Democratic Sentinel, Volume 18, Number 48, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 December 1894 — AFFAIRS OF A NATION [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

AFFAIRS OF A NATION

REVIEWED IN THE PRESIDENT’S ANNUAL ADDRESS. / fiecommendationa in the Matter of Currency Reform-Review of the Great Railroad Strike—The Treasury Deficit and the Bond Issue. Message to Congress. President Cleveland transmitted his annual message to both Houses of Congress Monday. The paper is not of very great length, but touches upon many important points in national policy. Among other things the President recommends withdrawal from the Samoan agreement; the construction of additional battle ships and torpedo boats; the formation of a national board of health; the authorization of short-term bonds at a low rate of interest and a reform in the national currency system. In addition he calls attention to salient points in the reports of the members of his Cabinet and especially indorses many of their recommendations. The President says: The assemblage within the nation’s legislative halls of those charged with the duty of making laws for the benefit of a generous and free people impressively suggests the exacting obligation and inexorable responsibility involved in their task. At the threshold of such labor now to be undertaken by the Congress of the United States and in the discharge of an executive duty enjoined by the Constitution, I submit this communication containing a brief statement of

the condition of our national affairs and recommending such legislation as seems to me necessary and expedient. I have endeavored to impress upon the Belgian Government the needlessness and positive harmfulness of its restrictions upon the importation of certain of our food products, and have strongly urged that the rigid supervision and inspection under our laws are amply sufficient to prevent the exportation from this country of diseased cattle and unwholesome meat. After referring to the restoration of peace in Brazil, and the action taken by this Government to protect American interests, the message proceeds to discuss the Oriental war, and says, concerning the mediation for peace: ■ Deploring the destructive war between the two most powerful of the Eastern nations, and anxious that our commercial interests in those countries may be preserved, and that the safety of our citizens there shall not be jeopardized, I would not hesitate to heed any intimation that our friendly aid for the honorable termination of hostilities would be acceptable to both belligerents. Feeling allusion was made to the assassination of President Carnot. Germany Bare Cattle Importations. Acting on the reported discovery of Texas fever in cargoes of American cattle, the German prohibition against importations of live stock and fresh meats from this country has been revived. It is hoped that Germany will soon become convinced that the inhibition is as needless as it is harmful to mutual interests. The German Government has protested pgainst that provision of the customs tariff act which imposes a discriminating duty of one-tenth of one cent a pound on sugars coming from countries paying an export bounty thereon, claiming that the exaction of such duty is in contravention of articles 5 and 9 of the treaty of 1828 with Prussia. In the interests of the commerce of both countries and to avoid even the accusation of treaty violation, I recommend the repeal of so much of the statute as imposes that duty, and I invite attention to the accompanying report of the Secretary of State containing a discussion of the questions raised by the German protests.

Payment of the sum adjudged due England by the Paris tribunal in the matter of the seal fisheries is recommended. Minor matters relating to diplomatic questions pending with Venezuela, Hawaii, and Italy are treated briefly, and of Japan the President says: “Apart from the war in which the Island Empire is engaged Japan attracts increasing attention in this country by her evident desire to cultivate more liberal intercourse with us and to seek our kindly aid in furtherance of her laudable desire for complete autonomy in her domestic affairs and full equality in the family of nations. The Japanese Empire of today is no longer the Japan of the past, and our relations with this progressive nation should not be less broad and liberal than those with other powers.” Cordial relations with Mexico are the subject of felicitation, and there is recommended a new treaty of commerce and navigation with that country to take the pla<M of the one which terminated thirteen years ago. An indemnity tendered by Mexico, as a gracious act, for the murder in 1887 of Leon Baldwin, an American citizen, by a band of marauders in Durango, has been accepted and is being paid in installments. The Bluefields incident in Nicaragua is reviewed at length, and the need of vessels to look out for our interests is shown. Relations with Russia. The recent death of the Czar of Russia called forth appropriate expressions of sorrow and sympathy on the part of our Government with his bereaved family and the Russian people. As a further demonstration of respect and friendship, our Minister at St. Petersburg was directed to represent ourGovernmet at the funeral ceremonies. The sealing interests of Russia in the Behring Sea are second only to our own. A modus vivendi has therefore been concluded with the imperial government Restrictive of poaching on the Russian rookeries and of sealing in waters which are not comprehended in the protected area defined in the Paris award. Occasion has been found to urge upon the Russian Government equality of treatment for our great life-insurance companies whose operations have been extended throughout Europe. Admitting, as we do, foreign corporations to transact business in the United States,

we naturally expect no less tolerance for onr own in the ample fields of competition abroad. Domestic Affaire. The reports of the American Secretaries are reviewed in practically the same shape as they have already appeared ii the news dispatches given in these columns. Speaking of military and naval equipment, the President says: The skill and industry of our ordnance officers and inventors have, it is believed, overcome the mechanical obstacles' which have heretofore delayed the armament of our coasts, and this great national undertaking upon which we have entered may now proceed as rapidly as Congress may determine. With a supply of finished guns of large calibre already on hand,, to which additions should now rapidly follow, the wisdom of providing carriages and emplacements for their mount can not be too strongly urged. The Secretary presents with much earnestness a plea for the authorization of three additional battleships and ten or twelve torpedo boats. If we are to have a navy for warlike operations, offensive and defensive, we certainly ought to increase both the number of battleships and torpedo boats. The Secretary states that not more than 15 per cent of the cost of such ships need be included in the appropriations for the coming year. I recommend that provision be made for the construction of additional battleships and torpedo boats. Reserve Supplies Necessary. The Secretary recommends the manufacture not only of a reserve supply of ordnance and ordnance material for ships of the navy, but also a supply tor the auxiliary fleet. Guns and their appurtenances should be provided and kept on hand for both these purposes. We have not to-day a single gun that could be put upon the Paris or New York, of the International Navigation Company, or any other ship of our reserve navy. The manufacture of guns at the Washington Navy Yard is proceeding satisfactorily, and none of our new ships will be required to wait for their guns or ordnance equipment. Both the Secretary of the Navy and the Secretary of the Treasury recommend the transfer of the work of the Coast Survey proper to the Navy Department. I heartily concur in this recommendation.

On the Pension Rolls. At the close of the last fiscal year, on the 30th day of June, 1894, there were 969,544 persons on our pension rolls, being a net increase of 3,532 over the number reported at the end of the previous year. Of these pensioners 32,039 are surviving soldiers of Indian and other wars prior to the late civil war, and the widows who are relatives of such soldiers. The remainder, numbering 937,505, are receiving pensions on account of the war of the rebellion, and of these 469,344 are on the rolls under the authority of the act of June 27, 1890, sometimes called the dependent pension law. The total amount expended for pensions during the year was §139,804,461.05, leaving an unexpended balance from the sum appropriated of $25,205,712.65. The sum necessary to meet pension expenditures for the year ending June 30, 1896, is estimated at $140,000,000. The Commissioner of Pensions is of the opinion that the year 1895 must, according to all sensible human calculation, see the highest limit of the pension roll. The claims pending in the bureau have decreased more than 90,000 during the year. A large proportion of the new claims filed are for increase of pension by those now on the rolls. The of certificates issued was 80,213. Tho names dropped from the rolls for all causes during the year numbered 37,951. Among our pensioners are nine widows and three daughters of soldiers of the revolution, and forty-five survivors of the war of 1812.

The barefaced and extensive pension frauds exposed under the direction of the courageous and generous veteran soldier now at the head of the bureau leave no room for the claim that no purgation of our pension rolls was needed. The accusation that an effort to detect pension frauds is evidence of unfriendliness towards our worthy veterans and a denial of their claims to the generosity of the Government suggests an unfortunate indifference to the commission of any offense which has for motive the securing of a pension and indicates a willingness to be blind to the existence of mean and treacherous crimes which play upon demagogic fears and make sport of the patriotic impulse of a grateful people. Recommendations of the Secretary of Agriculture are concurred in, and the admirable work of the Weather Bureaus and the life-saving service is warmly praised. Inspecting Meat Exported.

The appropriation to the Bureau of Animal Industry was $850,000 and the expenditures for the year were only $495,429.24, thus leaving unexpended $354,570.76. The inspection of beef animals for export and interstate trade has been continued and 12,944,056 head were inspected during the year at a cost of 1% cents per head, against 4% cents for 1893. The amount of pork microscopically examined 35,437,937 pounds, against 20,677,410 pounds in the preceding year. The cost of this inspection has been diminished from 8% cents per head in 1893 to GYs cents in 1894. The Secretary of Agriculture recommends the law providing for the microscopic inspection of export and interstate meat be so amended as to compel owners of the meat inspected to pay the cost of such inspection, and I call attention to the arguments presented in his report in support of this recommendation. The scientific inquiries of the Bureau of Animal Industry have progressed steadily during the year. Agricultural Experimentation.

The office of experiment stations, which is a part of the United States Departrhent of Agriculture, has during the past year engaged itself almost wholly in preparing for publication works based upon the reports of agricultural experiment stations and other institutions for agricultural inquiry in the United States and other countries. Under the appropriation to enable the Secretary of Agriculture to investigate and report upon the nutritive value of various articles' and commodities used for human food, the Department expended in the fiscal year 1892 $2,345,809.56; and out of that sum the total amount expended in scientific research was 45.6 per cent. But in the year ending June 30, 1894, out of a total expenditure of $1,948,988.38, the Department applied 51.8 per cent, of that sum to scientific work and investigation. On the subject of civil service reform the President says: “The advantages to the public service of an adherence to the prineiples.,of civil service reform are constantly more aparent; and nothing is so encouraging to those in official life who honestly desire good government as the increasing appreciation by our people of these advantages,” Tariff Needs Amendment.

The tariff act passed at the last session of the Congress needs important amendments if it is to be executed effectively and with certainty. In addition to such necessary amendments as will not. change rates of duty, I am still very decidedly in favor of putting coal and iron upon the free list. So far as the sugar schedule is concerned I would be glad, under existing aggravations, to see every particle of differential duty in favor of refined sugar stricken out of our tariff law. If with all the favor now accorded the wmar-refining

| interest In out tariff lava, It still lan* i guiahes to the extent of closing refineries and thousands of discharged workmen, it would seem to present a hopeless case for reasonable legislative aid. Whatever, else is done or omitted, I earnestly repent that the additional duty of one-tenth of a cent per pound laid upon sugar imported from countries paying a bounty upon its export be abrogated. It seems to me that exceedingly important considerations point to the propriety of this amendment. With the advent of a new tariff policy, not only calculated to relieve the consumers of our land in the cost of their daily life, but inviting a better development of American thrift and creating for us closer and more profitable commercial relations with the rest of the world, it follows as a logical and imperative necessity that we should at once remove the chief if not the only obstacle which has so long prevented our participation in the foreign carrying trade of the sea. Issuing of New Bonds. During the last month the gold reserve in the Treasury for the purpose of redeeming the notes of the Government circulating now in the hands of the people became so reduced audits further depletion in the near future seemed so certain that in the exercise of proper care for the public welfare ft became necessary to replenish the reserve and thus maintain popular faith in the ability und determination of the Government to meet as agreed its pecuniary obligations. It would have been well if in this emergency authority had existed to issue the bonds of the Government bearing a low rate of interest and maturing within n short period, but Congress having failed to confer such authority, resort was necessarily had to the Resumption act of 1875. Nothing could be worse or further removed from sensible finance than the relations existing between the currency the Government has issued, the gold held for its redemption and the means which must be resorted to for the purpose of replenishing such redemption when impaired. We hare an endless chain in operation constantly depleting the Treasury’s gold and never near a final rest. As if this was not bad enough, we have by a statutory declaration that it is the policy of the government to maintain the parity between gold and silver, aided tho force and momentum of this exhausting process and added largely to the currency obligations claiming this peculiar gold redemption. Our small gold reserve is thus subject to drain from every side. The demands that increase our danger also increase the necessity of protecting this reserve against depletion, anil it is most unsatisfactory to know that the protection afforded is only a temporary palliation. It is perfectly nnd palpably plain that the only way under present conditions by which this reserve, when dangerously depleted, can be replenished, is through the issue and sale of the bonds of the government for gold; and yet Congress has not only thus far declined to authorize the issue of bonds best suited to such a purpose but there seems a disposition in some quarters to deny both the necessity and power for the issue of bonds at all. I can not for a moment believe that any of our citizens are deliberately willing that their government should default in its pecuniary obligations or that its financial operations should bo reduced to a silver basis. At any rate I should not feel that my duty was done if I omitted any effort I could make to avert such a calamity. Questions relating to our banks and currency are closely connected with the subject just referred to, and they also present some unsatisfactory features. Prominent among them are the lack of elasticity in our currency circulation and its frequent concentration in financial centers when it is most needed in other parts of the country. The absolute divorcement of the Government from the business of banking is the ideal relationship of the Government to the circulation of the currency of the country. This condition cannot be immediately reached, but as a step in that direction, and as a means of securing a more elastic currency and obviating other objections to the present arrangement of bank circulation, the Secretary of the Treasury presents in his report a scheme.for modifying present banking l»ws and providing for the issue of circulating notes by State banks, free from taxation under certain limitations. The Secretary explains his plans so plainly and its advantages are developed by him with such remarkable clearness that any effort on my pait to present argument in its support wopld .be superfluous. I shall, therefore, .content myself with an unqualified indorsement of the Secretary’s proposed changes in the law and a brief and imperfect statement of their prominent features. , It is proposed to repeal all laws providing for the deposit of United States bonds as security for circulation; to permit national banks to issue .circulating notes not exceeding in amount 75 per cent, of their paid-up qnd unimpaired capital, provided they deposit with the Government, as a guarantee fund, in United States legal tender notes, including Treasury notes of 1890, a sum notes they desire to isspe, this deposit equal in amount to 30 per cent, of the to be maintained at all tiines, but whenever any bank retires any part of its circulation a proportional part of its guaranty fund shall be returned to it; to permit the Secretary of the Treasury to prepare and keep on hand ready for issue in case an increase in circulation is desired blank national bank notes for each bank having circulation and to repeal the provisions of the present law imposing limitations and restrictions upon banks desiring to reduce or increase their circulation—thus permitting such increase or reduction within the limit of 75 per cent, of capital to be quickly made as emergencies arise. In addition to the guarantee fund required, it is proposed to provide a safety fund for the immediate redemption of the circulating notes of failed banks by imposing a small annual tax, say one-half of 1 per cent, upon the average circulation of each bank until the fund amount to 5 per cent, of the total circulation outstanding. When a bank fails its guarantee fund is to be paid into this safety fund and its notes are to be redeemed in the first instance from such safety fund thus augmented—any impairment of such fund caused thereby to be made good from the immediately available cash assets of said bank, and if these should be insufficient such impairment to be made good by prorata assessment among the other banks, their contributions constituting a first lien upon assets of the failed bank in favor of the contributing banks. It is quite likely that this scheme may be usefully amended in some of its details; but I am satisfied it furnishes a basis for a very great improvement in our present banking and currency system. I conclude this communication fully appreciating that the responsibility for all legislation affecting the people of the United States rests upon their representatives in the Congress, and assuring them that whether in accordance with recommendations I have made or not, I shall be glad to co-operate in perfecting any legislation that tends to the prosperity and welfare of our country.

Twenty years ago Queen \ ictoria was taught how to spin by an old woman from the Scottish highlands. Her majesty is very fond of the occupation, being proud of her skill.

PRESIDENT CLEVELAND.