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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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THE MONEY CRISIS . The crisis in the United States arises from exactly the same cause that has , not very many years ago , produced a crisis in England , and that has prepared in Europe a more tremendous crash , perhaps 3 than the world has ever witnessed ; for it involves empires as well as commercial firms . The cause is speculation , overtrading , ganVbling in commercial chances , or whatever else it may he called . Its motive is the avaricious desire to obtain profits without the expense of much trouble . A man has money in his hands ; he wishes to be richer than he is ; he does not ¦ care to be at the trouble of entering into any honest business , to look after it himself , or to Study the duties ; but he hears that by putting his money into some novel enterprise just started , lie may make his fortune at a stroke . In the United States they grow cotton far more than they can use ; we can buy it at a price which is a great profit to the grower , and which leases us a profit to be made on the work of manufacturing it . A railway between the place of production and the exporting harbour diminishes the delay , trouble , risk , and expense of carriage . The labour' of constructing and managing the railway can be carried on with a profit for the proprietors . Having manufactured the goods in our densely-peopled country , we can carry the manufactured cotton back to America , and sell it with advantage to American purchasers and profit to English makers . In all these cases there is something made or done , a substantial piece of goods or a ^ solid service exchanged for the money given ; all parties are co-operating to increase each , other ' s wealth . But some man who understands nothing about cotton , railways , or manufactures , hears that probably there will be a great demand for cotton in England , and he buys up a large quantity , only to charge a higher price for it , and make his fortune at a blow . Another man hears that shares in the railway are likely to produce a great profit ; ho puts his money into shares , not to make the railway better , or to assist in serving the cotton-grower and the cottonpurchaaer , but most likely to soil the shares again to somebody who will sell them again , eunply to make money by the exchange . The English manufacture catches the fever ; he hears that cotton goods are selling at a good price , and ho makes as much as ever he can , without reference to the real probabilities of the want in America . " What if he does foreatal the market for others ?~
he puts money in his own pocket , and that is all he cares for . The clothing of the Americans , the employment of English labourers , the complete development of railway communication , the welfare of the country producing the cotton , the mutual advantage of all parties , have been forgotten b } r these speculators . They are in a fever of buying and selling ; they put others into the fever ; the same bale of cotton is sold several times over , the same railway share , "until at last it is discovered that the value is exaggerated beyond any real demand . The List man who has invested his money in the speculation lias Mien into a gigantic mistake ; he has not made his fortune at a blow , but he has made 4 iis bankruptcy at a blow ; and his friends and connexions who have trusted him , or perhaps shared in his inflated hopes , suftbr with him . This is the whole story of the American crisis . It is identical with the history of the Credit Mobilier speculation , which has not yet come to its crisis . It is the story of Capel-court ; of the London Joint-Stock mania in 1825 ; of the South-Sea Bubble , and of all the artificially created bankruptcies of Europe or America . This part of commerce could not be developed to such gigantic proportions if the regulations of trade did not facilitate gambling and open the door for the forgers and swindlers . We have had very nefarious transactions in the United States ; we see in the defalcations of
Mr . Frederic "W . Pouteii , the corresponding Secretary of the American Sunday School Union , that the practice of defalcations has been exported to that side of the Atlantic ; but neither ] S ~ York nor Philadelphia can show so long a list of : swindlers and bankupts by conspiracy as Pa-Tis , with its bubble companies and its I ) ocks iSTapoleon ; still less as London , with its veil-born forgers , its fashionable swindlers , and its religious bankers . Being based upon no substantial productions or exchanges , this kind of speculation must , sooner or later , come to a wind-up . The longer the day is postponed the larger the proportion of loss which falls upon innocent parties ; and we ought to be glad , therefore , when the day comes for a settlement of accounts . It occasions great difficulty for the moment . One of the first requirements for a settlement of accounts , even in bankruptcy , is money . Your bankrupt wants money ; his neighbours , whose credit is whispered away , want money to make their credit good . The State wants money , because some tax-payers are defaulters ; and the tax-payer wants money because the State is screwing him . This is exactly the condition of things in every part of Europe . Hamburg , New York , Paris , London , Glasgow , and Vienna have been carrying on a kind of auction to obtain the largest supplies of money . The banks of Hamburg have gone as high as 9 ^ per cent . ; private persons are said to have gone in Vienna as high as 12 or 18 per cent . By the depreciation of its own stock , tho State in Austria has gone to a yet higher figure , and will have to do something of the kind early next year . Under these circumstances , gold would have been drawn from London a . nd Paris to tho East and West , if tho principal bauks of England and of Franco had not set the example of giving a sufficient price for the gold they required to keep . This is the renBoh why the Bank of France has gone as high aa 7 j per cent ., and that is not high enough ; for tho Bank of England , which can roally obtain money at a cheaper rate , because its security ia better , hns gone aa high as 8 por cent . The Bunk of Franco , however , has circuitous contrivances for giving a better price for gold , without appearing to do so on tho face of tho returns .
How shall we get out of the . aifficStT ? We shall accomplish a rescue entirely by for ™ of the genuine trade of all the countries in volved . . By the side of the speculation which Louis JS apoleon ' s jobbing statesmen h ave got up m 1 ranee , there is a real extension of . commerce , and some of the commercial houses ' that have been actually involved are recover ing by favour of that extension . In this country the immense increase of our trade and the great extension of our agricultural enterprise and produce , at once give us the means of maintaining the present pressure and the confidence that we shall come off in the end . This is still more the case in the " United States . The Americans have only to wait for a few years , when the spread of settlement , the increase of produce , the growth of the older states in wealth , will beso many substantial guarantees that the ITnion will continue to grow richer and richer from this moment , notwithstanding the inconveniences occasioned to many individuals by the passing . embarrassments of speculative commerce . One evidence of the sound condition of the whole Union is the fact that its Government is at this very day enabled to mitigate the severity of the pressure , not only by the punctual payment of salaries and of all claims upon the Government , but by a stead y and rapid redemption of the public debt . After all , the injury inflicted by the recoil of over-speculation must fall upon the minority , especially in America . Some few years since , those very nien who had ruined themselves by speculations in the railway market , went back and retrieved themselves and their country by pursuing agriculture in tlie halfcolonized Jands of Michigan .
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STATESMEN FOR INDIA . The report that Lord Canninu is to-be recalled" from the head of the Indian Government does not appear to rest upon the slightest foundation . It does not express any intention of the" Ministers , but it expresses the intent of the English public . Public opinion has never been satisfied with the selection of Lord Canning . When he was sent over to India it was said that he had been appointed after others with a greater capacity for statesmanship had declined the office . In this country Lord Canning was well known as occupying the |) lace which Rowland Hill should have occupied . "While the latter did the work of the Post-office , Lord Canning was Postmaster-General ; and when he exchanged the government of letters for the government of Hindoos , it was understood that he could not get on unless ho could find some Rowland Hill in India to do the work . But there is a difference between the Indian Empire and the great oilice in St . Martin ' s-le-Gruud . It would p robably have puzzled Lord Canning to keep order in that large establishment , if he had not had experienced , energetic , and inventive men under him . As it was , there were letter-carriers who destroyed letters instead of delivering them ; lettor-carriera who claimed higher wages ; newspapers and book parcels that i-efusctl to reach their destination ; and it was reported that Lord Canning gave si great deal of attention and anxiety to the arduous duty of looking over Mr . Hill ' s shoulder while he performed the labour of keeping tho Post-office in order . " When somebody proposed that tho ornamental part of the Postoffice- should bo abolished , and that Mr . Rowland Hill himself should be Postmaster-General , Lord Palm urston said that tho good of keeping a peer in tho department was , not that the work of the Post-oflice might be hotter done , but that thero mig ht be another noble lord in tho Cabinet ; and
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Several communications unavoidably stand over . It is impossible to acknowledge the mass of letters we receive . Their insertion is often delayed , owing to a press Of matter ; and when omitted , it is frequently from reasons quite independent of the merits of the communication . N ? T 7 no ! ico c - au be tafcen . of anonymous correspondence . Whatevens intended for insertion must be authenticated by the name and address of the writer ; not necessarily tor publication , but as a Kuarantee of his good faith . We cannot undertake to return rejected communications .
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NOTICES TO CORRESPONDENTS . X 9 j : ~ "Ve do " 9 ? ins , ert » except on very special occasions , letters ongruialJy addressed to conte mporaries . The sub - ject of B . G . S communication is already out of date
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1 OgO THE LEAP EB . [ No . 396 , October 24 , 185 ? .
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* There is nothing so revolutionary , because there is nothing so unnatural and convulsive , as the strain to keep things fixed when allthe world 13 by the very law of its creation , m eternal progress . —Db . Abhoid , * .
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>— \ _ y —w SATURDAY , OCTOBER 24 , 1857 .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 24, 1857, page 1020, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2215/page/12/
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