent.; more than the New York and We of Nevada are principally old Californians. We rejoice in the Erie, 140.1 per cent.; more than the Pittabur_!!h, Fort Wayne and Chicago, 387.0 prosperity of the Queen City of the West, and believe the day not per cent.; moro than the Atlantic and Great Western, 277.3 per cent. ; more than the Alleghany Valley, 330.4percent. Hereareeightroads. Theyavera.geinlength far distant when she will rival in magnificence the greatest commer 1,088 mill'.s, which is a greater distance th:m from San Francisco to Ogden ; and the cial mart of the nation. Half of the life-blood that circulates in her Central Pacific ch.'\rges for transport{ltiou of frei~ht an average of more than 225 veins comes from the bone and muscle of the hardy miners of Ne per cent. above their tariff rates; while the operating expenses of the monopoly av vada. The most costly of her garments, the most brilliant of the era:re 40 per cent. leas a difference of 265 per cent. against the business community of Valifornia. Examining the cha.rges for first-claSs through passengers, we fina gems that sparkle in her diadem, and the most palatial of her man that tho average difference is 96 per cent. against us, and is greater yet for the sions have been purchased by their industry. They will pour into other classes o! passengers. her coffers this very year a stream of gold and silver bullion which, The road from Lathrop to Goshen, 146 miles is level, while the road from San Fran· if properly directed, would in a short time sweep from the land all cisco to Sacramento Vity, 140 miles, crosses the Coast R:mge of mountains; still the rates to Goshen are from 100 to400percent. greater than from San Francisco to Sac of our fractional currency. But we protest against the policy which ramento, while the rates from Sacramento to Red Bluff' are from 100 to 300 per cent. builds up great cities at the railro~d termini at the expense of locali- greater than the San Francisco and S.. cramento charges. The rate.~ per ton per mile ties of the interior. . are found to be from 3:l to lOOper cent. greater in the San Joaquin than in the Sacra mento Valley, except for fourth class, which is 8 per cent. less. Certainly no just Owing to our geographical position we cannot expect to be an equal cause for this discrimination exists. All these stations being on valley roads, the participator with the people of California in the blessings that must cost of transportation per mile should be equal. spring from the construction of the Texas and Pacific road; but we From San Francisco east to the State line, 278 milt>s, the Central Pacific tariff claim the right to sound the tocsin of alarm to the countless thousands on staple articles like coal.oil is now $11.70 in coin per ton, while the freight on coal-oil in the same quantities from New York to San Francisco is only $30m cur· that contemplate settling in the rich sections of country through rency. In other words, the discrimination against shippers within this State is which it passes, and to the people of this country, lest congressional more than 1,500 per cent.; and the same ia true in relation to such articles as sheet legislation should give the control of this great national highway to iron, rope, and rron pipe, which are brought from New Ym·k to San Francisco for the Central Pacific Railroad Company. from $30 to $35 per ton in currency, but cannot be shipped east to the State line for less than e;J4.80 in coin. Mr. Speaker, the people of California and Nevada, of Arizona and New Mexico, are not the only parties interested in this most impor The honorable gentleman· from Pennsylvania, [Mr. KELLEY,] for tant measure. From twelve to fifteen millions of people, represented whose ability I entertain the highest respect, in his celebrated speech by eight hundred and sixty-nine delegates, and representing every on finance, drew a comparison between the increasing prosperity of variety of business interests, have in soJemn conclave at Saint Louis Minnesota and California, to the disparagement of the latter. A care last November raised their nnited voices in favor of the construction ful exam~atiou of the above reports, in my humble judgment, would of the Texas and Pacific road in the manner designated in the bill. have furrushed a better and stronger reason why the Golden State is The propriety of its speedy construction has been urged upon Con- CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, gress by resolutions of the Legislatures of ten great States, and by the He mi~bt have made a similar affidavit to-day without any fear of chambers of commerce of New Orleans, Memphis, Cincinnati, Vicks committmg perjury, for during the la:~t five years the secretary, Jand burgb, Richmond, Saint Louis, Augusta, Louisville, Atlanta, Macon, agent, superintendent, and several directors of the Central have held Indianapolis, Pittsburgh, and the Cotton Exchange of Nashville. They corresponding positions in the contract and finance company of the re pectfully'])etition Congress to loan the credit of the Government to Southern Pacific. further its construction, for the reason that it is the most practicable The parties contracting to build the Southern built the Central. and preferable ronte, and w b ich, in the language of Benton, " is the one Besides, the Southern Pacific road is only a.n extension of the Cen demancled by every national consideration." They believe the people tral, it being admitted that the two hundred and twenty-eight miles of the United States are entitled to a road below the snow belt, so of road rtmning from Oakland to Stockton and from Lathrop to that transportation of troops and munitions of war may not be re Goshen is owned and controlled by the Central Pacific. tarded in case of Indian insurrection or invasion of the Paciiic States If these two corporations have an identity of interest, it is not and Territories by a foreign foe. Our merchants demand the construc difficult to detect th13 secret of their opposition to the Government tion of this road, over which the products of our land, the imports of aid asked to assist in the construction of the Texas and Pacific road. the Orient, and the islands of the Paciiic may pass without interrup The road being necessarily independent and competing, and running tion from the great snow blockades so frequent this winter on the below the snow belt through sections of our country richer in a!!l'i Central Paciiic. cultural, and with one exception in mineral wealth, than any t:'av Experience has demonstrated that the Union and Central Pacific ersed by the Union and Central, is destined to reap a great revenue, Company's line is totally inadequate to supply the increasi;tg d~ Whatever may be it.s profits, they lessen to that extent the receipts of mands of trade and commerce, by reason of the great uncertamty m the latter, which last yeat amounted in gross to nearly $26,000,000, the delivery of freight in the winter season, and the wl1Ilt of restric The net receipts of the Central alone were nearly 6,500 per mile, and tions in their charters in favor of the rights of the people. its managers, originally poor men, according to Mr. LUTIRELL, :us Let us now ascerta.in from what quarter comes the most serious op now among the wealthiest in the land. In order to secure their present position to this bill. Is it not from the Central Pacific Railroad Com and prospective revenue, they propose by the Luttrell bill to con~ pany, which, though a distinct corporation, owns and controls the struct the thirt.y-second parallel road without any governmental Southern Pacific f Since the c.ommencement of this session its a~ents guarantee of interest on construction bonds, if Congress will give and attorneys have made more speeches before committees than nave them the Texas and Pacific land grant. been made by the most eloquent members of this body in the course Now, if Congress had the power to declare a forfeiture in this in of legislation. They even dared to attack the measure on the gJ.'ound stance (which l deny) and did subsidize the Southern and Central that the Government aid solicited partook of the character of a sub Pacific with the Texas and Pacific land grant, can any one believe sidy, in face of the fact that the honorable member from California the road will be ever constructed f [Mr. LUTTRELL] introduced a bill, the object of which was to further In order to believe the offer a serious and honest one, we must do subsidize the Southern Pacific Company, declaring the land grant of violence to every rule that governs human actions. We will witness the Texas and Pacific lapsed and forfeited, and bestowing it on them. for the first time the strange spectacle of a rich corporation beg A subsidy is infamous when asked for the Texas and Pacific, but when ging for a chance to construct another road over which they can ex demanded by the CentraJ. Pacific for the Southern Pacific it is wise ercise no control, and which must materially reduce their profits. economy. Give them the land grant, let them construct the road, and we have Now for proof that these two corporations are ns closely connected the first instn.nce on record of a corporation creat.ing an opposition to ns the Siamese twins in their business relations with each other. itself. Why, sir, if an individual were indicted for the commission The gentleman from the southern district of California, in response of the most heinous offense, and it were proven on the trial of his to a question propounded him by the Committee on Railroads as to cause that for three months before the perpetration of the deed he their identity, said that a great many people of his district believed had devoted all the energies of his nature to the maturing of a plan they were one and the same. Mr. Huntington, the open and avowed for the reduction of his annual or monthly income to the extent of attorney of the Southern Paeific, did not dare to give a direct answer one-half or perhaps more, an honest jury would acquit him on the to a similar question put to him by the same committee, but awkwardly ground of insanity without leaving their seats. No government ought evaded it by stating that the two corporations were on neighborly to treat with such a coTporation, for its directors ought to be regarded terms. I am aware that be bas emphatically denied their relation as irresponsible agents. ship, but his testimony on this point, when viewed in a legal aspect, With the land grant the directors of the Central and Southern Pa cannot be entitled to much, if any, consideration. Before the com cific are willing to construct the road, subject to t.he limitations in mittee he said be ha.cl no concealments to make as to bil:~ connection favor of the people as are contained in the following' section of the with the Southern Pacific. He knew the rails for the Southern Pacific bill of the gentleman from California, [Mr. LUTTRELL:] were bought IJy the Central Paciiic. He could tell whether they were SEc. 7. That three commissioners shall be appointed, one each by the governors steel or iron, t.he name of the wood out of which the t.ies were hewn, of New York, Missouri, and California, who shall prescribe the rates for freight the number of tunnels and ranges of mountains traversed by the road, and fares to be charged, limiting such rates to a reasonable percentage of returns on the actual cost and runnin::r expenses of the entire line; and said liue or lines the number of miles to be constructed nuder the chaJ.'ter per year, yet sha1l never be leased to any other railway company, or controlled in the interest of his memory became so suddenly obscured that he could not tell the any other line. name of a single officer or member of the contract and finance company The striking singularity of the proposition contained in the abo\e of the Southern Pacific. section is sufficient at first blush to induce us to doubt its sincerity. Stanford, the president of the Central Pacific, virtually admitted Three commissioners shall be a.ppoin ted by the·governors of New York, their identity when he said, in speaking of the Southern Pacific, ''We Missomi, and California to prescribe the rules for freight and fares are toiling for the greatest prize "this continent affords. Hatl Scott without the filing of a bond or the taking of an oath for the faithful built his railroad to the Pacific he would have taken from us our best performance of their duties, responsible to no one for malfeasance in prospective traffic and carried it East. He would have reached even office. What a temptation for a vast railway combination, possessing to our borders aud carried off our tra.de." great political experience, to influence the gubernatorial struggles in But, sir, I am not confined solely to verbal admissions. I have some these three States for the purpose of securing two corrupt commis documentary evidence in support of the proposition. I discovered it sioners. But even if the section were amended (as I believe is in in a speech of the honorable gentleman from Californin, [Mr. LuT tended) by giving Congress the right to regulate fares and freight, I TRELL,] who introduced the bill to give the Texas and Pacific land have the most incontestable proof that they never intend to con grant to the Southern Pacific, delivered in the last session of Con struct the road subject to such a restriction upon monopolizing ten gress. It was made in support of a resolution for the appointment of dencies. In a letter addressed to C. P. Hunt.ington, bearing date the a select committee to inquire into the affairs of the contract and 8th day of February, by the chairman of the Senate Committee on finance company of the Central Pacific. The gentleman accumulated Railroads, this question is propounded: a vast amount of reliable statistics to prove the directors of the Cen Will you consent that the tariff rates for the use of said road for both local and tral Pacific, who now control the Southern Pacific, were perfidious other business shall be subject to the control of Congress nt all times t toward the Government, were robbing the stockholders, and resorted to bribeTy to cover up their infamy. To use his own language," they The letter of Mr. Huntington in reply contains the following lai;l formed a combination before which the fraud and rascality of the guage: Credit Mobilier sink into insignificance." Any further supervision or regulation by Congress, beyond that alrt>ady pro vided by law, we regard as uncalled for and superfluous. Without entering upon the In showing the necessity for investigation he presented the sworn question of the policy or power of the GenerPJ Gi>vernment attempting to regulate and uncontradicted affidavit of Sam Brannan. one of the foremost and fix the rat-es of freight and passenger t.rafiic on roads authorized by States and citizens of California,· a stockholder in the corporation to the extent opel'ated within States, where collat~ral and possibly conflicting enactments pre vail, I desire simply to show that there is here no occMion for it. of two hundred shares, who, believing himse)f swindled out of his If the Government is willing to guarantee, say, 7 per cent. per annum upon dividends, brought suit against the Central Pacific, and Stanford, tho capital invested, then perhaps we might consider the question; but where the Huntingt-on, and others. ·· That por~iou of it which bears on my propo parties who furnish all the capital take all the risk of losin.., it or getting no sition reads as follows: retmn, they shoulll have the hopl.\ at least, of making 10 per cent. to inauco them to invest. If the bill shall be amende Now, this letter of Mr. Huntington bears date February 15, nearly demand f And who does not know that this whole matter bas been a. month subsequent to the introduction of the Luttrell bill, and inaugurated and set forward as a mere matter of cheap political ought to set at rest the question of their insincerity. ' It must carry boncombef . conviction to every unprejudiced mind that all their protestations There has been no more apt remark in this whole debate than that against subsidies and all their offers to construct the Texas and Pacific of the gentleman from Massachusetts, [:Mr. HoAR,] to the effect that are but as sounding brass and tinkling cymbals. Like the apples there could be no more unseemly spectacle than that of the American that bloom on the shores of the Dead Sea, they are fair to the view Congress wrangling before the country and the world over the com but ashes at the core. They are only intended to balk legislation pensation of its members. I believe the public mind was content until they obtain possession of every natural avenue and gatewa.y when the compensation was placed back to $5,000 per annum, and I that leads to the Pacific. Already they control · not only every ro:ul believe "it was and is a just sum. When the compensation was $3,000 of note on the Pacific coast, but th~ PM.Cific Mail, the line of steamers the mileage WM double what it is now, so that members in the vicin running to China, the Oak1and Ferry and California Steam Naviga ity of Chicago, as I am informed, received as high as 1,600 mileage tion Company. Their attorneys have studied every industry of the instead of that received at the present time, and each drew a con , Pacific slope to ascertain the utmost amount of tribute they can levy gressional library said to be worth some $1,500 ; all of which has ; without hazarding its destruction. Inaction on our part only strength since been corrected. J ens the iron grasp of the Central Pacific upon the commerce of the But., sir_, I still reiterate what I have heretofore said in this debate, ( country. - that if the salaries of these twelve-hundred-dollar clerks is to be cut In the language of the Stockton Herald of the 22d of February: down regardless of the right or the wrong of the matter, then com mon justice requires that our own go with it. Five 'thousand dollars The only hope of escaping the burdens that now weigh us down lies in the speedy construction of a competing line. California is already bound hand and foot by the may seem a large sum for men engaged in their usual avocations a.t capitalists. their homes, and it is. But let.any one of these take any portion of his In conclusion, I desire to state that I have not set down "aught in family and proceed upon a journey among strangers, and be will soon malice." My relations with several of the prominent attaches of the discover that there .are a hundred ways in which he ca-n practice Central Pacific Railroad Company are of the most friendly chamcter, economy at home which it is utterly impossible to do when abroad; while I am totally unacquainted with any of the directors or corpo money will seem to evaporate in spite of all his prudence. I judge rators of the Texas and Pacific. The remarks I have made are simply that more money can be saved in a year from an income of ~,500 in the result of honest conviction, and, in my bumble judgment, will an ordinary western city than with the same economy can possibly meet the approval of the people I represent. be saved from the presen~ salary of a member of Congress. But, sir, whether his salary be $5,000, 3,000, o.r 2,500 per annum, I would SALARIES OF OFFICIALS AND E~IPLOYES. have it understood that fi·om the hour he accepts the trust his serv Mr. WILLIAMS, of Wisconsin. Mr. Speaker, as the remarks which ices belong to his constituents and the public, and to them alone. I I purpose to submit will rel:J.te more to the general policy and scope believe there is no more pernicious doctrine than that which teaches of this bill than to any particular paragraph, I prefer to present what that a member of Congress should practice his profession or pursue I have to say now to the House than to seek the opportunity under his private business while he is paid for serving the public. the limited debate in Committee of the Whole. Look for a momentrat the mere routine duties of a Senator or mem The attempt to cut down salaries and to economize in the public ber of Congress here, saying nothing of his extra labors. He visits the service is at all times an ungracious ta.sk, and where undertaken in Departments from nine to half past ten o'clock a.m. The majority of good faith and carrietl forward with enlightened caution should re the members now go daily to committee work at half past ten o'clock, I ceive the support of every member of this House. Cut where you and remain in committee-rooms and in the sessions of this House till l I will, you touch some vital interest and are sure to provoke instanta half past five o'clock p.m. And during three nights in the week the neous and determined resistance. And because you are d~aling with House sits from half past seven till eleven o'clock at night; making / interests which are vital, furnishes all the more re:J.son why you some twelve hours spent jn the stifling air of these chambers. In the should proceed only upon the most thorough knowledge of the needs mean time three mails have arrived. Now, what time or opportunity and requirements of the public service. bas the member to attend to his correspondence, read the debates of None could know these special wants 'better than the beads of De the two Houses, investigate and write out reports upon matters re partments and Bureaus, yet it seems to be conceded that while some ferred to him in committee f It is simply impossible. He cannot do of these have been called before the Committee on Appropriations it. Something must be neglected. The rich member may employ his while this bill was in course of preparation others have been wholly private secretary; the -poor nne cannot. Whatever he does must be ignored, and of those who did appear, some have been informed at done on the spur of the moment. He has little time for study and once, ·aft.er giving va] id reasons w by their force should be increased none for reflection. When then, if ever, shall he read or examine the rather than diminished; that their number of clerks would be reduced fifty vo1umes and more of executive documents, reports of commit 20 per cent., and the compensation cut down 10 per cent., and this in tees, and miscellaneous papers of a single session of Congress, many direct opposition to the advice of those who knew the value of their of them containing the rarest information upon matters which are services and the absolute necessity of retaining in the public employ the continuous subjeds of legislation f He can never do it except faithful and experienced clerks. during the recess of Congress and in the quiet of his home. Passing now, Mr. Speaker, to the question of our own salaries, I Mr. Speaker, I should as soon think of counting the hours during cannot accede to the doctrine alluded to in this debate and sometimes which a judge actually sat on the bench, an executive occupied the con tended for outside of Congress, that the compensation of a member chair of state, or a clergyman stood in his pulpit, with a view to :fix here rests in contract, in the nature of entirety, not to be increased or ing his salary, as I should of measuring the compensation of a mem diminished during the term for which he is elected, because if it be ber of Congress by the time spent in actual session. formed in contract at all it rests always upon the fundamental condi Of the one hundred and eighty-five lawyers, members of this House, tion of the power of Congress to increase or diminish it at pleasure. bow many have any business whatever in the Supreme Court of the But, sir, without discussing the lega1 technicality of t.he question, I United States f Perhaps a. score of them may have such national rep prefer to place it on the bi~her ground of a sacred trust, founded in utation as to command business there. Bnt, sir, instead of encouraging good faith and mutual confidence. It resembles the case of a party this practice I believe it should be discouraged, if not prohibited by who desires the services of another in whom he has such confidence positive law. No man can go into court and argue causes where the that he says to him: "Perform this service wit.h fidelity and to the interests of his clients will often conflict with the public interest, and best of your ability, and I shall leave it to you to name the amount of not render a divided service, or not have his judgment warped as an yoor compensation." No proposition could place a true man under a attorney from what it should be as a legislator. To require him to more delicate or higher sense of honor. And having named what be continue practice in local courts a thousand or two thousand miles believed to be a just compensation, upon the slightest intimation that from the seat of Government is about as reasonable as to ask him to his employer thought it too much, he would respond: "Yon name the pra-etice medicine or teach school under like circumstances. suru yourself.'' No, Mr. Speaker, the com_pensation should be fair, reasonable, and Now while this theory may be a little too refined fof the actu~l con just, and for that the constituent should command the undivided dition of thin~ existing between members and their constituents, it service; and the member should devote to his public duties the very certainly fnrmshes a hint in the right direction. best energies of his life. I am not unaware, sir, that there is a cry So, when in the Forty-second Congress members placed their own of distress in the country and a· demand for economy in all the De s::tla.ries at $7,500 per annum and there came. up an unmistakable de partments of Government. It is equally true that the impression mand from the people for its 1·estoration to the old figure, the very generally prevails that there is a reign of fashionable frivolity, Forty-third Congress; responding to that demand, at once put it back extravagance, and folly at thi8 capital, which within the last few to $5,000 per annum; and in my judgment, sir, it should have gone years has been the primary ca~e of dragging down from places of high back to that figure on the first day of the session, and without one position ::tncl trust some of the most honored men in public life. Let hour of cavil or debate. this impression become fixed, let the belief pervade the public mind The people bad spoken in no uncertain tones. We are their public that every man in official station has bis price, that common hon servants, and in matters personal to ourselves, after a fair hearin<:r esty is the exception rather than the rule, and we may bid adieu to and an unmistakab1e demand, it is our duty to obey. So had there the traditions of the American Republic and banish all hope for its como up now from the people, torough the press, by letter or by pe continued perpetuity. . tition, any general, well-detined demand for the reduction of salaries The people do not demand that we shall enter men's houses and of members of Con6rress, :trising ont of a fair understanding of the declare by positive law what shall be the grade of their expenditures, facte, it would be our duty to heed it. ~ut who has heard of any such the mode of thei:c lives, or the cost or cut of their garments; nor 2336 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. APRIL 8, whether· they shall indulge in badges, decorations, cockades, coat-of a~d may have served his conn~ in its hour of peril, sta~tding up-to arms, or any other weak imitations of royalty ; whether they shall hlS desk day after day, year m and year out, performm,tr routine. employ one coachman or two, or whether these shall wear the plain duti~s wit~out a mur~ur, that he may provide for the daily wants garb of the citizen, or be clothed in the livery of the lackey. These of h1s family. And yet, with such a man, $100 or $200 taken from his are matters of private bste and personal privilege, though no one salary often marks the dividing line between comfort and want. can reftect upon them without serious apprehensions from their tend I was told by the Adjutant-General of the Army to-day that some ency in a republican form of government. But what the people do of his clerks had been in service so long as to become experts in their want, and what I believe they are longing aud praying for daily, is special duties; but that as this bill proposed t.o reduce their salaries, the appearance here of the wife of some leading American statesman they would not remain, and that many of thein had charge of valu who can comprehend the true dignity of her position, and who, by her able papers pertaining to the war and the country, which he would nobility of charact-er, grace of heart, varied accomplishments, and never intrust to the care of inexperienced clerks. He further said womanly worth and virtue, can assume her true place in society, and that some of these old clerks had become so interested in their special put to eternal rout the shoddy and shams which have dominated here ties and the prompt performance of their duty that h~ often found for the last few years t.o the ruin of individualiJ and the disgrace of them working at night and out of office hours, and for no additional the American name. I am not saying, sir, that we have not such compensation. Now, Mr. Speaker, what does this bill say to such as \ women here now. They exist by the score. Let them come to the these f It says to them, work on; be faithful and diligent, and if at front, assert their power, and forty millions of people shall "rise up the e.nd .of the n~xt te~.or fifteen years political party exigencies shall ( '.~ and call them blessed." reqmre It, we will agam reduce your salary 10 or 20 per cent. in the . One other thin~, Mr. Speaker; for these are times for plain words. interest of "retrenchment and reform!" There is no disgmsing the fact that within the last three years the Gentlemen of the opposition, you hold the knife; you cut among republican masses of this country have been shocked, stunned, and vital interests. See to it that you so wield it that for mere party disappointed until they have become sore, sensitive, and distrustful. purposes you do not cripple the public service. The people are neither They scarcely know who to trust or what to believe. The question stupid, parsimonious, nor mean. .All they desire is what is reaROna of the hour is fast passing beyond that of how many delinquencies ble and fair. He who attempts to deceive them upon fictitious issues one political party can score up against the other into the higher and by appealing to their prejudices, real or supposed, will sooner or later more important one of," Do these offenses really existt and, if so, be hoist by his own petard. who will ferret out the offenders and bring them to justice.'' Answer Mr. Speaker, in conclusion I will say let us so compensate all our this question; winnow these bushels of chaff and lay bare the clean officials and employes that by the exercise of reasonable prudence grain of fact; wring out from these mountainous clouds of accusat.ion, they shall feel that they are not mere drudges nor slaves, but that rumor and scandal, the one crystal drop of truth; hold it up before they have a common interest with the Government in the faithful the world, so that by its light honor may shine the brighter and cor performance of their dut.ies, and that year by year they are gaining ruption blush the blacker. Do this fairly, thoroughly, impartially, a little upon the ·up-grade of life and gathering around them some and the people will not h:J.ggle with yon about a few dollars of a thing more of its comforts. Put hope, energy, interest, manhood, and Government clerk's salary on this side or that of the ledger. self-respect into your civil ser ice, and it. will reform itself; ~rush Much has been said about the issues of t.he coming political cam these out, and the opposite will be sure to follow. pai~n. May I be allowed to predict, sir, that the real issue will not be finance, the tariff, or any other question of political economy, so DISTRIBUTION OF GENEVA. A WARD. much as it will be: First, can the electra} franchise be freely and Mr. BURLEIGH. It has been my fortune for about twentv-five safely exercised in the southern half of this Republic; and, second, years to be familiar with ships and their interests, and with insurance I can the offices of this nation be honestly administered and our men companies, during this time being more or less interested in naviga I · in public life be trusted T These are the things the people want to tion. I remember well the feelings and action in war times of the ' know about, and what they want to know and mean to know gen ship-owners and insurers. Both were scared. The insurers knew not \ erally finds its way to the front in political campaigns iu spite of par what to charge, and kept on the safe side by exacting from their ties or political managers. scared ami cornered customers such rates as would make themselves One word further as to the sala.ries of these clerks, and I will relieve safe in all human calculation. I said "cornered 77 customers; most the patience of the House. If it be true, as it doubtless is in some of them were cornered; they were cornered in different ways. It is instances, that there is an excess in the number of these clerks, such the custom to own vessels in shares; sometimes they are divided ioto excess should be speedily reduced. But, though times are hard, the sixty-fourths. One man is appointed ship's-husband, whose duty it Government of the United States is not bankrupt; it can afford to is to insure and look after the interests of the ve~el. ·If he neglects employ all the service it needs, and of the very best kind, and for t-o insure and the vessel be lost, h~ had better quit the country or pay this it should pay a just and reasonable compensation, which com the loss out of his own pocket. He will keep the vessel insured, ptmsation should bear a true relation to the nature of the service ren whatever the rate may be. Often some of his owners are dependent dered and the circlllDstances and surroundings under which it is per women and children, having their all in the ship. Others, bolder, have formed. What would be a fair compensation under some conditions every dollar they are worth invested in one ship; they must insure. would be wholly inadequa~ under others. Now, I lay down this Other ships are in debt to banks or for hired money; they must in general proposition, that be who, by the practice of pru-d~twe and sure t.o protect their creditors, so that a large proportion of our ve~ eoonomy, can save something from his annual income over necessary sels were and are to-day in such a position that they most insure. expenses, is in the best condition to serve himself, and therefore to With confederate ccnisers turning up in unexpected quarters, and serve his employer. It is the man who is gaining a little in the world ships being captured and burned in all parts of the world, is there whose hopes revive and whose energies increase. 'Vould, you then, any wonder that a panic seized those interested in navigation ; that fix these salaries so low as to di8oourage 'lll attempts at prudence or they paid freely the exorbitant premium demanded by insurers; that economy' : the ship-owners were bled, year after year, until their vessels were The salaries of these clerks range from $1,200 to $1,800 per year, and lost or sold to foreigners to pay their debts; and that the United were fixed, in 1854, on a gold basis. ~ A statement which we have all Stat-es from being the second largest mercantile marine nation in the seen presented in their behalf shows, in det.ail, the appreciated price world sank to about the fifth f . of living in this city and the depreciated purchasing powerof.money, Where are the men that officered those ships of ours f Go with me and demonst:rates that, except during and immediately following the to New England and I will find you men in every town on the sea war, these salaries since 1818 have never been so low as at the present board that will take us out in their little fishing-boats to the fishing time. Yet this bill proposes t.o reduce them 10 and 20 per cent. · grounds ; get. in to conversation with them and you will learn that The question recurs whether an average Of $1,500 a year for a Gov they once commanded or were mates of a ship in the foreign trade, ernment clerk in the city of Washington is too high a compensation. that the war came on, the insurance bills ate the ship up, and they It would not be deemed too high at most of the State capitals. Is it have no money now, neither have their friends, to build a new ves here t If we were t.o estimate just what it wonld cost to feed, clothe~ sel. Their life bas been spent on the water, and they knew nothing and lodge one of these clerks precisely as we would do in the case of of any other business. . a horse; if we were t.o treat them sui gcneris, isolated from the rest of Now, the question is, Who shall have the money awarded to this coun the world; if they are presumed to have no social relations or intel try by Great Britain to pay for losses sustained by our commerce from lectual tastes, no desire for l'easonable recreation or mental improve English-countenancetl confederate cruisers T Shall it be given to insur ment; if they stand separate and apart from all mankind, then doubt ance offices that are to-day only in name what they were twelve and less the price is too high. But the exact opp9site is the case with fourteen years ago f In the ordinary course of events their stock is most human beings, and so it is with these clerks. Those of them more than half changed to new men, that will get this award if it who are unmarried, both male and female, are apt to have a mother, goes to them. Or suppose t.he same men own the insurance offices sister, or friend more or less dependent upon their earnings. that owned them in the war, shall we add to their gains T Shall we Some of the m08t cultivated young men and accomplished young enrich those who, when their country was 'struggling for life, took women in W ashiugton may be found among these Government clerks. advantage of the necessities of their distressed customers, and sucked You will meet them in the libraries and art galleries rather. than at the hlood from their veins to build marble e(lifi.ces and offices ou the "german." Some of these might teach even the "Hon. Bardwell Broadway, and palatial residences, with brown-stone fronts, on Fifth Slate" things which it would be profitable for him to know, and" by a avenue f To those that send lobbyists of great fame here, that some large majority." Many of them are married men with families to pro way or other have the entree on this floor, and have long and earnest vide for. I know, sir, of no nobler example either of manhood or interviews in the cloak-room with members of this House. This is of ~eroism than that of a father, who perhaps has seen better days, the way it was last session and the session before ; it is so to-day...... ' . 1876. CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-HOUSE. 2337 They are re-enforced by men that can talk "subrogation" well from barley is in blossom. It rusts the straw, preventing the proper ripen the great city of New York. I have seen them often recently in the ing of the grain, and also discolors it, rendering it unfit for muny pur cloak-rooms and lobbies, exercising on this long word in the interest poses for which barley is used; and, in consequence, we are compelled of the great and powerful insurance companies that have ma{ie a to buy barley from Canada and other countries that succeed in rais league with each other, and mean by their wiles to gobble up this ing a superior sumple. The Department of Agriculture hu~ imported money and add it to their gains, which their own books show were one thousand bushels from England, with the assistance of one of very large. our consuls, that may enable us to solve the problem, if it ripens Let me state a parallel case to a ehip-owner and insurer in this earlier or later, or is b~tter fitted natllfally to resist t.he influence I question. A business man hires money of a. money-lender to do busi have spoken of. ness with at fair rates of interest and prospers. Adverse action to There is a manufacturing establishment in my district, at Cedar business man's interest turns up; his property is being destroyed and Rapids, that makes oatmeal from three thousand bushels of oats every is in danger; both men get scared; the money-lender raises his rates day, sending the meal to Glasgow. A much greater breadt.h of oats .. \ of interest from time to time until the business man is impoverished bus been sown within a radius of fifty miles from Cedar Rapids. I I and exhausted. .Money-lender has become rich. Afterward parties But we can only raise oats weighing thirty-two pounds to the bushel, responsible for adverse action and destruction of business man's prop while the standard in most foreign countries is forty-two pounds. erty finds that he has done wrong and makes restitution-to whom T The Department of Agriculture is distributing oats imported from The business man or the insurer T Europe weighing forty-five and fifty pounds t.o the bushel. We have heard a great deal said of insurance law. I know by ex It is perhaps not universally known that the country suffers more ; perience that in adjusting insurance losses hardly any two adjusters from worn-out seeds than worn-out land. When a field is partly agree. In settling losses by insurers the rule. in France is different seeded with oats received from the Department weighing fifty pounds from the rule'in England; that of England differs from that of Bos to the bushel, and partly with the best common oats that could be ton ; and the rule i.u Boston differs from that of New York. procured weighing thirty-seven pounds to the bushel, and when the Now we, the members of this Congress of the United States, the heavier. oats produced sixty-five bushels an acre weighing forty-eight highest power in the land, have losses without precedent to adjust. pounds to the bushel, and the lighter oats producedforty-eigbt bushels Let ns so adjust them that we may not be a-shamed of our own action; an acre weighing thirty-one pounds to the bushel, it is time every let us not prefer the gainer to the loser, not prefer thqse who have farmer should know what is meant by worn-out seed, the percentage of grown rich upon the misfortunes of the country to those who did annual deterioration, and the necessity of periodical renewal, where businees on the waters and know no other, who are impoverished; the best seed can be had; and what sections of our country are best men whom the whole co~ntry look to to build up our commerce; men adapted to this and other crops. who, if the Government will give them their due, will put it on the We have in the Department the best agricultural library in the waters in ships, and dot every sea with their white sails. Again country. No provision is made in the bill for librarian. There is no build up our commerce till it stands the foremost in the world, and provision for an assistant chemist. , In an analytical laboratory a the old Stars and Stripes will be flung to the breeze in every port chemist cannot work without an assistant. the emblem of a free countrypuri.fied in the blood of its bravest and Perhaps no feature of this Department is of as much value to the best and united from end to end. country as the collection and dissemination of statistical informa · Mr. WILSON, of Iowa. I take an interest in the Department of tion respecting our crops; ·their condition compared with past sea Agriculture. I visit it often. It rests the eye, as it were, after look sons in all parts of the country, the probable excess or deficiency, ing upon the severe faces across the Hall, to gaze upon a shrub, a the probable increase or depression of Pl'ice cons~quent npon the sup f / flower, or a bird. It rests the mind after following the flights of ply; and while dllfing the present year the stagnation of our indus t fancy and analytical disquisitions of gentlemen to contemplate na tries has prevented the laboring man from earning the money to buy I ture in her Jess demonstrative moods. It is next to a visit to the wheat, bread, and beef to the extent he would were our industries prairies to visit the Smithsonian Institution and Agricult.ural Depart prosperous, and has kept the price of these commodities at a lower ment grounds, to see nature robing her beauties in spring verdure range than the shortness of the supply may have led the prodncers These strolls usually include utilitarian calls at the offices that are to expect, the statistical information furnished· by the Department sending all over the country seeds, plants, roots, and cuttings that are has been of incalculable value to all classes of people interested. to enable our people in every State of the Union to add to the com .1:<1-om correspondents in every county, nearly, in the United States forts and lnxllfies of life and prevent the exportation of $75,000,000 facts approximately correct are printed in the monthly report. The in gold to foreign countries for such commodities as can be produced newspapers, magazines, societies, and correspondents get the facts at home, where our soil and climate are as diversified a.<; our wants and spread them broadcast over the land. There is no other agency in these respects. . competent to gather such statistics. No provision is made in the The l>epartment of Agriculture has been the means of introducing pending_bill for the monthly report. The annual report is generally many of the comforts and necessities of life among our people; better out of date as far as the crop being harvested and marketed is con grains, a greater variety of vegetable~ suitable to the different lati cerned. tudes of the country. The improvements necessary to be made in The first statistical information the farmers of the country obtained these directions are as great to-day as at any time in the past. The was from the census reports. We have been printing the aunual re greatest of all our crops und the most important is the grass crop. An port only after it was years old and out of date. lf this Congress empire lies in the Mississippi Valley to be seeded down with tame refuses to appropriate money to print the monthly, we will be just grasses, and while we have plenty of men who can creditably fill a where we were before the T:wenty.fifth Congress, in 1839, when the position.on the supreme bench, we have very few who ca• success first appropriation of 1,000 was made for distributing seeus and pro fully seed down a field in grass that will graze a cow or steer to curing agricultural statistics, under the Commissioher of· Patents, each acre in both wet and dry sea~ons. The common law of England who prepared stat.istical tables until1853, when they were discontin applies to causes in our courts between citizens, an~ precedents centu ued till the Department of Agriculture was established in 18G2. In ries old can be quoted in the adjndicat.ion of cases arising to-day. 1863 the first monthly report was issued, which has been continued Human nature is the same as it was a hundred years ago; but our up to the present time. About this time a Maine f:1rmer wrote to the soil and climate are different from most other soils and climates, Department: while our prosperity as agriculturists keeps pace with the growth of Your monthly reports ~ive me ,just the information I have wanted for years. our knowledge of all the elements that enter into "the production of Knowing the supply and demand, I am a.ble to sell at my own price, and we can our staple crop. also fore~ee what will probably be wanted next year. Give practical farmers facts The only aid the farmers of the country have outside of their indi and let gentlemen of leisure theorize. vidual ex1)eriments and observation to enable them to determine what Individual effort cannot supply this want. No journal in the ln.nd is most suitable and profitable as regards grasses, grains, roots, trees, furnishes a tithe of t.be information respecting the monthly condi~ion and shrubs, and their adaptability to our varied latitudes, ha-s come of crops in all the Stat~s and foreign countries. from the Department of AO'ricnlture. If the Department can intro About one-half of our people are engaged in agricultural pnrsuits. duce a grass plant that wilfstand our winters as well as timothy, and This is the only Department of the Government that interests one be in blossom in summer a month later or a month earlier than tim half of our people directly. The States cannot supply tlw informa othy and blue-grass, it will lay the foundation of wealth not to be tion for themselves, for while each State could very readily arrive at measured by the total sum appropriated by this bill multiplied by a knowledge of the condition of all ita industries, such knowledge is itself. The Department is distributing Italian rye-grass this spring comparatively valueless without like information respect.ing all the that may suit south of the forty-first parallel of latitude, where the others. winters somewhat resemble Southern Europe. But the grea.t grass We were told last Congress that the Bureau of Education and De belt is north of that lutitude, and if there is a grass pla.nt in any part partment of Agriculture were to be abolished, as they had no place legi of the Old \Vord that will add to our pa tures and meadows, we need timately in tbe Federal Government, but I did not expect to see them it and must have it. We may have to wait a quarter of a century starved to death. If this House intends to carry out the States-rights till we become possessed of the knowledge in this direction we need. qoctrine to this extent, I hope they will do it squarely and openly. Individual effort may discover and demonstrate in a life-time what If speculators from their superior facilities for getting information the Department of Agriculture could bring about and publish to the are to control the rrice of our staple products from want of means at country in a season. the disposal of the Department of Agriculture to procure and pro We buy six million dollars' worth of barley in a season, and ne~nly mulgate t.he statistical information that will enable every man who as much flax-seed. We have in the Northwest about two weeks of feeds animals, grows gra!n, manufact.ures cheese or butter, raises fruit hot, moist weather, about the last of June and first of July, when or grru~S, to judge of the future for himself and of the proba,bly best IV-147 2338 CONGRESSIONAL RECORD-SENATE. APRIL 10, avenues in which to exert himself in order to prosper individually farmers of every other section. The leading products of ea.ch State are and benefit mankind, then we should have the manliness to say so, known to us all at present, but the tendency to abanrlon one branch an<.l not continue this Department in such a sickly condiltion that it of agriculture and gradually adopt another by some States is -of (?reat cannot work efficiently. interest to all. The agriculturists are the most prosperous of our We need apple-trees for the Northwest that will stand our cold win people to-da.y, their efforts crea.te most of our exports, and briug ters. Six years ago the Department imported a collection, number back money to pay the interest on our public debt; many of our iug two hundre