Shall the United States become the Leader of Repudiation? THE DANGER AND THE REMEDY. REPEAL OF THE RESUMPTION ACT. SPEECHES OF Mr. S. B. CHITTENDEN, OF NEW YORK, IN THK House of Representatives, November 13 and 14, 1877. WASHINGTON. 1877. Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library Gift of Seymour B. Durst Old York Library Shall the United States become the Leader of Repudiation? THE DANGER AND THE REMEDY. REPEAL OF THE RESUMPTION ACT. SPEECHES OF Mr. S. B. CHITTENDEN OF NEW YORK, IN THE House of Representatives, November 13 and 14, 1877. WASHINGTON. 1 877. Digitized by the Internet , Archive in 2013 http://archive.org/details/shallunitedstateOOchit SPEECH OF Mr. S. V>. CHITTENDEN. November 13, 1877. The House having under epnsideration the hill (H. R. No. 805) to repeal the third ection of the act entitled "An act to provide for the resumption of specie pay- ents"— Mr. CHITTENDEN said: , Mr. Speaker : I send to the Clerk's desk a memorial of the National Board of Trade and an amendment in the form of a substitute, which I ask may be rend and printed in connection with my remarks. The Clerk read as follows : MEMORIAL. The memorial of the National Board of Trade to the honorable the Senate aad House of Representatives of the United States in Congress assemhled. The undersigned heg leave respectfully to represent unto your honorable bodies that the National Board of Trade, at its late annual meeting, having under its . consideration the question of the resumption of specie payments by the Govern- ment and people of the United States, adopted the following resolution, to wit: Resolved, That in the opinion of the National Board of Trade, Congress has omitted to pass the necessary measures to carry the resumption act into effect, and it there- fore recommends that Congress should enact a law authorizing the funding of the legal-tender notes in bonds running forty years, and bearing 4 per cent, interest per annum, payable quarterly, to an amount not exceeding $10,000,000 per month, until the legal-tender notes shall be at par with coin. Respectfully submitted, by order and on behalf of the national board of trade. FREDERICK FRALEY, President, Philadelphia. Charles Randolph, Secretary, Chicago. Washington, 1877. Mr. CHITTENDEN. Now let the Clerk read the amendment I pro- pose as a substitute for the pending - bill. The Clerk read as follows : Strike out all after the enacting clause and in lieu thereof insert the following: Whereas the legal-tender notes of the United States, when first issued, were, by a provision of the act authorizing them, fundable at the option of holders into bonds of the United States bearing 6 per cent, annual interest; and Whereas but for such provision for funding neither the Secretary of the Treas- ury nor either House of Congress would have consented to their issue ; And whereas the exigencies of a prolonged civil war led to the temporary with- drawal of the said funding provision of the legal-tender act ; And whereas the Government of the United States is solemnly and firmly bound, by act of Congress, approved January 14, 1675, to provide for the redemption in coin of its legal-tender notes on and after the 1st day of January, 1879 ; And whereas the United States must, like all other debtors, public or private, provide for and pay all its honest obligations to the extent of its means and resources, or be discredited and dishonored : Therefore, Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and is hereby, authorized to withdraw, as soon as the necessary preparations can be made, the legal-tender notes of the United States, whenever presented by the holders 4 thereof, and issue therefor, dollar for dollar of face-value, coupon or registered bonds of the United States in the spirit of the original legal-tender act : Provided, That the bonds authorized by this act shall be payable in gold at the expiration of forty years from the 1st day of January, 1877, and bear interest at the rate of 4 per cent, per annum, payable quarterly in gold. Sec. 2. That the bonds authorized by this act shall be available for deposit in the Treasury of the United States for banking purposes under the various provisions of law relating to national banks. Sec. 3. That the legal-tender notes received in exchange for bonds under this act shall be destroyed, under such regulations as the Secretary of the Treasury may prescribe. Sec. 4. That all laws inconsistent with this act are hereby repealed. Mr. CHITTENDEN. Mr. Speaker, I am constrained to ask the protection of the Chair against all interruptions. Unless I am greatly mistaken, the bill we are considering means downright repudiation; just that. I hold in my hand the promise of my Government to pay me $10. The date of payment is fixed by law upon the statute-book. The Government must keep faith with me ; failing in that, it becomes the leader of all defaulter's and re- pudiators, including towns, cities, and States. The point of honor is central and vital in this discussion. But, before coming to that, I have to brush away some strange mistakes made by the gentleman from Kansas in opening the debate. First, 1 regret that the gentleman misunderstood my opinion of the resumption act. I concede that some additional legislation is nec- essary to make the act finally effective; but the absence of such legislation does not in the slightest degree weaken the sacred force of the obligation as it stands upon the statue-book, on the contrary it re-inforces that obligation, leaving Government absolutely without excuse. In the second place, I am sorry that the gentleman from Kansas was green enough to take into his confidences that monster of infla- tion, who told him that there were four hundred thousand street pau- pers iu the metropolis. The history of all paper-money delusions on earth will be searched in vain for the equal of that fellow. Finally, I deeply regret that after all his patient and profound study of finance the gentleman seems to have discovered that the commercial distress and shrinkage of values under which the country groans have been brought about by enforced contraction of the cur- rency under the resumption act of 1875. I beg leave to say to the gentleman from Kansas, and to all unfortunates who roam over the highways and by-ways of the nation, preaching his doctrines to the •great injury of honest people, that the resumption act is no more responsible for the present sufferings of New York and Kansas than it is for the frozen feet of the Turks in the Shipka Pass ; not a bit more! It is high time for members of Congress and all men of sense to drop and renounce forever all such nonsense. We have records which no man's ingenuity or audacity can change which enforce and estab- lish our position. As late as the 20th of October last, or about three weeks ago, there were more greenbacks in use than at any time from 1868 to 1873 ; more than when we were building ten thousand miles of railroads per annum and otherwise living and scheming as if all the reserved resources of this continent could be developed for the aggrandize- ment of our generation. We have to-day in use only about a million and a half less than we had when we constructed those sham fortunes which crazed the whole nation prior to the great explosion in 1873. 5 No man outside of will deny these statements of fact. Now place along-side the foregping facts the following : For about eight years prior to 1873, the brain power, labor power, and money power of the country, joined by the land-giviug power of Congress, were to an uncommon extent devoted to railroad industries. It amounted to a railroad mania. These industries suddenly collapsed. The capital invested was lost. A very large proportion of the labor of the country was displaced. It was violently switched off its track and plunged into a dee]) pit of enforced idleness and waiting. There it has remained: there it is now. Of course the power of the people To consume and pay for the products of labor is immensely crippled. Enterprise is dead. Incomes have disappeared. Wages are reduced. The volume of business is diminished. Prices have fallen. We have sharp contraction on all sides, and in all things, by the force of laws as immutable as the law of gravitation, the greenback currency only excepted ! It has required just four years to get rid of the new emis- sion of twenty-six millions issued after the crash of 1873 by a freak of legislation which history has already located in a lunatic asylum. Take three men, where you find them, who have for a long time en- joyed and shared a daily ration of a dozen bottles of good brandy. Take away one man ami continue the same ration, and what will be- come of the other two men if compelled to drink half a dozen bottles apiece daily ? The answer to that question will throw vivid light upon the exist- ing currency illusion, and the argument is not impaired by the fact that the two victims clamor wildly for another ration ! Nobody ever can compute the cost of the fatal issue of twenty-six millions of greenbacks in 1873 to which I have just referred. The most serious and distressing disappointments and disasters of the last three years are directly traceable to that act of lunacy, and the end is not yet ! But, says the gentleman from the West, the banks have contracted their currency ! Why not ? Government has no more right to say how many notes the bank shall circulate than it has to enact how many acres a farmer shall cultivate. The banks are equally free to expand and are now expanding their currency. The national-bank act admits of such expansion to the full amount of the bonded debt : say 82,000, 000,000. Expansion is profit, contraction is loss. Is it not tolerably certain that under such a system there will be all the cur- rency out that can be used honestly and properly ? But the gentleman shouts again he can get no money in the West ! They are mistaken. I know how it is myself, for I have been there. You have money instantly at command for everything you raise which the world wants. You and I both want money to resurrect our old and wild invest- ments which we do not deserve to get and never can borrow on lauds and improvements which have cost us four or five times their value. Let me explain what I mean, so that it may be clearly understood by every man from the North or South, East or West, who will take the trouble to give me a moment's attention. All Congressmen of our time have heard of Du Luth. I know a man who belongs to the class frequently denouuced iu these Halls with fluent and ignorant rhetoric as " bondholders," who was foolish enough, soon after the eloquent gentleman from Ken- tucky made himself and Du Luth famous forevermore, to send out there aud buy a corner lot, on a portion of which he built a house for homes and business purposes. 6 The total expenditure in cash eight years ago was $10,000, leaving a slice of land unimproved. The property has cost its owner, including interest and taxes and deducting income to the present time, more than $15,000. He is will- ing to sell it all for $2,500. The dreadful banks will not loan a cent on it. Why should t hey ? And yet there is plenty of money in Du Luth to-day to buy every horse, bushel of wheat, and prairie chicken brought to market. This case, Mr. Speaker, truthfully suggests the real trouble we have to deal with. There are thousands just like it in the city and State of New York. No shouting of demagogues, no paper money device is equal to the exigency upon us. It is cruel mockery and damnable wickedness to hide the truth any longer from the people. It is a crime against the omnipotent forces of nature, which with boundless generosity invite the nation to patient industry, uprightness, and frugal living, for us to try to conceal our scars or cure our disease as with a garment of irredeemable paper money, or with silver dollars worth but ninety-two cents a piece ! That was the price on Monday week ; they are two cents cheaper to-day. In the case I have cited, the sufferer bought no more than he could pay for. He simply threw to the winds his own in a ridiculous wild venture. If he had bought more and mortgaged the whole to some luckless bank, he himself would have been in the poor-house to-day and not here. My one practical observation is, that the limitation of our paper currency should be, and will be in the end, left to adjust itself under a free banking system, guided by the eager, intelligent, and aggress- ive enterprise of our people. There is but one alternative, namely : An exclusive greenback cur- rency, subject at all times to the caprice of Congress. If any one asks me what that policy will lead to, I refer them sor- rowfully to the startling vote given here on Monday for the silver bill. And now, Mr. Speaker, I come closer to the bill before the House. I make no reflections. I concede that its authors are my peers ; but I denounce their work as hurtful, discreditable, and without excuse. The issue presented admits of no compromise. There is no way to average honesty with dishonesty. There is no neutral ground between right and wrong. The popular notion that it is the duty of law-mak- ers to do the best they can with questions which divide the public judgment, does not apply here. It is apparent to the whole country and to the civilized commerce of mankind, since the votes of Monday, November 4, that an irre- deemable-paper-money delusion has done its perfect work in the minds and purposes of a large majority of the popular branch of our National Legislature, and that it remains for the people to arouse themselves to know the truth and save their priceless heritage from a bondage only less terrible than human slavery itself. I lay it down, Mr. Speaker, as a proposition firmly rooted in the deepest convictions of every thoughtful and upright citizen, that the national integrity shall not be sacrificed, and I declare to you, to my constituents, and" to the people of the whole country, that there never has been a day in American history since the days of colonial depend- ence when our national honor and welfare were so imperiled as now. Say not that this is an extravagant and heated statement. What have we witnessed ? What did this House of Representatives do on Monday, November 4 ? It passed a currency bill, which involves the one we are now considering, without a syllable of debate, which, if 7 enacted into law, is estimated to take t wenty millions, more or lews, from the hard earnings of the depositors in savings banks alone in the State of New York, and which will otherwise, in the event sup- posed, result in disasters and loss to every State in the Union which no man can measure <>r 6Sl [mate. Let me say here that 1 ha ve reason to think that at least half a million of men in the Empire State are prepared to send their protest to Congress against the silver abouui- nalion, in the name of common honesty. Why this frantic haste ? There was never snch a proceeding here before, involving so much. I am assured by those who served here, when the gentlemen who now rule the House and the country were on the other side of the Potomac with their guns, that no such hur- ried proceedings were tolerated. What is the meaning of it ? It has been intimated that the silver and auti-resumptiou bills are the sullen reverberation of the late Ohio election. It is said that eighty thousand republican machine politicians refused to vote in Ohio because their own upright leader kept his promises faithfully to the country, and that repeal and ruin are the penalty to be exacted by the successful democracy. I cut the following from a late Baltimore paper which throws a little light, perhaps, on my inquiry : I have come, he said, to tell the laboring-men of Baltimore and of the eighteenth ward that I stand here to-night in the face of that history, now made, hut not yet •written, by which the democratic party has fulfilled its promise of being a party in the interest of the whole people. In my last speech to you I sought to convince you that your depressed condition was due to the legislation of the republican party, and that prosperity would only return to you when the shackles thus im- posed were stricken from you. [Applause.] I tell you now that by the action of the democratic Congress this morning these shackles have been stricken from you. It has declared that there shall no longer be one money for the banker and the. bondholder and another for the people. It will now go further and will to-morrow morning pass the bill for the repeal of the noxious resumption act. [Applause.] Again, from the same paper and the same speech : "We have commenced by the resumption of silver ; we will follow it to-morrow by the repeal of the resumption act, and we will go further and make au equaliza- tion of taxes by restoring the income tax. We have here, it will be observed, resumption of silver secured to- day ; repeal of the noxious resumption act to-morrow, (they did not get on quite so fast as promised;) and equalization of taxes by restor- ing the income tax shortly. The last is a little mixed, but it looks to me like a proposition to equalize things generally. Mr. BLACKBURN. Will the gentleman allow me The SPEAKER. The gentleman from New York stated at the out- set of his remarks that he would not permit himself to be inter- rupted. Mr. BLACKBURN. I hope the gentleman will not decline to allow me to say he is using a report given in a newspaper which was never submitted to me for examination. The points, as he has quoted them and as I catch them, I here reiterate, and only express my deep regret that the resumption aet has not already been repealed and those shackles already stricken off. Mr. CHITTENDEN. Again, I find the following in a highly re- spectable New York paper" of October 25, cut from a paper published in Missouri: Nearly every city in the entire "West is hopelessly in debt. All are moving for a compromise. If they fail in that, the next thing will be flat repudiation. Much as we regret it, this is the feeling of a majority of the people. The majority rules, and the sentiment is " compromise or repudiate." we wish it were otherwise ; but it is not, and creditors may as well know the truth at once. 8 Here we have it, Mr. Speaker. Repudiate! That, in truth, is the word. 1 do not exaggerate. It comes as a rushing, mighty wind comes! We are now shaken by a wild blast of a grand currency illu- sion, which has swept over the plains of the South, the prairies of the West, carrying this House by storm on Monday, and threatening to ingulf the national integrity ! The bill before us justifies the most serious apprehensions. It is a plain breach of contract. Its monstrous and criminal impolicy is also only equaled by the silver bill, as is perfectly apparent to all who know the present condition of the commerce of our country with other leading nations. The currents of trade have set strongly in favor of resumption for more than two years, and now the miseries of two great nations en- gaged in war unite, as by a special providence, to assure the restora- tion of our currency to a gold standard. It is almost universally believed by men most largely and intimately connected with our foreign exchanges that but for the meddling by Congress gold will cease to be merchandise in New York, and be re- stored to use as currency within ninety days. There is nothing im- probable in this belief. The currents have all run in that direction for a long time, "and it becomes more and more evident, day by day, that they will so continue to run. Some of the promoters of this bill cannot be ignorant of the true state of things. They see that they have not a moment to spare if they are to make greenbacks forever irredeemable, as their bill, if enacted, will do. The crisis is upon them. It is now or never. With bank-notes once again at par with gold, the people will understand the case and not only insist upon maintaining the resumption act in its integrity, but also upon such other legislation as is necessary to secure the withdrawal of greenbacks slowly but surely. It is moreover re- assuring to recall the perfect unanimity of public sentiment in respect to the true character of irredeemable paper when the legal-tender notes were first issued. The Government, charged with the national life, in the darkest hour, without money and without credit, shut up the Constitution, and seized the only weapon within reach, as a man for want of a gun might seize dynamite and hurl it in bulk at the head of a burglar attacking his house at midnight. Then all intelligent men in both of the great political parties de- plored the use of legal-tender. The party immediately responsible for Government frankly appealed to history, warning the people against the dangers we now realize, urging them at the same time to avert such dangers by cheerful submission to taxation. The party opposed to Government, the democratic party, strenu- ously opposed the issue of greenbacks to the last, and the recorded fact that when the bill of February 25, 1862, authorizing their issue passed the House of Representatives but one democrat voted for it, is a withering comment upon the present attitude of leading demo- crats in several States. Mr. Pendleton, then a Representative from Ohio, now a candidate for the Senate of the United States, closed a long argument in this House to show that the Constitution gave no shadow of authority for the issue of legal-tender, even though the existence of the nation depended thereon, as follows : Let gentlemen heed this lesson of wisdom. Let them, if need be, tax the ener- gies and wealth of the country sufficiently to restore the credit of the Government. Let them borrow whatever money in addition may be necessary— borrow to the full extent that may be necessary — and let us adhere rigidly, firmly, consistently, persistently, and to the end, to the principle, of refusing to surrender that cur- 9 rency which tho Constitution has given us, and in the maintenance of which this Government has never yet for one moment wavered. This lesson by Mr. Pendleton is of great interest to the country and exactly fits our present circumstances. When he first delivered it, our ( 'onstitution was in ruins; and the only question then was, How shall it he restored ! All patriotic peo- ple were then struggling by all means to restore it. They succeeded. The Constitution is safe now, and every word of Mr. Pendleton's lesson may he applied with great force and advantage. Especially so, as his record as a candidate for the Presidency with his late speeches in Ohio show that he himself is a victim of the popular greenback delusion, which no longer hesitates to attack the national iutegrity. Mr. Speaker, I believe that the greenback is the most powerful en- emy our country has ever encountered, slavery only excepted. I wish 1 were master of words to express its true character. It is not money, but a device. It does not pretend to represent capital or labor. It is debt, representing the exigency of a great civil war. It is a device in its nature and in its influence on mankind, precisely like the paper- money devices of the days of our colonial dependence in the early part of the eighteenth century; of John Law's Mississippi scheme: the assignat of the French revolution, and the continental money of our own revolutionary times. There is nothing in the history of these several paper-money de- lusions to warrant the belief that the greenback will ever be fully paid. On the contrary all their traditions point to repudiation, and current events point the same way. We have very recently seen Mr. Pendleton, for example, in pursuit of votes, hending to the subtle and seductive power of the greenback ; and on Monday week one hundred and sixty-four members of this deliberative (!) body, inclose communion with the friends of the bill we are considering, without one moment's hesitation, voted that a bit of silver worth that day ninety-two cents and to-day about ninety cents and liable to be worth no more than eighty-five cents next week, shall henceforth be a law- ful dollar in this country ; and, in effect, that gold shall be known no more forever in our currency! If that is not square and downright re- pudiation, what is ? Shall the power which so declared a lawfuldollar on Monday hesitate to declare ten cents a lawful dollar when the pretext and exigency shall arise ? Edmund Burke about one hun- dred and fifty years ago proposed an emission of base coin for the American colonies to relieve them of a currency delusion, and history repeats itself to-day in a proposition lately submitted to the Senate of the United States to issue four hundred millions of " goloid" — if any one knows what that is. In the presence of these facts I denounce— in words I have recently uttered in another place — the greenback in place of money as a fraud. It is a sham. It familiarizes the individual and public conscience with shams. It has muddied all our springs of honest thrift and solid enterprise, confused and misled the public judgment, sapped the cour- age and wisdom of the Federal Treasury, and given immense comfort Mr. Speaker, it cannot and will not be denied that the indications all point to the greenback as the future shibboleth and rallying cry of the most aggressive, vicious elements of society throughout the land. How, then, shall we dispose of the greenback, and uproot the mis- chief of it ? 10 The substitute I have offered for the pending bill will do it as by magic. It will do it efficiently and instantly, without alarm or harm to any one. If adopted, gold and bank-notes will be equal in value before the executive ink is dry. It is the original and fundamental principle underlying the legal-tender act. No other method of paying the forced loan was ever talked about by any clear-headed man of either party for years. It has ever been, and is now, advocated as the only practicable method by the most distinguished political economists and eminent merchants in our country. It has been so recognized again and again by the present Secretary of the Treasury, as it was by two of his immediate predecessors, aud the principal argument we hear against it is the scandalous one that funding is unpopular. It is well known now that President Grant spent the very last hours of his administration in an earnest effort to secure the sub- stance of this proposed substitute to the pending bill, as the crown- ing achievement of his civil career. It is easy to show that funding at 4 per cent, cannot lead to rapid or hurtful contraction. Beyond narrow limits, gold will take the place of greenbacks as they are funded. The laws of trade and untrauimoled commerce can be relied upon under this simple substi- tute, and they will for the first time in fifteen years re-assert their authority. It will immediately utilize our present stock of mer- chandise of gold, converting it with all fresh gold products into active and useful currency. Can anything be more inviting or re- assuring than that ? Are we to renounce the truth because it is for the moment obscured by the clamor of ignorant and selfish men ? Can we restore confi- dence to capital by a new device ? Can we hope for general employ- ment of labor without a restoration of confidence ? Funding is no device or mere contrivance. It is the truth of straightforward common sense ; precisely that, and nothing more. It stands firm as granite mountains, buttressed by the best com- mercial sense and highest authorities in the world. Mr. Speaker, we are a spectacle to-day which future historians may describe with weeping and amazement. After a dire national calamity ; after the prodigious cost, waste, and suffering inseparable from fifteen years of war and irredeemable paper money, we stand in the very crisis of our distress aud disaster with a boundless and brilliant starlit horizon just in front of us. The question we have to answer is this : Shall the great Government of the United States, in this supreme moment, turn away from its own appointed, feasible, and honorable remedy, after strange gods, to plunge into a new and limitless abyss of cowardice and shame ? That is the question I submit. In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, I desire to place myself in close rela- tions with the gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Ewing.] I have four questions to ask him, which I respectfully request him to answer to his own conscience, to his people, to my people, and to the people of the whole country, whenever he shall speak for his bill on this floor. First. If I owe the gentleman a sum of money, which I have prom- ised by note of hand to pay on the 1st day of January, 1879, can I, with plenty of means, send him formal notice to-morrow that I will not pay him, and return here to meet honest men, uu veiled ? Second. Here again is a promise to pay $10 by the Government of the United States. The day for its payment has been fixed by law. How can the Government give me notice that it will not pay me, without disgrace and shame ? 11 Third. C;in this great Government aftbrd to risk oven a construct- ive imputation of dishonesty ! Fourth. How and why is it that all well-dressed gamblers, default- ers, and repudiators in this hroad land applaud to the echo the gen- tleman's hill ! I ask permission to print as a postscript to my remarks a brief and decisive utterance of my distinguished colleague [Mr. HEWITT] in favor of funding the greenbacks, which I cut from a letter of his written for the press a few months ago; and also some historical scraps referring to our earliest paper-money delusion which are of interest to all who desire to investigate the subject: The legal-tender notes are an overdue debt; it is a disgrace to the people of this country that the payment of this deht should not have been made long since. If the original privilege of funding these notes in G per cent, bonds had not been re- pealed, the debt would have been paid within twelve months after the close of the war. And again : To-day, if they were made fundable in a 4£ per cent, currency bond, they would all be paid and might all be canceled within twelve months. [From Mr. Bancroft's history.] The credit of the colonies was invoked in behalf of borrowers. The first emis- sions of provincial paper had their origin in the immediate necessities of Govern- ment. * * * - * * * * In 1712 South Carolina issued at a low rate of interest on the mortgage of lands "a bank" of £48,000. In 1714 Massachusetts authorized an emission of £50,000, to be paid back in five annual installments. The debts were not thus paid back ; but an increased clamor was raised for greater emissions. In 1710 an additional issue of £100,000 was made, and the scarcity of money was more and more complained of. All the silver money Avas sent to Great Britain to pay debts, and yet the system was imitated in the other colonies. Franklin, who afterward perceived its evil tendencies, assisted in 1723 in intro- ducing it into Pennsylvania, where silver had circulated ; and the complaint was soon heard that "they had very little gold and silver." Rhode Island in 1721 "issued a bank of £40,000," on which the interest was pay- able in hemp or flax. The first effects of the unreal enlargement of the currency appeared beneficial, and men rejoiced in the seeming impulse given to trade. It was presently found that specie was repelled from the country by the system ; that the paper furnished but a depreciated currency, fluctuating in value with every new emission; * * * that the increase of paper, far from remedying the scarcity of money, excited a thirst for new issues; and, finally, that commerce was corrupted in its sources by the uncertainty attending the expressions of value in every contract. In 1738 the New England exxrrency was worth one hundred for five hundred ; that of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, one hundred for one hun- dred and sixty or seventy or two hundred ; South Carolina, one for eight; North Carolina, one for fourteen in London, one for ten in the colony. And yet the policy was not repudiated. November 14, 1877. Mr. CHITTENDEN. I ask for half a minute. Mr. DOUGLAS. I object. Not half a minute to the " wrecker." [Laughter.] Mr. CHITTENDEN. I am indebted for half a minute to my friend from New Jersey, [Mr. Hardenbergh,] who is next entitled to the floor. The SPEAKER pro tempore, (Mr. Eden.) The House will come to order. 12 Mr. TURNER. I move that we adjourn for some minutes until some restoratives can be supplied to the corpse from New York. [Laughter.] Mr. CHITTENDEN. Mr. Speaker Mr. COX, of New York. I hope my colleague will have a fair hear- ing as a Representative of the people. Mr. TOWNSEND, of New York. The favor was granted to the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. FeltonJ of an extension of his time, and the privilege should be granted to the gentleman from New York to reply. Mr. HARDENBERGH. I yield the gentleman three minutes. Mr. TOWNSEND, of New York. He ought to have his own time. Mr. HARDENBERGH. I ask unanimous consent that the gentle- man from New York may have three minutes of my time to make a personal explanation. The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman can yield him a por- tion of his time. Mr. HARDENBERGH. I vield him three minutes. Mr. CHITTENDEN. I wiil not return to the argument. There is no man who knows my life who does not know that when I went to the unusual place of the Clerk's desk to speak yesterday, I went to speak the truth according as I understand it. The gentleman from Georgia has referred to me as a captalist — if I understood him cor- rectly — as owning Government bonds, and therefore personally inter- ested in this question. It is about eight years, Mr. Speaker, since I have held or owned a Government bond; and, although I spoke fa- vorably yesterday of national banks, I parted with my last share of stock in national banks more than five years ago. I do not make this statement to conciliate anybody ; it is nobody's business but my own ; but I make it to explode and expose to the world the fallacies and illusions which obscure this question — for the question before this House is before the world. It is a question now whether the credit, and honor, and integrity of the United States shall be sacrificed in the presence of all mankind and sunk into a bottomless pit of disgrace ! I therefore say that any man that aims blows at me as a holder of Government securities or as being interested in the national banks mistakes the mark. The bonds I hold are to a large extent those of defaulting railroads and States, and my own case fairly represents the condition of my constituents. I have not come here, sir, without ex- perience and knowledge of this question of currency. I have not come here and dared to utter anything on this subject that I have not carefully considered. If I had time I could expose the fallacies, the errors, and the absurdities of the last speaker, so that no man who is capable of forming an honest judicial opinion upon any great ques- tion could possibly make any mistake about this one. There has never been such mimicry of legislation as was witnessed on this floor November 4. There never was any subject of equal magnitude discussed by a deliberative body or passed upon by a deliberative body in which there was so much of error, so much of ignorance, so much of prejudice and passion, so much of that spirit, which, unrestrained, will assuredly destroy the integrity and the peace of this nation ; there never was any question discussed here in which there was so much said that was absolutely wrong, abso- lutely ridiculous, ruinous, leading only to utter dishonor. [Ap- plause.] o % ! I i \