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IN MEMORIAM
BERNARD MOSES
Sheldon d' Compa7?/y's Text-^Books. '
Hiirs Elements of Mhetorlc and Comj^osition
By D. J. Hill, A.M., President Lewisburg University, author
of the Science of Rhetoric. Beginning with the selection of a
theme, this book conducts the learner through every process
of composition, including the accumulation of material, its
arrangement, the choice of words, the construction of sentences,
the variation of expression, the use of figures, the formation of
paragraphs, the preparation of manuscript, and the criticism of
the completed composition.
lUWs Science of Hhetorlc
An introduction to tlie Laws of Effective Discourse. By
D. J. Hill, A.M., President of the University at Lewisburg.
l2mo, 300 pages.
This is a thoroughly scientific work on Rhetoric for advanced
classes.
Intellectual ndloso2)hy (Elements of). 426 pages
By Francis Wayland, late President of Brown Univer-
sity.
The Elements of 3Ioral Science
By Francis Wayland, D.D., President of Brown Univer-
sity, and Professor of Moral Philosophy. Fiftieth thousand.
12mo, cloth.
Elements of Political Economy
By Francis Wayland, D.D., late President of Brown Uni-
versity. 12 mo, cloth, 403 pages.
Recast by Aaron L. Chapin, D. D., President of Beloit
College.
No text-book on the subject has gained such general accept-
ance, and been so extensively and continuously used, as Dr.
Wayland's. Dr. Chapin has had chiefly in mind the wants of
the class-room, as suggested by an experience of many years.
His aim has been to give in full and pi'oportioned, yet clear
and compact statement, the elements of this important branch
of science, in their latest aspects and applications.
(^i;iMA>^ HMjy-*^
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in 2007 with funding from
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FIRST PKINCIPLES
POLITICAL ECONOMY,
CONCISE L Y PRESENTED
FOR THE USE OF CLASSES I:N' HIGH SCHOOLS
AND ACADEMIES.
AARON L. CHAPIN, D.D.,
PRESIDENT OF BELOIT COLLEGE.
NEW YORK :
SHELDON AND COMPANY,
8 Murray Street.
1880.
I. -^"
FIRST PRINCIPLES
HBni
Chi
POLITICAL EOOI^rOMT.
One volume. 16mo. 225 pages.
Concisely presented for High Schools and Academies, hy Aaron L.
Chapin, D.D., President of Beloit College.
II.
WAYLAND'S ELEMENTS
OP
POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Eecast, and revised by Aaron L. Chapin, President of Beloit College.
FOR COLLEGE USE.
One volume. 12mo. 425 pages.
Copyright, 1879,
By SHELDON & CO.
ElecirotyPed hy Rand, Avery ^ $^ Co., Boston.
PEEFACE.
From several quarters, there came a call for a concise
compend of the principles of Political Economy, which
could be used as a text-book for advanced classes in
high schools and academies. In this little book, the
author has attempted to respond to that call. He has
not tried to make a book for children, nor to make the
science easy for youth of more maturity; but he has
endeavored simply and clearly, in as few words as possi-
ble, to present the subject for the study of persons who
have learned something of the power of language, and
have been trained to think and reason for themselves.
The '* Exercises " thrown in all along are not intended
to furnish teachers with questions on the text. Every
one fit to teach this and kindred subjects will frame his;
own questions best. But they are designed, like the-
problems in arithmetic or algebra, to suggest practical
applications of the principles and topics of discussion
which will introduce some diversity of opinions, and
extend the range of the subject somewhat beyond the
limits of the text-book.
The book is a condensed presentation of the matter
887329
IV PREFACE.
contained in the teger work r^Jlcftiilj issued as a modifi-
cation of Waj^land'sf J^lei^a^nia- of Political Economy ; and,
for a fuller trtatxiiejit of the topics noticed, reference is
made to that book. It is desirable that every teacher
should also have at hand for reference one or more other
works of prominent writers, such as those of Adam
Smith, McCulloch, Mill, Fawcett, Thornton, and Jevons,
of England ; Roscher of Germany (an excellent transla-
tion of which has recently appeared) ; and those of
Bowen, Perry, Carey, Thompson, Bascom, A. Walker,
F. A. Walker, Sumner, and D. A. Wells, of our own
country.
Generally the author's aim has been to give a clear
statement of principles, avoiding the advocacy of one
side or the other of disputed questions. In the last
chapter, however, positive opinions are expressed on the
issue between protection and free trade, partly as an
example of the application of principles to pending
questions, and partly to indicate the present strong drift
of both philosophical and practical economists on that
question. If it shall serve to elicit opposite views for
full discussion in the class-room, the author's aim will
be best accomplished; for it is his earnest hope that
this introduction of this important brancn of science to
the study of our schools may tend to a more intelligent
apprehension of economic laws on the part of our peo-
ple generally.
Beloit College, Jan. 1, 1880.
co:n"tei^ts.
INTRODUCTION.
DEFINITIONS AND DIVISIONS.
PAGE
Political Economy defined 5
Fundamental truths.
Wealth defined 6
Sources of wealth, original, secondary.
How increased.
Value defined 7
Its maximum and minimum limits.
Divisions of the Science 8
Exercises 10
PART I.
PRODUCTION.
Threefold Subdivision .11
CHAPTER I.
SECTION I. —- OF LABOR.
Labor defined 11
Kinds of labor : 1. Physical labor. 2. Mental labor.
What physical labor does.
What mental labor does directly : 1. Discovery. 2. Inven-
tion. 3. Oversight.
Mental labor indirectly concerned in production.
Changes effected by Labor 13
1. Transmutation. 2. Transformation. 3. Transportation.
Exercises 15
V
VI CONTENTS.
SECTION n. — MEANS FOR INCREASING THE EFFECT-
^ IVENESS OF LABOR.
Ageistts of Nature most available .... 16
Animal power, sunlight, gravitation, wind, steam, gunpow-
der, &c., electricity and galvanism, chemical forces.
Agents for directing Power 17
How Natural Agents make Labor Effective , . 18
Division of Labor defined . . . . . .19
It implies analysis and distribution of parts.
Advantages of Division of Labor .... 20
1. Shortens apprenticeship. 2. Saves time. 3. Increases
dexterity. 4. Suggests inventions. 5. Employs diverse
capacities.
Exercises 21
SECTION III. — LABOR IN GREAT MANUFACTURING
ESTABLISHMENTS.
"What such Establishments require .... 23
1. Large capital. 2. Many laborers. 3. Rapid production.
4. Wide markets. 5. Executive ability in superintend-
ence ; in finances.
"Why not set up at once in a New Country? . , 24
how they promote the general welfare . . 25
1. They multiply and cheapen products. 2. Increase variety
of gratifications. 3. Favor certain employment for
laborers. 4. Balance diflferent branches of industry.
Evils incident to Division of Labor .... 26
1. Endangers physical health. 2. Dwarfs minds. 3. Im-
pairs independence. 4. Risk of sweeping disaster.
5. Fosters jealousies and antagonisms.
Exercises .28
CHAPTEK II.
of capital.
Capital defined . . . . ' , . . . . 30
Mistakes corrected : 1. Capital not synonymous with wealth.
2. Nor with money. 3. Does not include human quali-
ties.
Origin of Capital, the Fruit of Labor saved . . 32
Forms of Capital 33
1. Implements and machinery. 2. Materials. 3. Means of
subsistence. 4. Finished products.
Consumption of Capital 34
Destruction passing on all its forms.
CONTENTS. Vii
Productive AND Unproductive Capital . . . 36
Fixed and Circulating Capital 36
Exercises 37
CHAPTER III.
THE CO-OPEKATION OF LABOR AND CAPITAL.
Labor and Capital Partners 39
Most harmoniously united in one person.
"Why this cannot be Universal 39
1. Capital tends to increase. 2. Men's tastes differ. 3. Large
establishments necessary to some forms of production.
Conditions which favor the Union of Capital and
Labor 41
1. General distribution of capital. 2. Ratio of capital to
number of laborers. 3. Assurance of just reward to
each. This depends on, a, division of property;
6, just laws ; c, freedom to both capital and labor.
4. Intellectual and moral culture.
Exercises . . . . 43
PART n.
CONSUMPTION".
The Nature op Consumption 45
Kinds of Consumption . . . . • . .46
CHAPTER L
involuntary consumption.
Natural Consumption . 46
Accidental Consumption . 47
VHiat insurance does.
Immaterial and Notional Consumption ... 48
Exercises 48
CHAPTER II.
voluntary consumption.
Two Objects, Reproduction, Gratification . . 50
section I. — consumption fob reproduction.
The Rule of Economy 51
For capital : a, Use no more than necessary. &, Use the
cheapest possible, c, Exhaust all utilities.
For labor: a, Use no more than is needed, b, Use labor
adapted to the purpose, c, See that the labor is per-
formed.
Vlll CONTENTS.
Cabeful Study op Pbocesses essential to Economy, 53
Eestrictions on either Labor or Capital against
Economy 53
Economy promotes the General Welfare ... 53
Exercises 64
SECTION II. — CONSUMPTION FOR GEATIFICATION.
Kinds of Gratification 55
1. Those which preserve health and life. 2. Those -which
delight the senses. 3. Intellectual gratifications. 4. So-
cial gratifications. 5. Moral gratifications.
The Bule of Economy applicable to all ... 67
0, Consume only the needed amount. 6, Make consumption
perfect, c, Select carefully the gratifications.
The Reciprocal Relation of Consumption and Pro-
duction 68
Extreme frugality and extreme luxury to be avoided.
Exercises 60
CHAPTER III.
public consumption.
The Nature op Public Consumption .... 61
The Purposes to which it is applied .... 62
1. For support of government. 2. For public improvements.
3. To advance science, and difiiise intelligence. 4. For
popular education. 5. For care of afflicted classes.
6. To relieve poverty. 7. For a nation's defence.
Two Rules op Economy in Public Consumption , 65
Exercises 65
PART III.
DISTRIBUTIOlSr.
Distribution defined ....*... 67
The Parties to be recognized ..... 67
Laborers, owners of capital, the government.
Subdivisions 68
CHAPTER I.
THE remuneration OF LABOR.
Terms used, "Wages, Salaries, Commissions, Fees . 69
section I. — nominal and real wages.
The Distinction between Nominal and Real Wages, 70
CONTENTS. IX
Causes of the Difpekence 70
1. Money fluctuations. 2. Forms of payment. 3. Regular-
ity of employment. 4. Duration of power to labor.
section ii. — the efficiency of labok.
The Distinction between Nominal and Real Cost
OF Labor 72
Causes of Difference of Efficiency .... 72
1. Race-qualities. 2. Diet and clothing. 3. Personal habits.
4. Degree of intelligence. 5. Technical education.
6. Cheerfulness.
Exercises 74
SECTION III. — considerations WHICH DETER-
MINE THE RATE OF WAGES.
Wages imply a Contract 76
Considerations which determine the Rate . . 76
1. Cost of living, necessary wages. 2. Value of the prod-
ucts, maximum limit. 3. Custom. 4. Competition,
most influential of all. 5. The Golden Rule.
Combinations to resist Competition .... 80
Strikes, trades-unions, combinations of employers.
Exercises 84
SECTION IV. — CAUSES OF VARIATION IN THE
REMUNERATION OF LABOR.
Circumstances affecting Competition .... 85
1. Ease or difiiculty of the employment. 2. Skill required.
3. Trust involved. 4. Constancy of employment.
5. Probability of success.
Salaries, Commissions, and Fees 87
Labor so compensated involves : 1. Superior natural gifts.
2. Personal character.
Extraordinary Compensation in Learned Profes-
sions
The Case of Authors and Artists
Offices of Honor, Clergyivien, and Scientists
Eemuneration for Women's Labor .... 90
Beasons why it is less than that of Men. . . 90
1. Physical and mental constitution. 2. Home sphere.
3. Prospective marriage. 4. The actual organization
of industry. 5. Feminine instincts. 6. Partial sup-
port from friends.
The Case of Women of Genius 92
X CONTENTS.
Conclusions 92
a, Absolute equality unattainable. 6, Present inequality
unreasonable, c, How relief is to come. d5, Woman
queen in the home.
Exercises 9^
CHAPTER 11.
THE REMUNERATION OF CAPITAL.
The Justice of Remuneration for Capital . . 95
Threefold Subdivision 96
SECTION I. —RENT.
Rent defined 97
Rent of Agricultural Lands 97
Productiveness depends on Fertility and Situation, 97
Rent of City Property depends on Location . . 98
Why Rents rate less than Interest .... 98
Exercises 99
section II. — interest and dividends.
Interest defined 100
The Term implies a Mutual Advantage . . , 101
Interest on Capital not Wrongful Usury . . 102
Circumstances which determine Rates of Interest, 102
1. Risk, depending on: a, personal character; b, character
of the business ; c, character of the government. 2.
Convenience of the investment: a, facility of transfer;
bi permanency ; c, punctuality in payment of interest.
3. The profits of industry. 4. Ratio of demand to
supply of capital.
"Why Interest is High in a New Country. . . 106
Usury Laws explained 106
"Why Usury Laws are Unreasonable .... 106
1. They violate a right of property. 2. Civil law cannot fix
prices. 3. The price of capital most variable. 4. These
laws increase burdens. 6. Such laws never enforced.
Dividends defined 108
They depend on success of industry. They include interest
and profits.
Exercises 109
CHAPTER nL
distribution of profits.
Profits defined Ill
CONTENTS. XI
Items of Expense to be deducted from Proceeds . Ill
1. Wages. 2. Salaries. 3. Interest. 4. Insurance. 5. Taxes.
Percentage on Capital not a True Measure of
Profits 112
Three Members of the Partnership to be recog-
nized ... 113
Capital, executive agency, labor.
A Fair Distribution of Profits harmonizes Labor
AND Capital 114
Co-operative Associations 115
Exercises 116
CHAPTER IV.
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT.
The Claims of Government take Precedence of
other Claims 118
Taxation, the Maxim of Free Government . . 119
Adam Smith's Maxims 119
Direct and Indirect Taxation 120
Tariffs defined 121
Duties, Specific and Ad Valorem 121
National and State Taxation in the United States, 122
National Taxes 123
a, Excises, b, Stamps, c, Licenses, dt Income tax.
State Taxation, how imposed 125
Equitable Taxation should reach All Kinds of
Property 126
Liability to Double Taxation 126
Exercises 127
PART IV.
c
EXCHANGE.
Importance of this Department 129
CHAPTER I.
NATURE, NECESSITY, AND AGENTS OF EXCHANGE.
Exchange defined 130
* Value the Central Term 131
The Law of Supply and Demand 131
Three Classes of Commodities 131
1. Things wbich cannot be multiplied. 2. Things easily
multiplied. 3. Things multiplied at extraordinary cost.
XU CONTENTS.
Fundamental Principles stated by Mill . . . 132
1. Value a relative term. 2. Market value depends on sup-
ply and demand. 3. Cost defines natural value. 4. The
natural value of some things a scarcity value. 5. Things
that have a scarcity value not easily increased. 6. A
monopoly value is a scarcity value. 7. The natural
value of an article equals the cost value of the most
costly portion. 8. The condition of stable equilibrium
in exchange is that things exchange at their cost value.
Necessity of Exchange 134
Between individuals ; betvs^een nations.
The Agents of Exchange 136
Merchants, Retailers, Middle-Men . . . .137
Factors, jobbers, shipping-merchants, importers, bankers,
brokers, underwriters.
Outgoing and Incoming Currents of Trade . . 138
Exercises 140
CHAPTER II.
MONEY AN INSTRUMENT OF EXCHANGE.
Difficulties of Exchange by Barter .... 142
Money defined 143
section I. — THE FUNCTIONS OF MONEY.
Money as a Standard of Value 144
Money as a Medium of Exchange 145
Essential Qualities of Money 146
1. Stability of value. 2. Universal acceptableness. 3. Di-
visibility without loss of value.
One Substance should fulfil both Functions . . 147
Money not necessary as a Medium of Every Ex-
change 147
Every Thing comes to have its Price . . . .148
Articles used as Money 148
Uniformity of Money throughout the World de-
sirable . . 149
Exercises 150
SECTION II. — SPECIE.
Qualities which fit Gold and Silver for Money . 153
1. They have intrinsic utility. 2. They cost labor. 3. They
concentrate great value in small bulk. 4. They are
divisible without loss. 5. They are of uniform quality.
6. They can be easily verified. 7. They are indestruc-
tible. 8. They are adapted to each other.
CONTENTS. Xrn
Legitimate Agency of Government respecting
Money 155
1. To name a legal tender. 2. To regulate coinage.
Things to be regarded in Coinage .... 156
1. Quality of the metal. 2. Size of coins. 3. Form of coins.
Seigniorage 157
What may be done with Worn Coins and Foreign
Coins 158
The Question of a Double Standard .... 159
Gold for main standard, silver as subsidiary.
General Truths respecting Money .... 160
1. The cost of money equals the cost of the article exchanged
for it. 2. Freedom of commerce equalizes the supply
of money. 3. The amount of money small in propor-
tion to exchanges made. 4. Increase of money in a
country not of itself advantageous. 5. Abundance of
money not an index of prosperity. 6. A false maxim
refuted.
Exercises 162
CHAPTEK III.
credit an instrument of exchange.
Credit defined 164
section i. — the forms of credit.
The Leading Forms in which Credit appears . . 165
1. Book-accounts. 2. Loans. 3. Mercantile paper. 4. Bank-
deposits. 5. Stocks. 6. Bonds. 7. Circulating notes.
SECTION II.— THE USEFUL FUNCTIONS OF CREDIT.
Mistakes corrected 167
Credit is not capital, — does not create capital.
Borrower and lender cannot use the same capital at once.
The Useful Functions of Credit stated . . . 168
1. It brings wealth into use as capital. 2. It draws out in-
dustrial talent. 3. It quickens exchanges. 4. It is a
direct instrument of exchange between individuals,
between distant cities, between nations. 5. It may be
put into paper-money.
section iii. — the abuses of credit.
Some Abuses of Credit stated 172
1. Too freely granted. 2. By wild speculations of borrow-
ers. 3. By extravagant living of debtors. 4. By con-
fidence-operations. 5. By betrayal of trusts. 6. By
over-estimate of assets. 7. By excessive issue of paper-
money.
XIV CONTENTS.
Mischiefs caused by these Abuses .... 174
a, Fluctuating prices; b, Honest men pay for bad debts;
c, Trade made a game of chance; dt Moral sense dead-
ened ; e, Force of contracts relaxed.
Exercises 175
CHAPTER IV.
BANKS AND PAPER-MONEY.
Banks, Agents of Credit 177
SECTION I. — OFFICES OF BANKS.
Four Offices of Banks 178
1. To collect and keep money-deposits. 2. To negotiate
money-exchanges,— peculiarity of British exchange.
3. To make loans and discounts. 4. To issue circulat-
ing notes.
SECTION II. — THE UNITED-STATES NATIONAL-
BANK SYSTEM.
Main Features of the Law . . . . . .182
The Liabilities of National Banks . . . .184
1. The capital stock". 2. Circulating notes. 3. Deposits.
4. Balances due other banks. 5. Surplus funds and
issues. 6. Undivided profits. 7. Miscellaneous lia-
bilities.
The Resources of National Banks . . . .186
1. Loans. 2. United-States bonds to protect circulation. 3.
Bonds and stocks held as investments. 4. Balances
due from other banks. 5. Real estate. 6. Exchanges
and cash items. 7. Currency. 8. Funds to redeem
circulation. 9. Miscellaneous items.
The Sources of Profits of Banks .... 186
1. Interest: a, on United-States bonds; b, on circulating
notes ; c, on capital and reserves ; d, on deposits loaned.
2. Premiums on exchange. 3. Commissions for col-
lections.
Private Banking Houses and Savings Banks . . 186
SECTION III. —PAPER-MONEY.
Distinction between Paper-money and Money-paper, 187
Kinds of Paper-money 188
1. Mercantile currency. 2. National-bank currency. 3.
Mixed currency. 4. Credit currency. 5. Paper-money
secured by real estate.
CONTENTS. XV
<;HARACTERIST1CS OP PAPER-MONEY 190
1. Convenient. 2. Economical. 3. Involves always credit.
4. Can never serve as a standard of value. 6. Can cir-
culate only in the country where it is issued. 6. Liable
to fluctuations. 7. Causes prices to fluctuate. 8. Gov-
ernments tempted to issue it without limit. 9. Made a
legal tender, it is a forced loan. 10. A cause of panics.
11. Tends to make commerce a game of chance. 12.
Blunts the public conscience.
Exercises 193
CHAPTER V.
INTERNATIONAL TRADE.
Fundamental Propositions 195
1. All nations of one blood. 2. Earth and its resources
given to the one human race. 3. Earth's resources
best developed when each country produces that for
which it is best adapted. 4. Earth's blessings best dis-
tributed by free mutual exchanges.
New Facilities for Intercommunication welcomed . 196
False Doctrines formerly prevalent on Inter-
national Trade 197
The Theories of Protection and Free Trade dis-
tinctly STATED 198
Arguments for Protection considered . . . 199
1. Protection necessary to Varied Industry . . 199
Varied industry admitted to be a blessing, a, Every coun-
try has varied resources; 6, also diversity of talent;
c, men have diverse wants ; c?, varied industry makes
a home-market ; c, it favors social and moral advance-
ment.
Put Protection is not necessary to Varied Indus-
try 201
a, Industry has a natural growth, b, Free competition the
healthy stimulus to that growth, c, Varied industry
springs up as fast as increase of labor and capital war-
rant, d, The instinct for accumulation a safe guide.
e, Artificial stimulus produces re-action. /, Foreign
products are purchased with fruits of most effective
labor, g, Foreign competition cannot crush natural
growth, h, Artificial nursing makes a sickly growth.
Protection cannot add to natural resources, nor create capi-
tal, nor create men of skill. It can only change the
direction of capital and labor.
y^n CONTENTS.
2. Protection maintains National Independence . 204
Two kinds of independence. Protection fosters independ-
ence of isolation.
3. Agricultural Products need a Home-market . 206
Free trade the condition of a healthy home-market.
Positive Objections to Protection .... 208
1. It fosters antagonism of industries. 2. It leads to over-
production. 3. It reduces revenues of the State. 4. It
is an unstable policy. 5. It demoralizes legislation.
6. It corrupts public morals.
The Experiment of Free Trade between our
States 210
The Golden Rule applicable to Nations . . .211
Exercises 212
INTRODUCTION.
DEFINITIONS AND DIVISIONS.
Political Economy is the science which shows
how things intended to satisfy our wants are pro-
duced, and how they are consumed ; how they are
distributed among a people, and how they are ex-
changed one for another all over the world.
The science springs from four fundamental truths :
1. God has made men creatures of many wants,
and filled the world in which they live with means
for satisfying those wants.
2. The labor of men is necessary to draw out the
materials of nature, and to fit them for use in meet-
ing men's wants.
3. The exertion of labor establishes for the laborer
a right of property in the things which he produces.
4. The right of property implies the right of ex-
change or sale, and diversity of labor necessitates
between men exchanges of the fruits of their labor.
Three desires in men contend for the mastery : —
1. Desire of ease. This tends to repress labor.
2. Desire of present gratification. This tends to
consume the fruits of labor at once.
5
6 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
3. Desire of means for future gratifications. This
tends to stimulate labor, and to save its fruits.
A man or a nation grows rich only as the third of
these desires overrules the other two.
Wealth is the collective name for all useful things
which can be owned and exchanged. Some things
are ver}^ useful, yet they form no part of wealth,
because they cannot be exclusively appropriated.
Such are air, sunlight, and commonly water. Other
things, such as bread, salt, cloth, iron, houses, &c.,
are capable both of satisf3ing wants, and of being
exclusively possessed and exchanged. Only these
are properl}- accounted wealth.
The original source of wealth is the bounty of God
in nature.
The secondary source of wealth is human labor
directed to bring forth the bounty of nature in
form, in time, and in place, to meet the wants of
men.
Wealth is increased only by constant reproduction,
i.e., by destroying some useful articles to bring forth
others. Thus the wheat that is sown must die, in
order that a new crop may spring from it, yielding
thirty, sixty, or a hundred fold : the leather in the
hide must be cut up to make shoes, in which form it
meets wants. If a man consumes all his wheat, he
will have none to sow. The tanner prepares his
leather, expecting it to be used up for shoes. Ab-
stinence and foresight attend all productive labor.
Thus industry and frugality are indispensable con-
ditions of the increase of wealth.
INTRODUCTION. 7
Value is purchasing power, or that quality in an
object which gives it power to command other objects
in exchange. The term supposes always a compari-
son of two objects with reference to an exchange.
Thus value is a relative, not an absolute, quality.
Two things are combined in this quality of value,
— first, utility, that is, adaptedness to satisfy want
or gratify desire ; second, cost, that is, some labor
necessary to produce the object. We can think of
nothing which has greater utility than air and light ;
but they have no value, because they are so freely
supplied to all that they cost no labor. If one has
spent a day's labor in making a table, he will not
give it to his neighbor for air or light which he can
have for nothing ; nor will he exchange it for a box
which he could make with half a daj-'s labor. So,
in general, the value of an article is determined very
much by the labor which it costs to produce or pro-
cure it. Things are exchanged at what is called
their natural value, when the terms are adjusted by
the relative cost, labor for labor.
The utility of an object is its desirableness for
gratification. This may var}^ with circumstances,
such as individual taste, the fashion of the day, the
emergency of the hour, &c. To one who cannot
read, a book will have no use ; for his own gratifica- -
tion he will give nothing for it. One will readil}'
give a gold watch for a loaf of bread when there is
no other means of saving him from starvation ; then
the value, the purchasing power, of the loaf, rises a
thousand-fold above its actual cost.
These two elements thus define the extreme limits
8 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of value. The most one will give for an object is
determined by his estimate of its utility, or the
gratification it will afford him. The least a man
will ordinarily take for an object is determined by
its cost, or the labor necessary to produce it.
Between these limits value may temporarily fluc-
tuate, as the relations of supply and demand vary.
When the supply of an object is small, and many
persons desire it, the purchasing power of that ob-
ject is increased by competition among the buyers.
When a larger quantity of an article has been pro-
duced than is wanted, the purchasing power of that
article is diminished by competition among the sell-
ers. But this state of things, in either case, will
not continue long ; for free competition tends always
to settle the value of all things upon the natural
basis of cost.
Divisions. — Political economy treats of the pro-
duction of things to satisfy wants. Hence the two
leading divisions of the science are Production and
Consumption.
Production is the process of labor applied to ob-
jects of nature to adapt them to the satisfaction
of wants. We can neither create nor annihilate an}^
part of matter; but we can modify almost ever}^
thing so as to impart to it some utility, — that is,
we can create value. Under this division, therefore,
are considered the processes and laws by which
labor gives value to things. The substances thus
brought out are called products.
Consumption is the act of destroying utilities
INTRODUCTION'. 9
either for immediate gratifications, or to produce
some new utility for future gratifications. The
actual destruction of values is necessarily involved.
Under this division are considered the laws which
govern the economical use of w^ealth to satisfy wants
or gratify desires.
There are among men- great diversities of capacity
for labor. It is therefore good economy of produc-
tive effort to unite the labors of many persons on a
particular product, so that each may contribute the
part which he can do best. Yet each person has a
variety of wants, while his own labor is devoted to
one thing. He must therefore get what he needs in
exchange for what he makes. Hence arise two other
branches of our science, logically subordinate to those
just mentioned, though practicall}' of the highest im-
portance. They are Distribution and Exchange.
Distribution embraces questions of equit}^ and
practical methods pertaining to the assignment to
different laborers of their respective shares of values
produced. Here are considered the difficult problems
growing out of the mutual relations of employers
and employed.
Exchange is the act of transferring things from
one to another, according to their values. Each
individual is busied in creating one utility, and
wants a thousand. Each country produces of cer-
tain articles far more than it needs, and needs
many others which it cannot produce at all. Hence
the necessity of universal and ceaseless exchange.
Under this division are considered the instruments,
10 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
the laws, and the processes, which relate to the
mutual transfer of values.
The most difficult problems of political economy
belong to the departments of distribution and ex-
change.
EXERCISES.
1. Mention some articles of wealth.
2. Tell what you know of the manner in which they are
produced.
3. Name what you can of the utilities of each.
4. Do savages, or civilized men, have the most wants ?
Why?
5. Why has air no value ?
6. When and why may water have value ?
7. How does iron exist in nature ?
8. State what you can of the processes of labor which
render iron useful.
9. If a farmer gives a bushel of wheat for a razor, why
is it a fair bargain ?
10. Whence comes the great value of the diamond ?
11. Why does the value of an article decline as it goes out
of fashion ?
12. What events in Europe may enhance the value of the
American farmer's wheat-crop ? Why ?
13. Why has cotton less value than wool ?
14. What different kinds of labor are represented in a yard
of calico?
15. How are the ten cents paid for that yard of calico
distributed to the several parties who have labored to pro-
duce it ?
16. How does a merchant's labor add value to the goods
he sells ?
17. Why are strawberries and peaches generally cheapest
in the market Saturday afternoon ?
18. How does foreign commerce benefit our agriculturists
and manufacturers ?
19. How do railroads help to develop the wealth of a
country ?
POLITICAL ECONOMY.
PART I.
PRODUCTION.
Production is the process of drawing out means
to satisfy human wants by labor applied to natural
objects. Labor is the first essential. Some prod-
ucts of former labor are also requisite to begin with.
To these the name Capital is given. This branch
of political economy will therefore be best presented
under three subdivisions. The first will treat of
Labor, the second of Capital, and the third of the
co-operation of these two factors.
CHAPTER I.
SECTION L— OF LABOR.
Labor is tlie voluntary exertion of human beings
put forth to attain some desired object.
The processes of production give scope for the
exercise of all the faculties of man. Hence two
kinds of labor are to be recognized : —
1. Physical labor, in which muscular exertion is
the chief thing. ii
12 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
2. Mental labor, which engages chiefly the facul-
ties of the mind.
All productive industry combines some ph3^sical
and some mental effort. Even the day-laborer must
exercise his mind to handle his shovel with judg-
ment and skill. In general, labor is effective in
proportion as it is directed by intelligent mind.
Physical labor only moves things. It depends on
the capacity of living muscle to contract and ex-
pand, as governed by the will. But this power to
produce motion under the control of intelligent mind
gives man unlimited command over the forces of
nature to achieve his purposes.
Mental labor is directly concerned in the produc-
tion of wealth in three ways : —
1. In investigation to discover the properties and
laws of matter. So chemical research made known
the substance phosphorus, and its property of start-
ing into flame under friction.
2. In invention to devise methods and instru-
ments by which the properties of matter may be
made to meet human wants. So matches were in-
vented, — a very simple instrument, by which phos-
phorus is used to kindle our fires. So the spinning-
jenny and the power-loom were devised to facilitate
and cheapen the process of making cloth.
3. In oversight and superintendence. In the sim-
plest kinds of labor, mind must direct muscle.
Where numbers are joined in labor for a given
product, one ingenious mind, superintending, gives
effect to the muscular exertions of a score of igno-
rant workers.
OF LABOR. 13
It is obvious, that, in the wide range of produc-
tive industry, mental labor is quite as essential as
ph^^sical labor. Whatever, therefore, quickens the
mental activity and promotes the intelligence of a
people, tends to the increase of their wealth.
Mental labor is also indirectly instrumental in
production, as it is applied to improve the phj^sical
health and the mental capacity of individuals, and
to maintain order, justice, and security in human
society. Here belong the mother's care in nursing
and training children ; the teacher's labor to de-
velop the minds of youth ; the lawj^er's counsel and
pleadings to define and maintain the rights and ob-
ligations of men under the rule of civil law ; the
minister's efforts, by the truths and precepts of
God's word, to form good consciences, and improve
the public moral sense ; and the varied services of
legislators and officers of government to insure sta-
bility and order in the very structure of society.
Though these labors do not directly bring forth
material products, they favor all the productive
industry of a people, and are as essential to the
best results of its processes as the manual labor of
the farmer or the blacksmith.
The Chang^es effected by Labor applied to
matter may all be reduced to three, which are indi-
cated by the three words. Transmutation, Transfor-
mation, and Transportation.
1. Transmutation is a change In the elementary
form of matter. So, by the labor of the farmer,
carbon, gases, and water are changed into wheat;
14 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
by that of the chemist, acids and alkalies are
changed into salts ; by that of the tanner, skins
and tannin are changed into leather.
2. Transformation is a change in the aggregate
form of matter. The shoemaker transforms a hide
of leather into shoes ; the smith transforms a piece
of iron into a horse-shoe ; the spinner transforms a
bale of cotton into thread, and the weaver trans-
forms the thread into cloth.
3. Transportation is a change in the place of mat-
ter, as when a cargo of wheat is transported by ship
from New York to Liverpool, or ten tons of dry
goods are transported by rail-car from New York to
Chicago.
In a general wa}^ these changes represent respec-
tively the agricultural, the mechanical, and the com-
mercial departments of human industry ; and each
contributes an important element of utility. He
who makes the flour, and he who transports it to
the people who need it, render as important services
for the satisfaction of wants as the farmer who raises
the wheat. These divers forms of labor stimulate
and support each other.
These several forms of labor enter in different
degrees into the value of different articles. Thus
butchers* meat and green vegetables derive most of
their value from transmutation ; clothing, cutlery,
&c., derive the greater part of their value from
transformation ; and the value of bulky articles like
coal is determined very much by the cost of trans-
portation. In most articles, however, we see more
or less of all these forms of labor combined. By
OF LABOR. 15
new devices and increased facilities for either of
tliese forms of labor, production is enlarged and
improved, and comforts are multiplied.
EXERCISES.
m
1. Wliat is the difference between labor and play ?
2. What is skill ?
3. How are man's muscle and mind and a force of nature
combined in driving a nail ?
4. What kinds of labor produced the magnetic tele-
graph ?
5. How does that invention aid production ?
6. What services do the chemist and pattern-drawer in a
calico-mill render ?
7. How is the payment of a high salary to the manager
of a cotton-mill good economy ?
8. How is production favored by the brain-work of stu-
dents of science, of inventors, of lawyers, of teachers, of
legislators, judges, and magistrates ?
9. If you buy a pocket-knife for fifty cents, how many
and what forms of labor does the price represent ?
10. How do good roads favor production ?
11. How do the operations of thieves and swindlers affect
production ?
12. Do gamblers and speculators contribute to the increase
of wealth ?
13. How does the prevalence of drunkenness affect the
industry of a community ?
14. Are men who labor in the learned professions fitly
called non-producers?
16 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
SECTION" II. — MEANS FOR INCREASING THE
EFFECTIVENESS OF LABOR.
Economy of labor is ♦an important consideration
in the increase of wealth. Man's physical power is
limited, and his strength is soon exhausted. But
there are forces of nature which are stronger than
he, and some of which never tire. These he can
bring into his service, and so at the same time re-
lieve the burden and multiply the products of his
labor.
There is also great difference in the capacities of
different men. Some have strong muscles and dull
minds. Others have strong minds in weak bodies.
Some are specially fitted for one kind of labor, and
others for another. The fruits of labor will there-
fore be increased, if man}- join hands under a sys-
tematic arrangement which sets every one to doing
the particular work for which he is best fitted.
There are thus two ways in which the effective-
ness of human labor ma}^ be increased : —
First, by devices for employing the agents and
forces of nature.
Second, by a systematic division of labor.
1. The agents and forces of nature most available
for production are : —
a. The muscular power and instincts of animals.
b. The light and heat of the sun.
c. The force of gravitation, especially in falling
water.
EFFECTIVENESS OF LABOR. 17
d. Moving currents of wind.
e. The expansive force of steam.
/. The explosive force of gunpowder, dynamite,
&c.
g. The attractions and repulsions of electricity
and galvanism.
h. The action of chemical forces.
To these we must add, for combining and direct-
ing all kinds of forces, the mechanical principles or
powers ; viz., the lever, the pulley, the inclined plane,
the wheel and axle, the wedge, and the screw.
The properties of matter embodied in these agents
are the gift of God, and of themselves cost us noth-
ing. But in most cases, to make them available,
some instrument must be employed which has cost
labor. Thus, to control animal power, we need
yoke or harness, cart or wagon, &c. ; a lens enables
us to intensify the light and heat of the sun ; by
means of a water-wheel or pendulum we command
the force of gravitation ; by a wind- wheel we catch
the force of moving air ; by a steam-engine we ac-
cumulate and direct the expansive force of steam ;
by a hammer we combine the principle of the lever
with the force of gravitation and the density of
steel ; and the complicated machiner}" of a cotton-
mill is but an adjustment of various means to the
great purpose of physical labor, which we have seen
to be to produce and direct motion.
These instruments, when simple, like a hammer, a
spade, a plane, are called tools. When complicated,
like a fanning-mill, a spinning-jenn}^, or a steam-
engine, they are called machines. Some instruments
18 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
are required in every kind of labor, for human
limbs and muscles and brains unassisted can accom-
plish but little. The inventions of the last fifty
years have introduced elaborate machinery into all
branches of industry. One man with a pair of
horses, a plough, a drill, and a cultivator, can culti-
vate ten times as much land as he could with only a
spade and Ifoe.
This use of natural agents increases the effective-
ness of labor in two wa} s : —
First, it enables one man to do the work which
must otherwise require a number of persons, and so
either sets free a portion of labor for other occupa-
tions, or greatly multiplies and cheapens products.
Second, it achieves what no amount of labor un-
assisted could perform. So the telegraph-machine
is a means of instantaneous communication between
places a thousand miles apart ; the locomotive can
propel a train of cars at the rate of forty or sixty
miles an hour ; a screw-machine will turn out screws
by the million, with a uniformity and nicety of finish
which could not be attained by hand- work.
The great benefit thus realized is in multipl3ing
the means of satisfjing human wants, and bringing
them within the reach of all classes of people. An
incidental disadvantage is, that, with the introduc-
tion of labor-saving machinery, many persons are
thrown, at least temporarily, out of emplo^'ment, or
are compelled to learn new methods of labor. It
involves also the danger of over-production in cer-
tain articles, and of a general disturbance of the
harmonious relations of different branches of Indus-
EFFECTIVENESS OF LABOR. 19
try. Nevertheless the good results far outweigh the
evil ; and we may hope that the problem, now before
the world, of adjusting the system of labor to the
new condition of things, will soon find a happy
solution, which shall be equitable and advantageous
to all.
2. Division of Labor applied to production
means that different kinds of labor be distributed to
different individuals and classes so that all shall do
that for which they are best fitted.
The principle is illustrated on a broad scale in
the peculiar industries of different countries adapted
to their respective advantages. Thus tea is a spe-
cial product of China, cotton of our Southern States,
cutlery of England, silk goods of France and Italy.
In all civilized communities people take up differ-
ent trades and professions according to their several
capacities, tastes, and circumstances. The results
of labor are both increased and improved when the
farmer and the baker, the blacksmith and the jew-
eller, the weaver and the tailor, the merchant, the
lawyer, the doctor, &c., each devotes his energies
to the work of his particular calling. This order of
things marks the chief difference between savage
and civilized life.
But as a technical term of political economy, divis-
ion of labor has a more specific application to labor
employed on particular products. Suppose, for ex-
ample, an establishment for the manufacture of
watches is projected. The watch is made up of
many diflferent parts. Obviously it will economize
20 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
labor to assign each part to one man or set of men.
Thus the wise application of the principle involves
two things : —
1. An analysis of the article to be produced, and
of the work to be done, into distinct and simple
parts.
2. A distribution of these parts to the persons
employed, so that each workman shall confine him-
self as nearly as possible to a single operation.
The system is complete when the several opera-
tions keep each other going, — when there are no
superfluous hands, and none are kept idle waiting
on others' movements, — when the several processes
fit into each other like the gearing of smooth-running
machinery.
The special advantages of division of labor
may be stated as follows : —
1. It shortens the period requisite for one to
become an expert workman. It is quite evident that
one operation can be learned more quickly and more
perfectly than ten or twenty.
2. It saves the time which v^^ould be lost in pass-
ing from one kind of work to another. B}' the law
of habit, an operation often repeated becomes easy ;
mind and muscle adapt themselves to one form of '
labor, and acquire a capacity for continued exertion.
It will take some time to " get brain and hand in "
to another operation. Where compUcated tools must
be adjusted to different kinds of work, this consid-
eration is of more importance. " Time is money,"
said Franklin. This is especially true in all matters
concerning the production of wealth.
EFFECTIVENESS OF LABOR. 21
3. It increases the dexterity of the workmen.
Repeated "practice makes perfect." The mind,
the e^^e, the hand, are trained to quickness and
precision by the repetition of a single operation.
In a boiler-factor}^ the rapidity and precision with
which the man plies his hammer to form the rivet-
heads is wonderful. He has acquired this dexterity
by devoting himself to this single operation.
4. Division of labor suggests the contrivance of
tools to facilitate operations. Many of our most
valuable inventions have originated with workmen
whose attention was devoted to particular processes.
New improvements are thus continually brought
forward.
5. Division of labor brings into most profitable
service all diversities of talent and capacity. In the
manufacture of fine glass-ware, one part of the
process requires high artistic genius ; another, judg-
ment and skill, the fruit of experience ; another, ful-
ness and strength of lungs ; and others, the simplest
forms of manual labor. It were poor economy to
set a raw hand to engrave a delicate pattern, or
to send the artist to carry the vessels from the fur-
nace to the annealing-oven. By systematic arrange-
ment each can be kept doing that for which he is
best fitted, and for which he receives wages accord-
ing to its importance.
EXERCISES.
1. How much can a man do for himself without any
tools ?
2. What force of nature does the Indian's bow bring
into service?
22 POLITICAL ECONOMy.
3. Is there any definable limit to man's dominion over
other animals and the forces of nature ?
4. Name the animals which have been subdued to serve
man.
5. Name as many as you can of the useful inventions of
the present century.
6. What natural agent does the mariner's compass ren-
der available, and for what purpose ?
7. What natural agents are employed in photography,
and by what means ?
8. On what agencies of nature do the agricultural crops
depend ?
9. What is the function of the great balance-wheel in a
mill for rolling iron ?
10. By what principles is the power of a slowly-moving
water-wheel distributed to a hundred whirling spindles ?
11. What natural agents and what mechanical powers
does an axe combine ?
12. Mention some of the purposes to which the natural
agent heat is applied.
13. Why are inanimate forces preferable to animal power ?
14. State the comparative advantages of water-power and
steam-power.
15. Give an illustration of the principle of division of
labor, and how it increases the effectiveness of labor.
16. State the various kinds of labor involved in making a
pair of shoes.
17. Suppose a man works alone at shoemaking, doing all
the parts himself, how can he economize his labor ?
18. Why do shoes made in a wholesale way in a factory
cost less than shoes made to order ?
19. How does the division of labor affect the employment
of women and children ?
20. How does it develop and employ the highest talent ?
21. Do the use of machinery and the division of labor
make labor more, or less, respectable ?
MANUFACTURING ESTABLISHMENTS. 23
SECTION III. — LABOR IN GREAT MANUFAC-
TURING ESTABLISHMENTS.
The two means for increasing the productiveness
of labor, treated of in the previous section, are so
mutually related that the one involves the other.
The use of labor-saving machinery unites many per-
sons in the same process of production, and necessi-
tates the distribution of the parts of the process.
On the other hand, the division of labor to an}^ great
extent is ordinarily impracticable, except in connec-
tion with the use of machinery. Both t^nd to the
setting-up of large establishments, in which the full
beneJSt of these means of increased productiveness
is realized.
For their successful operation, these establish-
ments require
1. Large investments of capital in machinery,
buildings, &c.
2. Large numbers of laborers, of different grades,
under one general management.
3. The rapid production of articles in great quan-
tities.
4. An extensive market for the disposal of the
products.
5. Great executive ability of two kinds, —
a. In the superintendence of the mechanical pro-
cesses.
b. In the general financial management of pur-
chases and sales, credits, collections, and sharp
competitions on a large scale.
24 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
The application of the two principles may be said
to be limited by these several considerations. In a
new country there is little accumulation of either
wealth or population : the demand for particular
articles is small ; facilities for transportation, which
would widen the market, are few ; and the first
emigrants, though young and energetic, have yet
to develop mutual confidence and high executive
ability. Hence labor begins with each man's doing
by himself all kinds of work with few and simple
tools. But in due time diverse industry is devel-
oped as naturally as a tree grows. As wealth is
accumulated, and population increases, new wants
arise, and new means of satisfying them are provided.
As roads and bridges are made, and railways push
themselves on, the market is widened, enterprise is
stimulated, talents are brought forward, and great
establishments are set up for production on a large
scale. Such a natural growth is far more healthy
and sound than the premature development which
comes from forced, artificial appliances.
When a large establishment has been started, a
deficiency in either of the five particulars named may
prove disastrous. If the funds at command are all
put into what the English call " the plant," the
enterprise may fail for lack of working capital ; or
skilled laborers may be scarce ; or the products may
be diminished through insuflScient or unfit material ;
or, on the contrary, the products may be in excess
of the demand, with no provision for enlarging the
market. Most disastrous of all is the lack of ex-
ecutive abilit}^ and wisdom in either the detailed
MANUPACTURIXG ESTABLISHMENTS. 25
processes of the manufacture, or the general ad-
ministration of the business.
When, however, these conditions are fulfilled, by
a harmonious combination of all the elements in due
proportion, the highest efficiency of labor is attained.
The general welfare is thus greatly promoted in
several wa^^s.
1. Primarily and chiefly, products are multiplied
and cheapened. The large estabhshment economizes
labor, as appears in what was said of division of
labor. It economizes materials, saving every item
of utility in the scraps and odds and ends w^hich in
production on a small scale would be thrown away.
Thus, in the large packing-houses, the hoofs, the
horns, the bones, even the blood and refuse matter,
of the animals slaughtered, are utilized. It econo-
mizes supervision also ; one man of brains being able
to oversee and direct the operations of five hundred
or a thousand workmen easih' and effectively. As a
consequence, the cost of articles is reduced, so that
thousands instead of hundreds of people can afford
to use them. Thus the great cotton-factories have
l»rought down the cost of common musUn from fift}^
cents to six cents per yard, and all classes of people
can use it freely and abundantly.
2. Production on a large scale tends to increase
the variety of objects which minister gratifications.
How many new and beautiful fabrics made of cot-
ton have the great factories given to the world !
The article caoutchouc, called India-rubber formerly,
because its onl}' known use was to rub out pencil-
marks, is now brought out from large estabHshments
26 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
for working it, in a hundred forms, adapted to ren-
der most important services. The concentration of
labor quickens invention.
3. Such organization of labor increases tlie cer-
tainty of the steady employment of laborers. On the
first introduction of labor-saving machiner^^, work-
men have been often thrown into a panic lest they
should lose emploj^ment ; but almost invariably,
under the augmented production and reduced cost,
the demand is so extended that the labor required
is increased, instead of being diminished. Thus the
actual condition of the English weavers was greatly
improved by the introduction of the power-loom.
Notwithstanding occasional fluctuations consequent
on over-production and financial revulsions, the ten-
denc}^ of large manufacturing establishments is to
insure constancy of employment to laborers of all
grades.
4. This sj'stem of large productive operations
helps to maintain a proper balance between different
branches of industry. Increased production in one
department stimulates activity in every other, both
by the example of success, and by an actual demand
for other products, to meet the various wants of
large numbers of people gathered. So, gradually,
the use of machinery and the division of labor are
combined in large establishments for making all
kinds of articles, from friction-matches to locomo-
tive-engines ; and some common interests bind all
together.
MANUFACTURING ESTABLISHMENTS. 27
Certain evils incident to the minute divis-
ion of labor in large establishments must also be
noticed.
1. There is danger that the physical health and
vigor of laborers will be impaired. There is more
or less involved, long and close confinement to a
single operation, which overtasks one hmb or set of
muscles, in a posture which cramps and oppresses
the vital organs, under exposure to deleterious gases
and exhalations, and to the breathing of air bereft
of oxygen, and charged with carbonic acid. There
are also strong temptations to the confinement and
excessive labor of children not full-grown, and to the
overtasking of women, unfitting them to be healthy
mothers. The vital statistics of large manufactur-
ing towns present painful facts illustrating this evil.
2. There is danger that the mind will be contracted
and enfeebled. When one's attention and energies
are absorbed for ten hours each day in sharpening
pins or counting buttons by a machine, his soul' must
be cramped, and its development hindered, unless
special means are taken to counteract the tendency.
3. The division of labor involves some loss of in-
dependence and self-respect. The number of those
who manage business for themselves is diminished ;
and men dependent on wages lack something of that
manliness of character which is gained under the
responsibility of a business of their own.
4. When a large establishment fails, it involves a
sweeping disaster. The fate of great numbers of
workmen hangs on the wisdom of one manager.
Thus the mischiefs of a general financial crisis are
aggravated.
28 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
5. Mutual suspicions, jealousies, and antagonisms
are fostered in large manufacturing establishments.
The natural inequality of men is increased. Some
chafe under subordination to others ; and one rest-
less, jealous spirit may disturb the cheerful labor
of hundreds. On the other hand, the possession of
power prompts some employers and managers to an
imperious disregard of the rights of those under
them.
These evils are to be recognized, yet they are not
incurable. By many manufacturing companies spe-
cial pains are taken to counteract them, with favor-
able results. We may hope for relief to come from
the present agitation of the labor- question, and from
whatever measures promote intelligence and foster
the sentiments of justice and good-will.
EXERCISES.
1. Describe any large manufacturing establishment you
may have visited.
2. What natural agents are brought into use by its
machinery ?
3. How many persons are employed in it, and how is
the work distributed among them ?
4. How much are the articles produced improved and
cheapened ?
5. Where do these articles find a market ?
6. What special qualities has the superintendent ?
7. What is the condition of a people who have no
machinery or division of labor ?
8. Is it luxuries, or necessaries, that are most produced
in large manufactories ?
9. Is it the rich, or the poor, who are most benefited by
the reduced cost of manufactures ?
10. Is it wise, or foolish, for the laborers in Mexico to
MANUFACTURING ESTABLISHMENTS. 29
destroy reapers and other labor-saving agricultural ma-
chinery introduced ? Why ?
11. Will the setting-up of a large factory in your town
affect laborers favorably, or unfavorably ? Why ?
12. Why are laws needed to regulate the employment of
children in factories ?
13. How may the danger' to the health of laborers in
factories be relieved ?
14. What can be done to save minds from being dwarfed ?
15. Must one necessarily sacrifice a proper spirit of inde-
pendence and self-respect by becoming an employe in such
an establishment ?
16. What is the effect of successful enterprise in one
branch of industry on all others ?
30 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER II.
OF CAPITAL.
Its Definition. Capital is that part of wealth
•which is employed, or designed to be employed, in
production. Since this word is used vaguely, we
need to adhere to a strict definition. Let us notice
two or three mistakes which tend to confuse ideas
on this subject.
1. Capital is not synonymous w^ith wealth. All
capital is wealth ; but all wealth is not capital. Sup-
pose a farmer's crop this year gives him a hundred
bushels of wheat to spare. He may lay it up in his
granary for his own future use ; or he may sell it for
gold, and bury the gold for safe keeping ; or he may
spend the gold for a fine picture with which to adorn
his parlor. In either case it is a part of his wealth ;
but since, in either case, it will do nothing to increase
his next ^^ear's crop or income, it is not capital. If,
however, he exchanges his surplus wheat for a horse,
or spends the avails of it on labor to clear and drain
his fields, or buys with it a share of stock in a
flouring-mill, he turns this part of his wealth into
capital. His wheat is gone, or the money is gone ;
but in the horse, or the improved land, or the share
in the mill, it is to work out for him more wealth
next year.
OF CAPITAL. 81
2w Capital is not synonymous with money. Money
buried in the ground produces nothing. A man
intending to start a woollen-mill may need first to
turn some of his property into money with which
to pay for buildings, machinery, &c. His fifty thou-
sand dollars deposited in the bank for this purpose
is his prospective capital ; but it will not become
for him actual capital till it is paid out for a build-
ing, a water-wheel, spinning-jennies, and power-
looms. When his establishment is complete, his
money will be all gone ; but now he has his capital
all ready for service. Money in circulation is an
instrument of exchange, and so performs an impor-
tant function for all productive industry ; but it is
just a wheelbarrow to pass things from one to
another. The confusion of ideas comes from the
fact that capital, and indeed all wealth, is estimated
in terms of money ; but in reality only a small por-
tion of an individuaPs or a nation's capital is in the
form of money ; and always the quality of money is
of far more consequence than its quantity.
3. Capital does not properly include human
qualities, such as strength, skill, judgment, energy,
Integrity. These are often spoken of loosely as a
part of capital. Certainly they are very important
elements of production, and are the result of pre-
vious productive effort ; but they are qualities of
labor, and so, in the distinctions of our science, are
more properly classed under that head, as we have
seen.
Varying the form of our definition a little in view
of these mistakes, we ma}^ say Capital includes all
32 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
material products devoted to purposes of further
production.
The Origin of CapitaL Capital is always the
fruit of past labor saved. A farmer's boy once
received as the first wages of his labor an ewe-
lamb. He might have sold the lamb, and spent
the avails on his immediate gratification ; but he
chose to keep it, and care for her and her 3'oung.
The clip of wool and the natural increase from year
to year were in like manner saved, till he came into
possession of a valuable flock ; then he sold the
flock, and with the avails commenced business as
a merchant. Thus the first-fruit of his labor saved
became the nucleus of a capital which fostered the
industries of two continents. Such is universall}' the
origin and growth of capital. It begins in saving,
and grows by the continued exercise of industry
and frugality. The first step of the savage towards
civilization is to learn forethought and self-denial.
In this aspect of the matter, capital is simply past
labor embodied, and reserved for present labor to
work with. Hence we see that labor and capital
are not so diverse as many suppose. In nature
they are akin, and indispensable to each other in
the processes of production ; always combined for a
common end. They are set in antagonism to each
other only through a popular sentiment, or an or-
ganization of society radically false and wrong.
Forms of Capital. The products of previous
labor appear as capital in man}^ and varied forms,
but all may be grouped under four heads ; —
OF CAPITAL. 88
1. Implements and machinery by which present
labor is made effective. Here are included the cart,
the plough, the divers tools, machines, and useful
and laboring animals of the fanner ; the axe, the
plane, the awl, and the hammer of the mechanic ;
the engines and various machinery of the manufac-
turer ; and the wagon, the ship, the railway and its
rolling-stock for the transportation of goods. To
this category belong also the land and its improve-
ments by drainage, irrigation, fences or hedges, &c.,
and buildings for barns, workshops, storehouses, and
manufactories. To all of this the general term
Fixed Capital is often applied. With the activity
of invention, and the multiplication of machinery,
the amount of capital in this form becomes very
large.
2. Materials to which present labor is to be applied.
Under this head may be set down the farmer's seed
and manure ; the manufacturer's raw materials, such
as lumber, cotton, iron, wool, leather, &c. ; his sec-
ondary materials, such as yarn, steel, gold-leaf, &c. ;
and his auxiliary materials, such as coal for raising
steam, chlorine for bleaching, acids, alkalies, and
d3'e-stuffs for coloring. All these come with values,
as the products of former labor, to have their values
increased by new transformation under present labor.
3. Means of subsistence for laborers. Men must
have food and clothing and shelter while they work.
This must come from previous labor, as the crops of
last year sustain the farmer and his help while this
3"ear's crops are maturing. Under this head must
be embraced dwelling-houses, as well as all kinds of
eS4 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
provisions and apparel needful for the support and
comfort of families. In large establishments the
provision made for salaries and wages covers all
these items.
4. Finished products waiting for a market. The
process of production is not completed till the prod-
ucts pass from the producer's hands. A farmer
may not choose to dispose of his crop as soon as it
is gathered. At certain seasons, the manufacturer
may be compelled to accumulate a large stock of his
goods, in readiness for a brisk sale when the market
opens. For the time, the crop, or the stock of
goods, absorbs a portion of capital. This necessity
is incident to every line of productive industry, and
allowance must be made for it in providing capital
for the business.
In civilized societ}', something in these forms of
capital is essential to every kind of production.
The blacksmith who works by himself must have
forge and anvil, hammer and tongs, for instruments ;
some iron for material ; a home, with some store of
clothing and food, for his subsistence ; and a few
finished horseshoes hanging in his window, ready
for the first call. And the capital of a great cotton-
factory, though counted b}" millions, may all be
resolved into these four forms.
The Consumption of Capital. Though capital
is the fruit of saving, 3^et it is the fixed law of pro-
duction that labor applied to capital destroys value of
one kind in order to bring forth a superior value of
another kind.
OF CAPITAL. 35
This change is passing on capital in each of its
forms. The instruments slowly and surely wear
away by use, the materials are immediately de-
stroyed, food is rapidly consumed, clothing more
slowly, and the house more gradually still, but none
the less surely ; and the finished product sold is lost
to the producer, to appear again in new implements,
new materials, new means of subsistence, and new
products. This is the unceasing round of values
destroj^ed for the sake of greater values produced.
The difference between the value consumed and the
value produced is the profit, — the end steadily
aimed at. It matters not in what form the value
re-appears, provided only it is greater than that
destroyed. If a value is destroyed to produce
another only equal to it, we lose our labor. If a
value is destroyed, and nothing is reproduced, we
lose both labor and capital. Individuals and nations
grow rich only as the value created is superior to
the value of both the labor and capital consumed.
Mr. Mill says, " The greater part, in value, of the
wealth now existing in England, has been produced
by human hands within the last twelve months. A
very small proportion indeed of that large aggre-
gate was in existence ten years ago ; of the i)resent
productive capital of the country, scarcely any part
except farm-houses and a few ships and machines ;
and even these would not, in most cases, have sur-
vived so long, if fresh labor had not been employed
within that period in putting them in repair. Capi-
tal is kept in existence from nge to age, like popula-
tion, not by preservation, but by reproduction."
36 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Productive and Unproductive Capital, By
our definition, all capital is, or is designed to be,
productive. Wealth that is not productive is not
capital. But capital is sometimes unprofitably in-
vested, as in a mill or a railway abandoned. Some-
times in a financial revulsion, or in consequence of
over-production, the business of a great factor}^ is
suspended. In these cases, for the time, capital is
unproductive. Then it loses its ordinary profit ;
and, besides, machinery unemplo3'ed generally suf-
fers damage quite as fast as when running. Sound
economy requires that capital be constantly joined
with labor, and so made productive.
Fixed and Circulating Capital. We notice
these as terms quite commonly used ; but the dis-
tinction they indicate is neither yery im^oortant nor
very accurately defined. In general, fixed capital
means little more than land, buildings for both busi-
ness and dwellings, tools, and machiner3\ Circu-
lating capital means finished products in passage
from producers to customers. Thus fixed capital
brings out its fruits in circulating capital. And
since, in prosperous production, the A^alues produced
are greater than those consumed, the surplus of cir-
culating capital is very naturally turned into fixed
capital for enlarged operations. A particular article
may be set down under the one head or the other,
according to its relations. A plough, for instance,
in the plough-factory, just finished, or in the hands
of the merchant, is circulating capital ; held by the
farmer for use, it is a part of his fixed capital.
OF CAPITAL. 37
Money, though it circulates more freely than any
thing else, must be classed with fixed capital. It
is an instrument of exchange, which, like a wagon,
a ship, or a locomotive, runs to and fro continually,
only to move other things.
EXERCISES.
1. Is a workman's coat an item of capital? How is it
with his Sunday suit ?
2. Is money deposited in a bank for safe-keeping merely
capital to the depositor ? What if the banker loans that
money to a manufacturer ?
3. When may a piano-forte be regarded as an item of
capital ?
4. Suppose a man has great skill as an engraver, but no
plates nor tools to employ his skill. Is his skill capital ?
Can the plates be made productive capital without the skill ?
5. Do the savings of a miser increase capital ?
6. What risks are involved in putting one's savings into
capital ?
7. What is the ultimate effect of extravagant living on
production ?
8. If a seamstress pays for a sewing-machine out of
her earnings, what does the machine represent ? What
advantage does it yield ?
9. Illustrate the forms of capital in the case of a
cabinet-maker working by himself.
10. Illustrate the same point in any large factory with
which you are familiar.
11. What capital is necessary for a wood-chopper who
works by the day ?
12. If the Pacific Mills pay each week six thousand dol-
lars wages, what items of capital does the sum represent ?
13. What items of capital appear in the annual inventory
of a shoe-factory ?
14. How is the capital consumed in the yearly wear of
machinery replaced ? In estimating profits, what allowance
must be made for this ?
88 rOLITICAL ECONOMY.
15. A farmer paid five hundred dollars for stock in a
railway running near his farm. The suhsequent sale of
the road under foreclosure of honds made the stock worth-
less. But the facilities of the road add ten cents a bushel
to the price at which he sells his wheat. Is the capital
which he put into the railroad productive, or unproductive ?
16. When is a threshing-machine fixed, and when circu-
lating capital ?
CO-OPERATION OF LABOR AND CAPITAL. 39
CHAPTER III.
THE CO-OPERATION OF LABOR AND CAPITAL.
In the processes of production, liabor and
Capital are Partners, Co-ad jutors for a com-
mon end, Sharers in a joint result. Each is ne-
cessary to the other; each is helpless without the
other. The most stalwart man can produce nothing
without food and clothing, tools and materials, —
the fruit of previous labor, i.e., capital. Facto-
ries filled with ingenious machinery, warehouses
full of cotton, stores of finished goods, capital in
whatever form or amount, can do nothing to in-
crease itself. Thus labor and capital are the two
necessar3^ and inseparable factors in the production
of wealth.
For their co-operation these elements meet most
harmoniously in the same person; that is, when the
laborer owns capital enough to emplo}^ his own
labor. Then one will, one self-interest, controls
both, and jealousy is excluded. But this adjust-
ment cannot be universal, for three reasons : —
1. Capital under the application of labor tends to
increase, SO that the man soon finds in his hands a
surplus, to employ which he must seek another, who
has only labor, to work under him. Thus a distinc-
40 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
tion between laborer and capitalist, employer and
employed, is sure to rise.
2. The great diversity of capacities and tastes
among men necessitates a separation into two
classes. Often the man strongest, and most skilful
for labor, has no tact to manage business, and save
its returns. On the other hand, men of great finan-
cial ability are not infrequently physically weak, and
unfit for manual toil.
3. Certain forms of production must be carried on
in large establisliments, where are combined large
amounts of capital and great numbers of laborers.
The advantages of machinerj^ and the division of
labor can be secured in no other way. Some things,
like ships and locomotives, can be made only by
such combinations ; and even such things as pins,
buttons, and matches are most economically pro-
duced on a large scale.
Thus the two factors are separated: the capital
falls to some persons, and the capacity to labor to
others. The abstract equality and mutual depend-
ence of the two factors is disturbed, jealousies
spring up, and short-sighted self-interest produces
antagonism between them. As the parties meet to
enter into contract, the capitalist has the advantage,
because he has something which he can live on ;
while the laborer must work, or starve. The capital-
ist is tempted to use his advantage ; and the con-
sciousness of dependence makes the laborer sensitive,
and suspicious of wrong. Against their own true
interests, the parties are led thus to array themselves
against each other.
CO-OPERATION OF LABOR AND CAPITAL. 41
Conditions on which the Harmonious Union
and Effective Co-operation of Latoor and Capital
depend : —
1. A general distribution of capital; that is, such
a condition of things, that the capital of a country
is in many rather than few hands ; that laborers
themselves shall have, or be encouraged to secure,
some capital. All means which help laborers to
save their earnings favor this condition.
2. The ratio of the amount of capital to the number
of laborers. It is a fundamental principle of Politi-
cal Economy that industry is limited by capital, and
every increase of capital demands increase of labor.
The grand regulator is free competition on either
side, under which the tendency is towards an equi-
librium ; for nature provides for the steady increase
of both capital and labor in some definite proportion.
3. The certainty that labor and capital shall each
have its just reward. Nobody questions the right
of the laborer to a reward for his toil. If we
remember that capital is the fruit of past labor
saved, the right of its owner to a reward for its use
is equally plain. The reward of each must come
from the product of their union. To insure this
certainty of reward, certain things in the social
organization are essential. '
a. There must be division of property, personal
ownership in every thing that can by labor be made
an object of value, and appropriated. Without this,
capital cannot be. The theory of communism is
false to nature, and fatal to industry.
b, A prevalent moral sentiment and just laws must
42 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
give security to property-rights. These safeguards
are needed to pre^'ent robbery and fraud by individ-
uals, and to restrain governments from oppression.
C. There is needed, for both capital and labor,
perfect freedom, unrestricted by monopolies, or special
legislation. The inherent right of every man to do
what he will with his own, provided he do no wrong
to his neighbor, is not to be questioned. Ordinarily,
each will judge best for himself as to ,the use he will
make of both his labor and his capital.
4. The general intellectual and moral culture of
a people is an important condition of the effective
co-operation of labor and capital. Intelligence in
the laborer adds to his efficiency. Honesty and in-
tegrity are of the highest consequence to the safe
investment of capital. With reference to the co-
operation of the two, it is important that both
parties, as they meet, be able to take broad views
of their common interests and mutual dependence.
Harmon}^ between the two requires mutual respect ;
and the basis of this is self-respect on the part of
each, which springs from a clear, intelligent under-
standing of relations, rights, and privileges. Thus
means for the general education of a people, and the
culture of good consciences by all religious influ-
ences, have an economical value which cannot be
over-rated.
There is reason to believe that laborers have some
occasion to complain of hardships from the oppres-
sion of capital ; 3'et the wrong is not all on one side.
The agitation of questions at issue between the
parties will do good, if it leads to a better under-
CO-OPERATION OF LABOR AND CAPITAL. 43
standing and a controlling regard for their common
interests. But measures which directly increase
jealousy between them, organizations which contem-
plate hostility and violence, can only aggravate the
evil, and work damage to both sides. Combinations
on either side to rule out fair competition, and repress
freedom of individual judgment and action, are
positively and only mischievous. Whatever tends
to increase the intelligence, and promote the thrift
and independence, of laborers, is helpful to hearty
and profitable co-operation.
EXERCISES.
1. Illustrate the partnership of labor and capital in the
case of a blacksmith who owns his shop, tools, &c., and
works by himself.
2. Suppose, at the end of a year, the blacksmith has a
surplus of earnings. How can he use it to extend his busi-
ness?
3. Explain the co-operation of labor and capital when
he has a hired man working with him.
4. How are labor and capital partners in a watch-factory,
whose capital, valued at a hundred thousand dollars, is
owned by a hundred stockholders, and employs a hundred
hands ?
5. In what ways might a laborer in such a factory turn
his surplus earnings into capital ?
6. Suppose a skilful workman, with little tact for mana-
ging business, and a poor workman, with great executive
ability. Is it best that each should attempt to run a small
business of his own ?
7. Which is best for a country, — to have its land, as in
England, owned in large tracts by a few landlords, or to
have it, as in our country, held in small farms owned by
those who work them ?
8. What is the effect on industry of a social organization
which divides people into fixed classes, as rich and poor ?
44 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
9. Show how competition affects the union of capital
with labor, when the laborers are few in proportion to the
amount of capital, and vice versa.
10. Does the world owe any man a living without labor ?
11. If the property of a town were all held in common,
how would industry be affected ?
12. How does the lack of division of property among the
Indians hinder their civilization ?
13. Can labor and capital meet in successful co-operation
where the public sentiment tolerates fraud and robbery ?
Which party there suffers most ?
14. Show the effect on capital and labor of an oppressive
government, like that of Turkey.
15. What are monopolies ? How do they interfere with
the advantageous co-operation of labor and capital ?
16. Suppose a government offers a bounty for the pro-
duction of woollen goods. Who pays the bounty ? Is it
just and equitable ?
17. Is it good policy, by bounties or high protective tariffs,
to build up one branch of industry at the expense of all
others ?
18. When labor is scarce, and the profit of production is
large, can any combination of employers to keep down the
wages of labor long succeed ?
19. When there is no profit on the production of cotton-
goods, can a strike on the part of the mill-hands prevent
the reduction of wages ?
20. What means do you think best adapted to promote
justice, mutual confidence, and good-will between laborers
and capitalists ?
CONSUMPTION. 45
PART II.
CONSUMPTION.
The Nature of Consumption. All the pro-
cesses of political economy contemplate actual
gratifications as the ultimate end. This is the
legitimate use of wealth. It can be attained only
by consuming the results of production. Con-
sumption is thus the counterpart of production,
and in its widest signification it is simply the de-
struction of value. B}^ this is meant not the anni-
hilation of material substances, but the extinction
of particular forms of utility. Thus when bread
is eaten, when a coat is worn out, when a tree is
felled, when a hide of leather is cut up, the particu-
lar utilit}^ which each possessed is destroyed. It is
in the nature of things an established law, that we
can neither create new values, nor gratif}^ our desires,
except by the destruction of existing value.
It is to be noted, however, that one act of con-
sumption does not necessaril}^ destroy all the utilities
of an article. The linen of a worn-out shirt has
still an important utility as material for the manu-
facture of paper. From the ashes of burned wood
may be extracted an alkali useful in making soap.
46 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Hence economy in consumption requires effort to
exhaust the utilities embodied in all objects.
Kinds of Consumption, There are several ways
in which values are destroyed by the extinction of
utility, all of which come within the range of our
broad definition of consumption. Sound economy
must make account of all.
A general distinction is made as we speak of
consumption as Involuntary or Voluntary ; i.e., as
effected without or with direct design on the part of
man.
CHAPTER I.
INYOLUNTARY CONSUMPTION.
Under this head three specifications may be named.
1. Natural Consumption; that is, the waste of
utility, the destruction of value, which is the work
of nature. All things tend to decay. Wood and
vegetables rot, iron rusts, linen goods become mil-
dewed, woollen goods and furs are moth-eaten, grain
in store heats and spoils, flour turns sour, and all
things in use, even gold and silver, insensibly wear
away. To this head is to be referred also the
destruction caused by locusts, chinch-bugs, vermin,
&c. " It is estimated that in England the destruc-
tion caused by rats, mice, insects, &c., amounts to
ten shillings an acre per year, equal to ten million
pounds per annum."
The degree of this kind of consumption varies
with the climate of different regions. It appears in
INVOLUNTARY CONSUMPTION. 47
one form under the influence of heat, in another
under the power of cold. It is most general and
most rapid in tropical countries. It is most within
the control of man in the Temperate Zone, but no
part of the world and no form of wealth is wholly
exempt from this liability.
Sound economy calls for prudent foresight and
diligent labor to prevent as much as possible this
kind of consumption. Yet, after the best that man
can do, there will be much of waste and loss from
this cause, which must be carefully taken into
account in the estimate of wealth and in plans for
its increase.
2. Accidental Consumption. Under this head
may be included those sudden calamities which carry
sweeping destruction before them, proceeding some-
times from the carelessness of men, sometimes from
the unforeseen and inexplicable action of nature's
forces. Such are great fires, railway- collisions,
steamboat-explosions, shipwrecks, floods and torna-
does, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, ava-
lanches and land-slides. The annual destruction
of values in these ways is very great. Wealth in
every form and in all countries is more or less liable
to be thus suddenly consumed. No human art or
foresight is competent to prevent it altogether.
To meet this liability various methods of insurance
have been adopted. But insurance cannot prevent
the loss caused by destructive accidents. It onl}'
relieves individuals b}^ distributing the loss when it
occurs. When a house is burned, the destruction
of value is absolute ; the wealth of the community
48 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
is by so much diminished. If it was insured, the
impoverishment of the individual owner is prevented
only by bringing many to share the damage.
3. Immaterial and Notional Consumption.
These terms are used by Roscher to indicate that
dechne of value which comes from lapse of time or
change of fashion. Thus the chief value of a daily
newspaper is gone when it is a week old, although
in itself it is the same thing as on the day it was
issued. So, too, all sorts of fancy-goods, six
months after they are brought to market, lose a
considerable part of their value b}^ a change of
fashion. If we remember that value is simply
" purchasing power," it is evident, that, in the light
of our science, these causes effect a consumption
which is as real as that which comes from the actual
destruction of the articles. Manufacturers and mer-
chants and consumers also must take this loss into
account.
This kind of consumption varies much in different
nations, and with different classes of people. In
Germany fashions change much less than in France.
In some countries, while the aristocratic and wealthy
classes change their dress with the fashion, the con:-
mon people wear their clothes till they go to pieces. '
In general, this kind of consumption increases with
the advance of civilization.
EXERCISES.
1. Uliistrate the relation of consumption to production
in a particular instance.
2. Are all men producers ? Are all consumers ?
INVOLUNTAKY CONSUMPTION. 49
3. Illustrate the definition of consumption by the ordi-
nary expenses of a family.
4. Can you think of any gratification which can be
attained without some destruction of value ?
5. When a barrel of flour is made into bread, what is
consumed ?
6. When the bread is eaten, what other consumption
takes place ?
7. When a manufactory stands idle for six months, what
kind of consumption is involved ?
8. Wliy is it good economy for a farmer to keep his tools
and machines under cover when not in use ?
9. The burning of Chicago created a great demand for
labor and materials for rebuilding : was the loss occasioned
by the fire thereby diminished ?
10. A ship and cargo, worth together half a million dol-
lars, were totally wrecked at sea; but thirty days after-
ward insurance amounting to four-fifths of their value
was paid to the owners. What was the total destruction
of value involved, and on whom did the loss fall ?
11. In Germany, military officers are required to wear
buttons marked with the initials of the reigning sovereign :
what special effect on the value of their uniforms must
follow the emperor's death ?
12. When and why is it good economy for a merchant
to sell his fancy-goods at less than their cost ?
13. Which involves the greater consumption of ladies'
dresses, actual wear, or change of fashion ?
14. What is the effect of frequent changes of fashion
on production ?
60 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER 11.
VOLUNTARY CONSUMPTION.
There are two objects for which men of their own
purpose destroy existing values. The one is the
increase of wealth by reproduction; the other is
immediate gratification. Reproductive consumption
demands care, skill, and labor, while consumption
for gratification ordinarily requires neither. Hence
the former is more or less irksome ; the latter is a
present joy.
We can rarely use the same value for these two
distinct and opposite purposes. One cannot eat
his cake, and have it to sell for something else. A
man cannot spend a hundred dollars for a social
entertainment, and have the same money as capital
in his business. On the other hand, the value in-
vested in tools and materials for production is not
available for the suppl}^ of food for the table or fur-
niture for the house. These two kinds of consump-
tion may therefore be best presented in distinct
sections.
CONSUMPTION FOR REPRODUCTION. 51
SECTION I. —CONSUMPTION FOR REPRODUCTION.
In presenting the laws of production, it was shown
that the creation of vahies requires a union of capi-
tal and labor in which both are consumed. Sound
economy respecting consumption for this object pre-
scribes the general rule, that the destruction of value
for the desired product be always the least which
will meet the necessity. This rule is applicable to
both capital and labor.
As respects capital, the following suggestions are
in point : —
a. The amount of capital should be no greater
than is necessary. In cutting cloth for garments,
leather for shoes, boards for furniture, &c., there is
opportunity for great saving or great waste of ma-
terials. In agriculture, sowing done by drilling
saves much seed. Care in the selection and adjust-
ment of tools and machinery may also do much to
diminish the cost of products. It is unwise to
employ a steam-engine of a hundred horse-power,
when only half that amount of power is needed ; or
to use delicate cutting-tools for coarse work.
b. The kind of capital employed should be of the
lowest value that will accomplish the purpose.
Straw is a cheaper material for paper than rags ; yet,
for many purposes, paper made partly or wholly of
straw serves well. Chemistry applied to the arts
has introduced cheaper dye-stuffs for prints. Re-
search and invention are thus constantly economizing
62 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
the cost of production, and every manufacturer needs
to avail himself of the fruits of such study.
The frequent adulteration of articles is an abuse
of this principle. In such cases, the aim is to pass
off goods, under false appearances, for what the}'-
are not ; which is simply fraud, never to be justified.
C. Every utility of the substances employed in
production sliould be exhausted. There are frag-
ments which may be saved. Thus in the manufac-
ture of jewelry, the filings and sweepings of the
workroom yield a considerable value. There are
secondar}^ utilities which may be developed, as the
refuse of a large slaughter-house furnishes materials
for soap, candles, and glue. Formerly the seed of
the cotton-crop was mostly thrown away ; now from
the kernel large quantities of valuable oil are ex-
tracted ; the oil-cake furnishes excellent food for
cattle and sheep ; the hull of the seed fields soluble
phosphate of lime and potash for manure ; and the
spent hull makes a white and clean paper-stock. By
realizing these new values the cost of producing
cotton-fibre is reduced.
A chief advantage of production on a large scale
is, that it warrants different operations for develop-
ing these minor utilities, which in small establish-
ments are wasted.
As respects labor, the rule of economy suggests
three corresponding points : —
a. The labor employed should be neither more
nor less than will effect the intended result. A super-
numerary laborer wastes both his own time and that
CONSUMPTION FOR REPRODUCTION. 53
of others. A deficienc}' in the number of laborers
tends to confusion, and precludes the most economi-
cal division of labor. The great advantage of ma-
chinery is not that it diminishes labor, but that it
multiplies the products of a given amount of labor,
and so economizes production.
b. The grade of labor should be carefully adapted
to diflferent operations. All the advantages of '' di-
vision of labor " come into account here. It is wise,
when great skill is required, to employ a man of skill
at high wages. It is unwise to put such a laborer
upon work which can be as well done by an unskilled
workman at less wages.
C. The labor paid for should be all performed.
To secure this, efficient superintendence is all-essen-
tial. '' Time is mone}^," says the maxim. Certainly
it is money to him who pays money for it. Every
hour paid for that is spent in idleness is so much
unprofitable consumption, — an absolute loss. Good
superintendence often makes all the difference be-
tween success and failure in the conduct of busi-
ness.
From these considerations it is evident : —
1. That the economical consumption of capital
and labor depends chiefly on the careful study and
accurate knowledge of the nature of the processes
of production.
2. That all restrictions on the freedom of capital
and labor are opposed to economy of production.
3. Economy of labor and capital in production
promotes the general welfare, by saving from destruc-
54 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
tion much that ma}^ be made tributary to the satisfy-
ing of human wants.
EXERCISES.
1. Illustrate the distinction between consumption for
reproduction, and consumption for gratification.
2. Suppose a man buys a piano-forte for $500, and then
mortgages the piano for $300 with which to buy tools for
his business. Does the same value serve the double purpose
of gratification and reproduction ?
3. Give examples of waste and saving in the materials
of production.
4. How do contrivances for the more perfect consump-
tion of fuel in steam-engines favor production ?
5. Name an article which has been both cheapened and
improved by the use of cheaper materials.
6. Is the use of barytes, instead of white-lead, for mak-
ing paint, a legitimate economy ?
7. Name an instance of a secondary utility secured by
productive operations on a large scale.
8. What is the consequence of employing five men on
the work of four ?
9. Is he always the most economical laborer who works
for lowest wages ?
10. What need of a foreman at high wages in each
department of a cotton-factory ?
11. Which is the best regulator of consumption for pro-
duction, prescriptive law, or free competition ? Why ?
12. Would it be a blessing to either laborers or the com-
munity if labor were restricted to eight hours a day ?
CONSUMPTION FOR GRATIFICATION. 55
SECTION IL — CONSUMPTION FOR GRATIFICA-
TION.
The ultimate end of all industr}' is to provide for
the wants of men, and to minister to their happiness.
The products of industr}^ may fitly be consumed on
several kinds of gratification.
1. Gratifications essential to the preservation of
health and life. All men require food, clothing, and
shelter. Hence these are called necessities. The
term is, however, used relativel}^, not absolutely.
The measure and qualit}- of goods needed in this
form varies with circumstances, such as climate,
grade of civilization, occupation, and social position,
and also with the taste, temperament, and education
of different persons. A bamboo hut, a measure of
rice, and a few yards of cotton cloth, suffice for the
pariah of India. A respectable citizen of our coun-
try requires values a hundred-fold greater.
2. Gratifications which delight the senses and
tastes. The mere sustaining of existence comes far
short of filling out the measure /Of men's capacity
for enjo3^ment. Such things as delicacies for the
table, beautiful dress and equipage, ornamental fur-
niture, the products of fine art in painting, statuary,
architecture, and music, public exhibitions to please
the eye and the ear, yield rich gratifications to peo-
ple of taste. The desires which run in this direction
are natural. Their gratification, within due limits,
is refining and elevating. Means for these gratifica-
56 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
tions may be drawn from the resources of nature,
and quite generally distributed. It is morally and
socially healthful for people of every class to enjoy
some things which they esteem luxuries.
At the same time, there are in this direction dan-
gers to be carefully avoided. Appetites unnaturally
formed and unduly pampered may gain the master}^,
and lead to indulgences which produce miser}' instead
of happiness. These things ma}^ minister only to a
desire for vain ostentation, which breeds discontent,
envyings, and jealousies, — the bane of happiness.
And men are sometimes led by a refined taste into
ruinous extravagance, which exhausts their means,
and robs them of even the necessaries of life. Self-
control and prudent forethought should ever regulate
both the desires and their gratification.
3. Intellectual gratifications, from fit exercise of
the mind and the acquisition of knowledge. These
aflfect the higher part of men*s nature, and 3deld a
pleasure exceedingly rich and pure, with a consump-
tion of values comparatively' small. All are capable
of enjoyment in some degree from this source, and
the capacity for it increases as provision for it is
enlarged.
4. Social gratifications, through the exercise of
hospitality and all acts of friendliness, in the varied
contact of men with one another. By the constitu-
tion of our nature we are formed for mutual inter-
course and fellowship, and through the good- will
which seeks to please others we find a rich gratifica-
tion for ourselves. Such gratifications bind society
by strong and healthful ties, and promote the general
happiness.
CONSUMPTION FOR GRATIFICATION. 57
5. Moral gratifications, through the culture of a
good conscience toward God and toward men, and
the exercise of benevolence. To secure these, some
value must be consumed in the support of rehgious
institutions and in gifts of charity. By such expen-
ditures the noblest capacities of our nature are drawn
out ; and for the expenditure there is returned the
richest satisfaction, — a satisfaction not hmited to
the moment, but abiding for the lifetime of the soul.
The rule of economy applicable to consumption
for gratification is essentially the same as that laid
down for reproduction. It may be stated in a gen-
eral way thus : Sound economy dictates that we
secure the largest and best gratification at the least
practicable consumption of values. This rule sug-
gests
a. That the quantity of articles consumed be
limited by the actual needs. Americans may learn
economy in this respect from most European peoples.
Quite generally our tables are loaded with a profusion
of food which is simply wasteful. Ordinarily it is
more economical to jjurchase supplies for the house-
hold from day to day, at retail, than at wholesale,
though the prices paid are higher. So, too, it is
commonly unwise to purchase an article just because
it is cheap. The first and main question is always*
''Is it needed?"
h. The consumption should be as perfect as pos-
sible, exhausting every utility. The surplus of a
dinner may provide for the next breakfast. An
article of clothing outgrown by one child may be
made over for a younger. Bad cooking is always
58 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
wastefuL Hence it is good economy to provide a
house with the best cooking-utensils, with fuel that
produces most heat, and with competent servants.
Hence, too, a knowledge of domestic economy and
a careful superintendence of the. operations, on the
part of the mistress of a family, is of the highest
consequence to home comfort.
C. Good judgment is to be exercised in the selec-
tion of our gratifications. Of two gratifications that
are equal, it is wise to choose the least expensive.
That which favors physical health is to be preferred
to that' which tends to disease. Those which refine,
strengthen, and elevate our being are to be chosen,
rather than those which degrade and weaken us. In
our individual gratifications we have occasion to
regard social consequences, and, both for our own
sake and for the good of others, choose those which
improve, in preference to those which demoralize,
society.
In general, intellectual and moral pleasures are
inexpensive, as compared with sensual gratifications,
and those which minister to fashion and vanity.
The cost of an hour of drunken frolic or gluttonous
feasting will buy books for a year's higher enjoy-
ment ; and the sums spent in the ostentatious dis-
play of dress, at the beck of the despot Fashion,
would furnish means for many deeds of charity
which would fill with perennial joy the hearts of both
giver and receiver.
Before leaving this topic, a few things need to be
said on the reciprocal relation between production
CONSUMPTION FOR GRATIFICATION. 59
and consumption for gratification. The production
of goods is always carried on with reference to their
consumption, and rapid and ample consumption is
the true stimulus of production. As another has
expressed it, " Material welfare consists in an ample
consumption: ample production assures abundance;
and, under the law of competition, abundant pro-
duction assures rapid and more equal consumption."
Extreme frugality would leave goods in the hands
of producers uncalled for, and at once throw laborers
out of emplo3^ment and out of the means of living.
Extreme luxury would consume resources and hinder
the accumulation of capital necessary for production.
Th6 problem is, to find the golden mean which shall
keep the balance that sustains prosperous industry,
by a steady demand for its products. The problem
can be solved only as each man studies it, and finds
the solution for himself by using his means for
healthful gratifications, at the same time limiting his
gratifications by a due regard to his means.
Where great inequalities of condition prevail, the
lavish expenditure of the rich in luxurious consump-
tion is no doubt a blessing, as it gives employment
and the means of living to the poor. But for the
greatest general good there is a better use of the
superfluous wealth of the rich, by its employment as
capital in a way to give the poor a chance to increase
their means, and at the same time to multiply and
cheapen products so that all the people — the rich
and the poor alike — may have more of comforts
and luxuries within their reach.
60 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
EXERCISES.
1. Name what you think are necessaries of life.
2. Name the luxuries enjoyed in your home.
3. Name some articles which are necessaries in one
family and luxuries in another.
4. Can you name an article now regarded as a universal
necessity, which was unknown two hundred years ago ?
5. Illustrate the different wants of people of different
classes and of different countries.
6. Is it an extravagant outlay for a rich man of culture
to spend twenty thousand dollars for a library ? What if
his library is kept for show, and seldom used ?
7. Illustrate the evil of undue indulgence in luxuries.
8. Are cheap goods always the most economical ?
9. Wlien is a large outlay for a social entertainment
justifiable ?
10. Is there any exception to the rule that one's gratifi-
cations should be limited by his income ?
11. When is it important to learn how to spend; as well
as how to save ?
12. Is it desirable that all should restrict their expendi-
tures to bare necessities ?
13. How can we dispose of our surplus food-products,
unless we use tea, sugar, silk, &c., brought from other
countries ?
PUBLIC CONSUMPTION 61
CHAPTER IIL
PUBLIC CONSUMPTIOlSr.
The Nature of Public Consumption. Under
the social instinct mankind gather and live in com-
munities. This gives rise to certain common wants,
which are provided for by public agents of the
government, using means drawn from those who
compose the society or state, by taxation.
These common or public wants can be satisfied
only by the destruction of values, just as in indi-
vidual consumption. It is to be remembered that
the values thus destro3^ed are a part of the property
of individual citizens taken for public use. In gen-
eral, the government has nothing to expend but
what is contributed by its tax-paying citizens. In
ancient times despotic governments called out thou-
sands of their people to labor directly in building
city- walls and other public works, and collected from
others the food necessary to sustain them, and the
materials to be used. This was a direct and obvious
draft on private property for public use. In medi-
aeval times, when a sovereign made war, he called on
his vassals to send each his quota of men, fur-
nished with horses and armor, and food for their
sustenance. Each individual thus felt immediately
the burden of the values destroyed in public con-
62 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
sumption. The same thing is involved in the
modern system of providing for the public consump-
tion by taxes paid in money. The farmer sells a
portion of his grain, and with the money pays his
tax ; the next day the commissary of an army may
take the same mone}^, and buy up the same grain for
the use of the government troops. Or, if the pro-
cess is more complex and roundabout, it comes ulti-
mately to the same thing, — a part of the farmer's
crop is consumed, its value destroyed, not for his
private advantage, but for a public use.
A clear apprehension of this very simple truth is
needed to correct a notion entertained by many, and
often expressed, that large public expenditures are
a benefit, provided only the money remains in the
country. In all public consumption it is goods,
real values, that are destroyed. The wisdom of the
expenditure is determined by inquiring what propor-
tion the benefit attained bears to the value destroj^ed.
The benefit, however, may appear in an immaterial
form, as in the maintenance of justice and the pro-
motion of general intelligence. The thing to be
insisted on is that there shall come a real good as
large as possible, from a destruction of value as
little as possible.
The Purposes to which Public Consumption
is properly applied may be specified as follows : —
1. For the support and administration of govern-
ment. Law and order are grand essentials of good
society. On them depend the security of private
property and of personal enjoyment. To secure
PUBLIC CONSUMPTION. 63
these, legislators, executive officers, and judges must
be supported, and buildings furnishing suitable
accommodations for these functions of government
must be erected at the public expense. It is good
economy to pay salaries sufficient to secure the best
talent for these services.
2. For Tvorks of public convenience, commonly
called public improvements. Here are included
such things as paving, cleaning, and lighting the
streets of a city, providing water-works and sewer-
age, constructing roads and canals, improving har-
bors, building and sustaining light-houses, &c.
These works confer benefits upon the whole commu-
nity. It is just, therefore, that they should be paid
for out of the common treasury. For them, also, it
is often necessarj^ that private property be taken for
public use, by the right of eminent domain, a right
pecuhar to the government.
8. For advancing science, and diffusing intelli-
gence for common interests. Under this head be-
long exploring expeditions, astronomical observa-
tions, geological surveys, coast-surveys, meteorolo-
gical observations, entomological investigation, and
the whole post-office system as a means of diffusing
intelligence and promoting social communication.
Expenditures for these things jdeld broad, general
benefits of the highest importance. By its system
of storm-signals, our National Observatory saves
yearly wealth exposed to the dangers of the sea,
whose value is a hundred-fold that consumed in its
maintenance.
4. For the promotion of popular education. The
64 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
prosperity of a country depends very much on the
intelligence of its people. General education tends
to a wise application of industry, and makes it more
effective. It brings labor and capital to meet more
nearly on an equality, and promotes the harmony of
their co-operation. It is of advantage to ever}"
honest man to have inteUigent men to associate and
to deal with. For such a common blessing it is fit
that tha common funds provide, to some extent, and
at the same time, that scope be given for private
beneficence to be exercised for the same end.
5. For the care of classes afflicted by peculiar
calamities or deprivations. Hospitals for the sick
and for the insane, and institutions in which the deaf,
the blind, and the feeble-minded may by peculiar
processes receive an education, are here referred to.
Our common s}Tiipathies and benevolence prompt
such means of rehef for the unfortunate. They can
be most economically provided by the government.
Their benefits must be largely gratuitous because
such misfortunes come in largest proportion upon
the poor.
6. For the relief of poverty. The poor we have
always with us. Every encouragement should be
given to the exercise of private charit}" for its relief,
because Christian beneficence brings a blessing to
the giver as well as to the receiver. But there is
necessity also for some public provision for the poor,
to meet some cases which fall outside the range of
private beneficence, and also to offer some facilities
for the poor to do something towards their own
support. It is unwise, however, to dispense either
PUBLIC CONSUMPTION. 66
public or private charity in a way to encourage
pauperism.
7. For the nation's defence. The general gOOd
is involved in the nation's life. While selfishness
rules human hearts as it does, especially in in-
ternational relations, exigencies will arise when
nothing but military force will save a nation's life.
Such exigencies must be anticipated by due appro-
priations for forts, and armies, and navies, and the
various munitions of war. When war is inevitable,
then no expense is unreasonable which is necessarj'-
to prosecute it with the utmost vigor. Yet it must
ever be remembered that war is always destructive,
terribly destructive, of both wealth and of men who
produce wealth.
With reference to the whole range of public con-
sumption, sound economy dictates two plain and
simple rules : —
1. The style and scale of national expenditures
should be such as to command the respect and honor-
able pride of the people Tvithout useless display.
2. The methods of national expenditures should
be such as to hold all agents of government to a
direct and strict responsibility, and to insure the
utmost fidelity in the discharge of all trusts.
EXERCISES.
1. Illustrate the destruction of values drawn from pri-
vate wealth, in the public lighting of city streets. What
benefit accrues therefrom, and who enjoy the benefit ?
2. Is fraud in public expenditures less criminal than in
66 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
private relations? What false sentiment prevails on this
subject ?
3. Name the blessings of good government which war-
rant expenditures for its support.
4. The members of the British Parliament receive no
compensation for their services : what objections to apply-
ing the same rule to our members of Congress ?
5. Why should the general government maintain light-
houses, instead of leaving the citizens of each port to pro-
vide their own ?
6. Give reasons for or against the policy of railways
being built and run by the government.
7. Should the government control the operations of the
electric telegraph as it does the postal system ?
8. Why is it right for a legislature to appropriate money
for a state geological survey ?
9. Why is it right that a man who has no children be
taxed for public schools ?
10. What benefit accrues from monuments, Fourth-of-
July celebrations, &c., to justify the outlay of public funds
for such purposes ?
11. Why should a state maintain special institutions for
the care of the insane and the education of the deaf ?
12. Why should criminals in a state-penitentiary be com-
pelled to work ?
13. Should those whom sickness or calamity has reduced
to poverty feel disgraced by accepting public relief ?
14. Mention some of the evils of pauperism as it exists
in England.
15. How does war stimulate production ? Does this fact
make war less a calamity ?
DISTRIBUTION. 67
PART III.
DISTRIBUTION.
We have seen, that, for the production of wealth,
labor must be joined with capital ; that various kinds
of labor and divers forms of capital are involved ;
that the general industry of a people includes the
labor of men of various occupations and profes-
sions ; and that the protection of good government
is essential to prosperous industry. The value of
each article produced, estimated by its cost, repre-
sents, therefore, a number of different services ren-
dered by different persons.
Thus problems arise respecting the distribution, to
each one concerned in the process of production, of
his share of the value created. The third division
of our science is occupied with these problems, and
may be defined thus : —
Distribution is that department of Political
Economy which determines the principles on which
the proceeds of industry are divided among the par-
ties concerned in their production.
The parties to be recognzied are three : First,
the Laborers of all grades, whose energies, phj'sical
and mental, are directly or indirecil}' engaged.
68 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Second, the Owners of the Capital, the fruit of past
labor saved, and now combined with present labor
for a joint result. Third, the Government, which
secures the safety and the rights of all, and which
draws on the proceeds of Indus tr}^ generally for its
maintenance.
But the stimulus to all industry and enterprise is
the anticipation of profits, i.e., a surplus of values
produced above those consumed ; and the success of
industry is measured by its profits. Hence arises a
special question of prime importance, respecting the
apportionment of the profits.
This department will be treated, therefore, under
four subdivisions, viz. : —
1. The Remuneration of Labor.
2. The Remuneration of Capital.
3. The Distribution of Profits.
4. The Revenues of the Government.
CHAPTER I.
THE REMUNERATION OF LABOR.
Terms used. The compensation of labor is ex-
pressed by difi'erent terms. Mr. F. A. Walker sa^s
that "of English-speaking people, three - fourths
probabl}', two- thirds certainly, subsist on wages."
This term is applied to manual labor of all grades.
It means a stipulated reward for services rendered,
rated either by the time occupied or by the work
accomplished, by the da}^ or b}^ the piece. It pre-
THE REMUNERATION OF LABOR. 69
supposes the relation of employers and employed,
bound by mutual stipulations, which may be varied
or terminated on short notice.
Salary expresses a fixed sum of money, reckoned
usually by the year, for services which involve brain-
work and responsible trust. Thus in a large manu-
factory, the mass of laborers receive wages, but the
treasurer, the superintendent, &c., have salaries.
Clergymen, teachers, and civil officers are generally
compensated by salaries. The term implies an en-
gagement of some permanence, and a grade of ser-
vice requiring special qualifications and previous
education.
Some agents are compensated by commissions;
that is, a certain rate per cent of the value involved
in each transaction. The term is applied to brokers,
insurance-agents, collectors, travelling salesmen, and
the like. In this case, the employer is responsible
only for what is actually done ; and the agent's
reward depends on his personal enterprise, tact, and
fidelity.
Lawyers, physicians, and certain civil officers are
remunerated by fees. The term originated probably
in the gratuity formerly oflTered by a party benefited
for a service done. Hence more or less indefinite-
ness in this mode of remuneration. The rate is
adjusted for each particular service by usage, or by
the arbitrary demand of the party rendering the
service, or by the good- will of the party served.
The questions respecting wages involve the most
difficult problems of Distribution, and demand our
first attention.
70 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
SECTION L— NOMINAL AND REAL WAGES.
Nominal wages are wages estimated in terms of
mone}^
Real wages are measured by the necessaries, com-
forts, and luxuries of life, which they will command.
It is important to observe this distinction, in com-
paring the rates of wages in different countries and
at different periods. The money- wages of an Eng-
lish laborer may be much less than that allowed an
American ; but the prices of all things which sup-
port life may be so much lower in England than in
America as to nulUfy the difference. The laborer
who receives the lowest money-wages may be the
best off. In 1843 the rate of wages for an Ameri-
can day-laborer was one dollar per day ; in 1865
the nominal rate was doubled : 3^et the one dollar
of 1843 would buy a third more of comforts than
the two dollars of 1865.
Several causes tending to produce this difference
are worthy of notice.
1 . The most influential of all is the fluctuations in
the purchasing power of money. A sudden increase
in the amount of that which passes as money must
diminish the purchasing power of each dollar. The
fact appears in enhanced prices for all commodities.
The use of paper money leads generally to sudden
expansions and contractions. The worst mischief
of such fluctuations falls on those who live by wages.
2. The form of payment often makes a difference
NOMINAL AND REAL WAGES. 71
between Jiominal and real wages. While wages are
generally reckoned in money, they are not always
paid in money. With farm- laborers, their board is
counted as a part of their wages. Manufacturing
laborers are sometimes paid by the "truck-system,"
as it is called ; that is, by orders on stores, where
prices are fixed somewhat arbitrarily, ruling out
competition.
3. The greater or less regularity of employment
affects the real value of wages. In agriculture,
brick-making, house-building, the fisheries, and the
like, labor is in measure precluded at certain seasons
and crowded at others. The real remuneration of
labor must therefore be estimated not by the wages
of one day or one month, but by that rate as quali-
fied by the regularity or irregularity of each occupa-
tion.
4. The duration of the power to labor must be
taken into account in determining the difference
between nominal and real wages. Vital statistics
show that the number of years during w^hich a man
can expect to have strength and vigor to earn wages
varies with men of different nationalities, in different
climates, and in different occupations. Glass-blow-
ing, and almost all work in mines, are exhausting
occupations. Men can continue them but few years.
To know the real compensation of labor, therefore,
we must estimatffe the wages of a lifetime.
If the use of machinery tends to depress nominal
wages, it tends also to multiply and cheapen the
necessaries of life so as to enhance real wages.
The laborer of to-day enjoys many comforts which
72 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
were hardly known a half-century ago. At the
same time the fact of having enjoyed these things
freely makes it a hardship now to be in any degree
deprived of them.
SECTION IL— THE EFFICIENCY OF LABOR.
Labor, as an element of production, must be esti-
mated not by the time occupied, nor by the rate of
wages paid, but by the efficiency of the labor itself.
With respect to efficiency, men differ greatly. All
who have occasion to employ numbers of men know
this very well, and must recognize a distinction
between the nominal cost of labor, indicated b}' the
wages paid, and its real cost, estimated b}^ the value
of the work done. The English contractor, Mr.
Brassey, found that a London bricklayer employed
at five shillings a day did more work than two coun-
try workmen who were each paid three shillings and
sixpence a da3\
We may name the following causes of difference
in efficiency : —
1 . Peculiar qualities of blood and race. Physical
influences, such as local climate, customary food,
and habits of Ufe, continued through many genera-
tions, modifj^ the physical structure of a race.
Hence come differences in height, weight, muscular
strength, and especially in nervous force and spirit.
Thus the Chinese and Japanese fall below the aver-
age of men in stature, and the Scotch rise above
it. The French, without great size or vigor, are
more than ordinarily quick and active. The Eng-
THE EFFICIENCY OF LABOR. 73
lish and Germans have great patience and endur-
ance. Peculiar characteristics become hereditary,
and mark whole races.
2. The quantity and quality of food and clothing.
A man who lives chiefly on potatoes or rice cannot
have the strength and vigor of those who have a
more varied and generous diet. This matter is
carefully studied in the rearing of working-animals :
why should it not be as much regarded with respect
to working-men? Clothing and food help each
other in maintaining the warmth of the body.
3. Habits respecting cleanliness of person, and
purity of air and water. Whatever depresses a
man's vitality must diminish his efficiency. What
can more effectually impair health and depress nerv-
ous force, than to live, as too many laborers do,
crowded in narrow, filthy tenements, where the sun-
light is excluded, and the water is contaminated
with sewage-matter, and the air is charged with
noxious poisons?
4. Intelligence is an important element of efficiency
in a laborer. One who has learned to read and write
has thereby improved his capacity to learn and
exercise a trade. Intelligent laborers can think for
themselves, and with little superintendence strike
for the object aimed at in their labor, at the same
time exercising their invention to devise means for
increasing the efficiency of their toil.
5. Technical education and industrial associations
increase the efficiency of labor. Instincts are heredi-
tary ; and one gains unconscious tuition by contact
and familiarity with organized industry. In asso-
74 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
elation with good workmen, a boy grows into habits
of quick observation and manual dexterity, and so
learns the best part of his trade before be begins
his regular apprenticeship.
6. Cheerfulness and hopefulness of spirit help
much to make labor efficient. These qualities grow
out of self-respect, social intercourse, and the labor-
er's personal interest in the result of his work.
Slave-labor lacks these elements, and is therefore
unprofitable. The laborers may be put on starva-
tion-wages, and so reduced to the level of slaves.
It is for the interest of employers, as well as of
laborers, that wages should be such as to inspire
cheerful hope.
EXERCISES.
1. If the annual product of a watch-factory is valued at
half a million dollars, among what parties must this sum
be divided*?
2. What claim has a stockholder of the company on the
product ?
3. How will the workman who makes only hair-springs
get his share ?
4. Whence come the means to pay the tax of five hun-
dred dollars laid on the property ?
5. How large a portion of the fifty employes will receive
wages ?
6. Who of them will be paid salaries ?
7. How will the salesman who travels to sell the watches
be paid ?
8. How is the lawyer employed to collect bad debts
compensated ?
9. JS'ominal wages are now in 1879 fifty per cent lower
than in 1873 : how is it with real wages ?
10. Illustrate how an increase of money affects real
wages.
THE EFFICIENCY OF LABOR. 75
11. Under an expanding currency, do wages rise as soon
or as high as the prfces of goods ? Why ? Which, wages
or prices, first go down under a contraction of currency ?
12. What objection may a laborer make to receiving his
wages in orders on a store, especially if the store belongs
to his employers ?
13. Why is it right that the nominal wages of a brick-
layer should be higher than those of a shoemaker ? ■
14. Do you know any reason why the smelters of lead-
ore should be paid higher wages than farm-laborers just by
them?
15. What causes combine to make our native American
or Yankee laborers peculiarly efficient ?
16. Why is it good economy for a manufacturing com-
pany to provide neat and convenient tenements for their
employes ?
17. Is it a wise and just law which compels laborers to
send their children to school for a certain portion of their
time? Wliy?
18. What is the advantage of thorough apprenticeship to
a trade ?
19. Does the habit of singing while at his work impair,
or improve, a laborer's efficiency ?
76 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
SECTION IIL — COIS'SIDERATIONS WHICH DETER-
MINE THE RATE OF WAGES.
Wages imply a contract between two parties, — a
promised reward for promised services. The two
parties join in the contract for their mutual advan-
tage, yet each having a separate interest. The
wages agreed on must be determined by some regard
to each of these separate interests.
1 . On the side of the laborer, the first considera-
tion is the cost of living. The man depends on his
wages to pro\dde for himself shelter, food, and cloth-
ing, that he may be kept in health and vigor, fit for
work. More than this, since man is short-lived,
children must be reared, in order that the stock of
laborers may be continued. There must be also
some provision for the laborer in his old age, when
he is too feeble to work. Whatever is essential to
the support of the laborer and family, must thus be
taken into the account ; and this consideration deter-
mines what some writers term necessary wages. Its
chief force is to define a limit below which wages
cannot be set to continue long without inducing
misery, and reducing the number of laborers.
The cost of living varies in different climates,
and, to some extent, according to the habits of dif-
ferent races and classes of people. Hence in warm
countries wages may be lower than in cold. The
habits of the Chinese enable them to live on less
wages than Americans. It is, however, a bad sign
THE RATE OF WAGES. 77
for a people's prosperity and happiness, when wages
are pressed down to this lowest limit. The compen-
sation of labor should be such as to give the diU-
gent and thrifty a chance to multiply their comforts
and improve their condition.
2. On the side of the employer, the main consid-
eration is the value of the products. The employer
embarks his energy and capital in a branch of pro-
ductive industry, expecting from the sale of the
products to have a surplus for his own reward, after
paying wages and all other costs. His power to
pay wages depends on the purchasing power of
these products. When their price in the market
rises, he can afford to pay higher wages ; when it
decHnes, he may be compelled to stipulate for re-
duced wages. The value may be so reduced that
he will have no alternative but to close his opera-
tions, and extricate his capital as best he may.
The chief force of this consideration is to define
a limit on the other side, — a limit above which
wages cannot rise to continue long without ruining
the business. The laborer comes to the negotia-
tion, asking at least such wages as are necessary for
his support. The employer comes, offering at most
such wages as he thinks the value of the products
will enable him to pay. The actual agreement will
strike a point between the tw^o extremes, fixed by
other considerations hereafter to be named. These
two considerations suggest this general statement.
The minimum limit of wages is the rate necessary
for the support of the laborer and his family. The
maximum limit is the rate determined by the market-
78 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
value of the products. The mere will of either
party cannot safely change these fixed limitations.
3. The customary rate of wages is a consideration
of some force in determining the rate that shall be.
There is always a presumption in favor of existing
usage, which, in the negotiation, may be pleaded on
one side or the other with some effect. This con-
sideration resists an}^ contemplated change. Thus,
when, in 1865, an inflation of the currency in the
United States had increased the cost of living, and
at the same time increased the prices of products,
there was need that wages be advanced ; but em-
ployers clung to the old rates, and 3delded very
reluctantly to the rightful demands of their employes.
Ten years later the condition of things was just the
opposite. Both the cost of living and the prices of
all productions were greatly reduced, and employers
were constrained to reduce wages accordingly. But
then the laborers clung to existing rates, and resisted
the proposed reduction, often with violence. This
is, however, a qualifying, rather than a determining
consideration. Like the law of inertia in phj'sics,
it resists or impedes all changes of wages.
4. Competition is beyond all others the controlling
consideration, determining the rate of wages. The
other considerations named have some weight. This,
while it cannot nullify, does overbear them.
Competition is the struggle of ti;vo or more persons
to gain the same thing at the same time. Many labor-
ers are seeking wages, and high wages, at the same
time. Many emploj^ers are seeking profits as large
as possible at the same time. Competition becomes
ipk
THE RATE OF WAGES. 79
active just in proportion to the comparative num-
bers on either side. If the number of laborers is
large in proportion to the employment offered, a
sharp competition arises between those seeking
work. Each, rather than lose his chance for wages,
will lower the rate at which he will contract. If the
number of employers is large, with a large amount
of capital in proportion to the number of laborers,
a sharp competition arises among employers. Each,
rather than lose his chance for anticipated profits,
will raise the rate of wages he is willing to pay.
If, for any reason, the wages in a particular
branch of industry rise above the ordinary rate, a
speed}^ rush of laborers into that employment inten-
sifies competition till the wages are brought down.
On the other hand, if a particular branch of pro-
duction yields profits above the ordinarj^ rate, there
comes a rush of employers with their capital into
that business ; wages are raised, and products are
multiplied and cheapened till profits are brought
down to the ordinary level. Competition thus tends
to bring wages and profits to an equilibrium most
favorable to the interests of all. In the nature of
things, competition is inevitable : it has a blessing
in it, and it is simply absurd to ignore or con-
demn it.
If competition were universally free and fair, it
would do much to remove present inequalities of
condition, and the burdens and the benefits of human
industry would be equally distributed. But over-
reaching selfishness is continually interfering with
competition to make it neither free nor fair. We
80 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
cannot rule out all competition. It would be neither
just nor wise to do so if we could. But much
may be done to resist abuses of the principle, and
to give full scope for its natural and beneficent
function.
5. The Golden Rule of Christ, "Whatsoever 3e
would that men should to you, do ye even so to
them," presents a consideration which both Political
Economy and Christian Ethics ma}^ fitly recognize
and enforce in its application to the question of
wages. Genuine self-interest, as distinct from rank
selfishness, dictates the adoption of this rule. There
are pleasing indications that it is in increasing meas-
ure regarded in the mutual relations of labor and
capital. Men like Mr. Bright in England, and cor-
porations like the Pacific Mills in our country, act-
ing on this principle, show clearly how it tends to
soften animosities, to inspire mutual confidence, and
to eflfect genial co-operation, so as to increase the
eflficiency of industry, and give all an equal share in
its products.
Certain combinations to resist competition must be
noticed in this connection. Combinations on th
part of laborers take two forms, strikes and trades
unions.
A strike is a mutual agreement of a number of
workmen to stop work until their employers accede
to certain prescribed terms. It must be admitted
that laborers have a right to define terms of the
contract with their employers, and to refuse to work
except on those terms. It is their right also to
THE RATE OF WAGES. 81
combine in counsel and effort to maintain their com-
mon interests, and earnestly to press their claims.
But one set of workmen have no right to interfere
with the freedom of others who do not choose to
join the strike. The first, the most sacred, the
dearest right of ever}^ laborer, is the right to do
what he -will with himself, his time, his strength, his
skill. Yet since the strike, in order to be effective,
must rule out all competition, threats and violence,
instead of simple persuasion, are resorted to as
means of preventing other laborers willing to work
from doing so. This is a flagrant outrage on the
most precious right of freemen.
As a strong and determined assertion of a reason-
able claim, a strike may do good service ; but the
claim is reasonable only when the necessities of the
laborers require, and the prices of products permit,
the increase of wages, or whatever better terms are
insisted on. Then there is a better way : it is b}^ a
frank and open negotiation between the parties. In
prosperous times, there is little occasion for strikes.
In adverse times, strikes can accomplish onl}^ dis-
aster to all parties. For, as Mr. Brasse}' sa^^s,
" Strikes against a falling market always fail."
Trades-unions are combinations of laborers of
particular trades in permanent organizations to
promote the general interests of their respective
fraternities. These associations often perform the
functions of mutual benevolent societies. Contri-
butions are made for the relief of sick, disabled,
and distressed members ; and measures are em-
plo3'ed to promote S3'mpath\', social enjo3'ment, and
82 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
mental culture. They thus render beneficial ser-
vice, and are worthy of praise and encouragement.
But often these associations attempt to regulate
wages, by resisting competition, in two wa3^s : First,
by promoting and sustaining strikes, in which they
are likely to aggravate the evils already referred to,
because under them the strike is better organized
and more domineering. They are apt also to insist
on uniformity of wages irrespective of thfe varying
abilities and efficiency of different workmen, which
involves injustice to superior artisans as well as to
emplo3xrs. Second, by restricting apprenticeship,
which is simply an attempt to rule out free compe-
tition, and give to a limited number of persons a
monopoly of certain forms of skilled labor. This
Involves the injustice and mischief which are inher-
ent in the very principle of monopoly. If generally
carried out, it would set the various branches of
industry in antagonism to each other, and tend, as
Mr. Brassey says, "to establish that subdivision of
caste which has been the great curse of India."
When managed for these ends, trades-unions involve
heavy taxes on the members, and often subjection
to selfish and reckless leaders, who seek their own
personal interests rather than the common good.
On the other side, combinations of employers are
often formed to resist competition. Such combina-
tions sometimes attempt to regulate the prices of
products, creating a monopoly in the general mar-
ket. Their action in this form belongs to the
department of exchange. They attempt also to
THE RATE OF WAGES. 83
regulate wages by agreements not to pay above
certain rates. While the right to enter into such
agreements cannot be .questioned, the actual combi-
nation involves an abuse of the power of capital
to tyrannize over labor and dictate terms. It pro-
duces in the laborer a sense of injury, and incites
antagonism and attempts at retaliation, which pre-
vent the cheerful co-operation of the two great
factors of industry.
Such combinations seldom succeed in controlling
wages except for very brief periods. To be effec-
tive, the combination must embrace all who are
engaged in a particular industry, and also all the
capital likely to be drawn into' it. . If the wages
fixed by the combination are so low as to make the
profits larger than those of other forms of business,
free capital will rush in and bid for laborers b}^ rais-
ing wages, thus renewing competition, and defeating
the end sought.
Experience shows that combinations on either
side, to prevent free competition, cannot, for any
long time, materially influence the rates of wages.
Such attempts interfere with the natural law of
supply and demand, which is the grand regulator of
wages for the best interest of all .concerned. When
issues arise between the parties to the labor-con-
tract, the surest way to a fair adjustment is by frank
mutual explanations, or, in the last resort, by joint
reference to just arbitration. In most cases, the
occasion of difficulties may be forestalled by the
culture of mutual good -will in active co-operation
for the common good, intelligently apprehended and
prosecuted on both sides.
84 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
EXERCISES.
1. Can either party, employers or employed, arbitrarily
fix a rate of wages for labor ?
2. Can the government, by law, fix a rate which will
stand ? Why not ?
3. Why ought not laborers to be content with wages
which suffice for their bare support ?
4. Illustrate the effect of climate on the scale of living,
and by consequence on the rate of wages.
5. When the cost of living is increased, are laborers to
be blamed for demanding higher wages ?
6. Are manufacturers to be blamed for reducing wages
when the prices of their products decline ?
7. When business is depressed, is it right that high
dividends to stockholders should be maintained by reduced
wages ?
8. Illustrate the conservative mfluence of custom on
wages in some one trade.
9. Why is the rate of wages generally higher in a new
than in an old country ?
10. Illustrate the effect of a financial panic on wages.
11. What reason have laborers to think that free compe-
tition bears most hardly on them ?
12. If over - population by sharp competition reduces
wages to the starvation limit, can a strike relieve the
case ? How can such a case be relieved ?
13. State the results, good or bad, of any strike which
you have known about.
14. State what benefits and what evils you have known
to come from membership in a trades-union.
15. What consequences would follow if the policy of
limiting the number of apprentices were carried out in all
forms of industry requiring skill ?
16. What is there to prevent the application of " the
Golden Rule " in the mutual relations of laborers and their
employers ?
KEMUNERATION OF LABOR. 85
SECTION IV. — CAUSES OF VARIATION IN THE
REMUNERATION OF LABOR.
Evidently all kinds of labor are not compensated
alike. Competition tends to produce uniformity of
compensation. Whatever, then, diminishes the in-
tensity of competition, opens the way for other
causes to produce variation. Several circumstances
thus affecting competition may be named : —
1. The ease or difficulty, the agreeableness or dis-
agreeableness, of the employment. For easy work,
many are ready to compete ; but from hard work,
many draw back, and the number able to put forth
great muscular effort is small. Mining- work under
ground is disagreeable ; the number willing to en-
gage in it is much less than of those ready to do
pleasanter work on the surface : hence only a better
compensation will induce any to go below. It is
not an uncommon thing for a gentleman to pay a
male cook more than his private secretary ; the
dignity attached to the one office, and the menial
character of the other, accounting for the difference.
2. The skill required in the operation. Here we
note the difference between simple labor and edu-
cated labor. Skill can be acquired only by practice
and training, which cost both time and money. It
becomes thus an investment, for which the possessor
may justly ask a compensation. • Unusual skill sup-
poses unusual natural endowment, the rarity of
which precludes sharp competition.
86 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
3 . The amount of trust involved in the occupation.
In services about banks, or which in any way involve
the handling of money ; in manufactures where, as
in the case of jewelrj^, the precious metals are put
into the hands of workmen as materials ; in railway
operations, where the safet}^ of many persons and of
large amounts of property depends on the conduct
of a single engineer, — in these and similar cases,
good judgment and incorruptible integrity, as well
as skill, are required. This combination of qualities
is comparatively rare. Hence, while the demand is
imperative, the suppl}^ is small, and competition for
such places is restricted. For such positions, it is
good economy to pay trustworthy men extraordinary
compensation.
4. The constancy or inconstancy of employment.
In out-door occupations, such as those of the car-
penter and bricklayer, work is interrupted by bad
weather, rainy days, and the winter- season. The
compensation for the working time must be larger
than ordinar}", to cover the time when work must be
suspended.
5. The probability or improbability of success.
This consideration applies more to what are called
the professions than to ordinary trades. He who
learns the trade of a carpenter ma}' be almost sure
of finding emplo3^Ilent at some compensation ; but
one who studies for the profession of a lawj^er has
hardly an even chance of being able to live by
his profession, and, at best, must persevere through
years of unremunerated toil, to establish a reputa-
tion which will assure him full success. The high
REMUNERATION OF LABOR. 87
remuneration for successful practice is the prize
which sustains one in the earlier stages of the race.
The remuneration of labor by salaries, com-
missions, and fees, involves some peculiarities
which must be noticed.
1. The labor which is thus compensated is gen-
erall}^ of a kind that requires both superior natural
gifts, and special and expensive education.
2. It is also true of it, that on the one side, per-
sonal character and reputation, and on the Other, tlie
respectability, dignity, and permanence of the ser-
vice, are highl}^ estimated.
These considerations, more or less, rule out ordi-
nar}^ competition, and put the mutual contract in
each case on special grounds. The whole number
of those whose labor is thus compensated is small,
compared with the great body of those who receive
wages ; and, to 'the few so favored, a large share
of the proceeds of industry is actually distributed.
This seems like injustice ; but it must be remem-
bered that it is chiefly public and administrative
services that are compensated b}^ salaries and fees.
In any productive enterprise, — a woollen-mill or
watch-factor}", for instance, — a wise and vigorous
executive administration is essential to make the
business profitable. It is for the interest of every
one in the establishment who receives wages, that,
for the place of high trust, the best talent should
be secured by a salary sufficient to command it.
So, too, all private interests are promoted when
public affairs are guided by men of ability and integ-
88 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
rity. For offices of government, which require men
of more than ordinary capacity, it is right, there-
fore, that more than ordinary compensation should
be provided.
The apparent injustice is entirely relieved, if the
wa}' is open for every one to make the most of him-
self, and to rise in position and emolument accord-
ing to his real merit. This is illustrated in the case
of George Stephenson. He began his career as an
engine-boy at the lowest wages. As his mechani-
cal genius was developed, he was made an engine-
wright, and put upon a salar}^ of a hundred pounds
a year, when he thought his fortune was made.
But by patient stud}^ and labor he invented the loco-
motive-engine, and became "the father of railways."
Then the services of his later 3'ears received munifi-
cent remuneration. The world, enjoying unspeak-
able benefits from his achievements, pronounces that
remuneration justly and worthily bestowed.
In the learned professions, especially those of law
and medicine, men of highest ability and repute
receive extraordinary remuneration, simply because
such men distance competition and custom. Where
great interests are at stake, it is sound economy to
emplo}^ the best*legal talent at any price. In a
crisis of life or death, the best medical counsel is
cheap at any cost. After the reputation has been
achieved, law3'ers like Webster and Choate, and
physicians like Mott and Parker, would be over-
whelmed with business if they did not limit it by
high charges. It is not unusual for members of
these professions to agree upon a scale of fees to
REMUXERATIOX OF LABOR. 89
be charged. But such agreements can fix only the
minimum limit, leaving an open range above for
compensation to be increased according to each
(>ne's ability and reputation. These higher rates
ire the prizes which stimulate the efforts of young
aspirants in these professions.
The difference of remuneration is most marked
In the departments of literature and fine art. A few
lines from the pen of a Brj'ant or a Longfellow, a
few strains of music from a Jenny Lind or a Kel-
logg, a painting done by a Church or a Bierstadt,
a statue from the chisel of a Thorwaldsen or a
Powers, command prices that seem to common folk
absurdly extravagant. But these products are in-
imitable fruits of highest genius, which sets those
who have it above all competition, in the enjo3'ment
of an unrestricted monopoly.
Generally men in all callings and professions in-
sist on the highest remuneration they can command.
But often the honor, dignity, and permanence of
certain positions are considerations of weight on
the other side. Thus a lawyer, whose practice
would 3deld an income of twenty-five thousand dol-
lars, may accept a place for life on the bench of
the United States Supreme Court at a salary- of ten
thousand dollars.
Men devoted to scientific research, clerg3^men,
and teachers, are, as a whole, confessedh^ under-
paid, when compared with men of equal ability and
attainments in other professions. But with many
of them, delight in the study of truth, and devotion
to the work of Christian beneficence for the well-
90 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
being of mankind, wliich find satisfaction and joy
in the service itself, go far to balance, in their esti-
mation, the meagreness of their pecuniary reward.
The remuneration for women's labor in most
emplo3'ments is less than that of men for similar
services. The fact is apparent on ever}^ hand. In
present circumstances, the following reasons, though
they may not altogether justify it, account for the
fact.
1 . It is a prevalent opinion, that for miscellaneous
labor, women are by physical and mental constitution
inferior to men in the qualities essential to highest
efficiency. In the spinning-room of a cotton-fac-
tor}^, men are emplo3'ed almost entirely, because
women have not the strength to handle the jennies.
In the weaving-room, two or three men work with
a hundred women. The women tend the looms as
well as, or better than, the men ; but for oversight,
the men are needed to meet exigencies for which
women are supposed to be unequal.
2. In the order of nature and in the constitution
of society, the sphere of activity for most -women is
ordained to be in the home, each the solace and
help of a husband, and the nourisher and mentor of
their children. This fact tends to rule out women
from man}^ occupations, and to create the impres-
sion that it is unwomanly to enter them.
3. The wages of men are adjusted to the presump-
tion that each has or -will have a family to provide
for ; and those of w^omen, to an anticipation that each
will in due time, by marriage, be relieved of her own
REMUNERATION OF LABOR. 91
support. A very large proportion of the women
who to-day depend on their own labor are j^oung
persons who are passing, one after another, into new
relations, where they are to be cared for by men's
earnings.
4. Productive industry is now organized on the
assumption that women's w^ork is to receive less com-
pensation than men's. In most cases, the greater
cheapness of female labor is the chief reason for
employing it. The prices of all commodities into
which this kind of labor enters are diminished there-
by. If the rule is a false one, it cannot be suddenly
changed without deranging the entire systems of
production and exchange.
5. There are feminine instincts w^hich prompt
w^omen to draw back from many occupations because
they are coarse, or involve too rough jostling with the
world. These instincts are natural ; and when they
are crushed out, the charm of womanhood is gone.
Yet the prevailing tendenc}^ is to make them excess-
ive, so as to produce a morbid sentiment of false
delicacy.
The foregoing considerations limit the number
of occupations open to women ; and these are so
crowded, that competition is intense, and low wages
are inevitable.
6. This competition is made sharper by the fact
that many w^omen who seek employment are partly
or w^holly supported by other resources than their
own labor. These can and often do underbid
others who have nothing but their wages to depend
on. Not infrequently, too, the fact of their better
92 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
circumstances, their better appearance, and, it may
be, their superior intelligence, secures for them the
preference.
Notwithstanding all this, there are exceptional
cases even now, where women of superior energy
or genius command for their services a remunera-
tion equal to that accorded to men for like work.
This is especially true of women's work in fine art.
The female stars in music and the drama, such as
Kellogg and Siddons ; in painting and sculpture,
such as Rosa Bonheur and Harriet Hosmer ; in
poetry and light literature, such as Mrs. Browning
and Mrs. Stowe, — receive from an admiring public
ample compensation for their productions. Occa-
sionally, too, a woman possessed of great executive
ability for managing business wins for herself a
full reward. But these exceptions are so few as to
prove, rather than controvert, the rule.
As the case now stands, good judgment must
accept the following conclusions : —
a. In the nature of things, there are reasons
why, in general, the remuneration for women's work
should fall somewhat below that of men. Absolute
equality between the sexes in this respect is not
likely to be attained.
h. This inequality, as a present matter of fact, is
much greater than is either right or necessar3\ The
distress that comes from it cries out in the name of
justice and philanthropy for relief.
c. The needed relief can come onl}^ as the sphere
of competition is widened, and its intensity relieved,
by opening for women free access to all fit occupa-
REMUNERATION OF LABOR. 93
tions. The chief obstacle to this is the ban imposed
by women themselves on one another, under the
tyrann}' of fashion and prejudice and mawkish sen-
timentalism. There is no good reason why with
women, as with men, honest work well done should
not be always respected and honored. A change
of opinion on this point, in female circles, will be a
change of public opinion.
d. In the quiet sphere of domestic life, woman
renders to society her noblest, most blessed service,
— a service whose worth cannot be estimated in
terms of current money. Her position of queenly
power in that sphere must ever be carefully guarded.
On the whole, the outlook of to-day is full of
hope for the success of a conservative reform, which
shall correct existing wrongs without impairing those
most sacred rights of woman which centre in the
home.
EXERCISES.
1. Why pay a glass-blower for five hours* work more
than a porter in the same establishment for a whole day ?
2. Why are extraordinary wages paid to men who work
at rolling iron ?
3. Why do men working in a powder-mill expect higher ,
wages than they would ask in a flouring-mill ?
4. If a man spends five years learning the engraver's
art, how is he to be compensated for his outlay of time and
money ?
5. Illustrate how a trustworthy character may have a
money-value.
6. Why is a higher price charged for a coat made to
order than for one of a wholesale stock ?
7. 'Why are the wages of a locomotive-engineer higher
than those of a fireman whose work is harder ?
94 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
8. If seven out of ten who study law fail of success,
what inducement is there to seek the profession?
9. Why is it right that the general scale of salaries
should be higher than that of wages ?
10. On what grounds may an eminent surgeon charge a
fee of a thousand dollars for an operation which occupies
but two hours ?
11. Is it unjust for an artist like Powers to ask what he
will for the products of his genius ?
12. Is it wrong for a clergyman to change his place for an
increased salary ?
13. Why do women prefer to live in a garret, and earn a
pittance with the needle, rather than to go into domestic
service in comfortable homes at good wages ?
14. What would be the consequences, good or bad, if the
salaries of female teachers were made the same with those
of males of the same grade ?
15. Is it desirable that women should engage in field-
work, or in the legal profession ?
REMUNEKATIOX OF CAPITAL. 95
CHAPTER 11.
THE REMUNERATION OF CAPITAL.
Justice requires that the owner of capital
should be compensated for its use. Capital is
a necessary partner with labor in the production of
wealth. Its two most important forms are : first,
the "plant," i.e., the buildings, tools, and machinery
to work in and to work with ; and, second, the mate-
rials to work upon. Labor and skill can do nothing
till these are provided.
Capital is the fruit of past labor preserved by
self-denial. One's right of property in that which
he has earned and saved is the same as his right
to his present power to labor. No man expects to
put forth his powers in present labor without some
reward. Why should one be expected to give the
use of the fruits of his past labor and self-denial
without reward? The hope of such reward is the
special inducement to diligence and saving. Sup-
pose James Brown has health and strength and skill
as a blacksmith, but no shop, no tools, no iron.
John Smith has by previous labor and thrift become
the independent owner of a shop and its appurte-
nances, but, broken in health, is unable to work.
Eaqji is helpless without that which the other can
furnish. Both will derive advantasie from the union
96 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of these two properties, the power to labor, and the
capitaL This union maj^ be effected in either of
three ways, — Smitli may hire Brown to work with
his shop and tools send iron, and pay him wages,
taking the surplus of the proceeds for himself; or
Brown may hire Smith's shop and tools, and pay
him rent for their use, taking for himself the sur-
plus of all he can earn ; or Brown may buy of
Smith the shop and tools, giving him, since he has
no mone}', a note and mortgage for their value, on
which he is to pay interest ever}' 3'ear. Can any-
body question the rightfulness of either of these
transactions? The}^ are but three modes of doing
one and the same thing, — that is, of bringing labor
and capital into partnership. The first estabhshes
the relation of employer and employe ; the second,
that of landlord and tenant ; the third, that of
creditor and debtor. Each involves a simple shar-
ing of the joint product of industry.
This simple case illustrates the equitable grounds
of the remuneration of capital in all its aspects.
The principle is the same, if Brown borrows money
for the purchase at the bank, and pays the interest
there ; or if ten persons contribute means for the
purchase, and so make a stock company, each to
receive dividends on the profits of the business
instead of interest.
For the fuller presentation of the subject, it may
be considered under three heads ; viz.. Rent, Inter-
est, Dividends.
RENT. 97
SECTION I.— RENT.
Rent is the compensation paid for the use of land
and its appendages, commonly called real estate. It
implies ownership of land, and a right on the part
of the owner to receive a compensation for its use
when he lets it to another.
In Great Britain and other countries, where the
influence of the old feudal system is still felt, the
problems of rent are man}' and complicated, because
the titles to lands are encumbered by entails and
mortmains. But in our countr}^ lands are held in
fee-simple, w^hich makes the ownership absolute, and
the transfer by sale or lease eas}^ and simple.
For agricultural purposes, the amount of rent
which land will command must depend mainly on
its productiveness, which is determined by the fer-
tility of the soil, and the situation with reference
to a market for the produce. Fertile lands near to
a good market command the highest rent, because
the farmers are assured of both good crops and
good prices. With reference to a new country
inland, the opening of railways and other facilities
for tranportation enhances rents : first, b}^ virtuall}^
bringing the lands near to the old markets ; and,
second, by favoring the emigration of population to
build cities and develop varied industries, and so
to form new markets.
Beauty of situation, good neighborhood, and prox-
imity to schools and churches, are also minor con-
98 rOLITICAL ECONOMY.
siderations of more or less weight in determining
the rents of agricultural lands.
In this countr}^, farms are quite commonly rented
'* on shares; '* that is, the landlord receives in com-
pensation for the use of his land a certain propor-
tion of the crops. The capitalist thus shares with
the laborer the risks as well as the profits of the
business.
In cities, rents for lots and buildings are deter-
mined almost entirely by location, witli respect to
centres of business, the character of the neighbor-
hood, and the freaks of fashion. A store in the
centre of business will rent for much more than one
half a mile off, because a merchant tliere will sell
ten times as many goods as in the other location.
A residence in a respectable or fashionable quarter
of the cit}' commands the highest rent, because it
secures pleasant surroundings, or gratifies pride and
vanity. With the growth of cities, the centres of
business and the fashionable quarters are subject
to change from time to time, so as materially to
var}^ the rent-value of property ; and this fact needs
to be considered when capital is invested in that
form.
Generally, except in the favorite locations of
great cities, rents are fixed at a lower percentage on
the market value of the property than the average
rate of profits from business, and less than the
average rate of interest. The chief reasons for this
are the greater security of capital in real estate, and
the probability, that, with the advance of society,
the value of real estate will be increased. Property
RENT. 99
in land cannot be run awa}^ with, nor destroyed, nor
fraudulently disposed of; and not infrequently, by
the mere rise of value, a small capital in this form
grows into a fortune.
EXERCISES.
1. What would be the effect on industry if a rule were
established, that an owner of capital could have no com-
pensation for its use when loaned to another ?
2. Under such a rule, which would suffer most, laborers,
or capitalists ?
3. If it is right for one to borrow capital for his own
advantage, is it wrong for the lender to claim a share in
that advantage?
4. What does the term " real estate " include ?
5. Could the resources of the earth be developed to
advantage, if there were no private property in land ?
6. Why will a poor farm near a seaport command higher
rent than one of richer soil a hundred miles away ?
7. How has the opening of railways to the West affected
the value of New-England farms ?
8. Why does the character of its neighborhood affect
the value of a farm ?
9. Illustrate the great inequalities in the rate of rent for
city property, and the reasons therefor.
10. Why should the average rent for real estate be but
five per cent on its value, when the average interest for
money is eight per cent ?
11. Can you give an instance, and the facts, of a fortune
made by the purchase and management of real estate ?
100 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
SECTION XL— INTEREST AND DIVIDENDS.
Interest is the compensation paid for the use of
capital estimated in money. This is to be preferred
to the more common definition of interest as "the
price paid for the use of money," because it covers
the whole ground. Money as the medium of ex-
change is the most convenient form in which loans
can be made. When credit is extended in anj^ wa}',
the value is set down in terms of mone^^ on which
interest may be reckoned as the parties agree, or as
the law may prescribe. But it should alwa3^s be
borne in mind that what the borrower wants is not
the mone}^ but the capital which it represents, or
for which it is immediately expended.
Thus one may buy land for a site, and have a
building erected on it, and purchase a steam-engine
and machinery for a mill, and cotton to be worked
up, at each step giving his note for a part of the
value, to be paid at a future date with interest. Or,
instead of doing this, he may borrow of a friend or
at the bank money enough to meet his deficiency,
giving his note for the whole with interest ; and then
set up his establishment complete, by purchases
made for cash. The transactions are essentially the
same. In the first case, the loan is made of the
capital directl}^, without passing any money ; in
the other case, the monej' is only a means of reach-
ing the capital. The land, the mill, the engine, the
machinery, and the cotton are what the manufacturer
INTEREST AND DIVIDENDS. 101
wants, and what he actuaHyihprrQws^as capital for
his business. \>'>l''' '> '' > ' ' -
Interest is reckoned ,at' a^ccjrtaiu;'pei\' Cjefrti* ^f'^
certain value defined in'tofns'of morle3% 'wliich' is
called the principal. The percentage is called the
rate, and is usually stated as the rate per annum,
though often payable at shorter intervals than a year.
The word interest is a Latin verb, and means, "it
is of advantage." The term implies a mutual advan-
tage to borrower and lender, and thus recognizes
the natural and necessary partnership of capital and
labor. It is for the advantage of the skilful laborer
to borrow, at a reasonable interest, as much as it is
for the advantage of the capitalist to loan. Were
there no money-lenders, there could be no money-
borrowers ; and, were there no monej^-borrowers, the
industrious artisan would be the greatest sufferer.
The parties come together for their mutual advan-
tage. Why, then, should it be thought any more
odious for one to lend for his own advantage, than
for another to borrow for his own advantage? So
far as the transaction itself is concerned, both must
be regarded as equally honest and honorable. This
mutual advantage marks the chief difference between
a loan and a gift. A gift implies benevolence: a
loan implies interest. A giver sacrifices his own
advantage for the benefit of the receiver : a lender
and a borrower confer each a benefit on the other,
adjusted as equitably as possible. Lenders are
sometimes avaricious, exacting, oppressive. So,
too, borrowers are sometimes profligate, negligent,
fraudulent. These are abuses which selfishness
102 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
thrusts into this,, as into all business transactions.
They onght not to impeach the legitimacy of the
txnr)s;apfie^i itself rigbtlj conducted.
Some people think it W^ong that interest should
be taken, because under the name usury the Scrip-
tures denounce it, and our Saviour prescribes it as a
rule of Christian love, that men should lend, hoping
for nothing in return. But the cases contemplated
in the Scriptures- are loans made to relieve pressing
necessities of the need}^, not loans of capital made
with a view to profitable industr3\ The law of
Christian charity, which bids us give to the poor,
looking for no return of either principal or interest,
is still binding ; but it does not apply to loans which
are only a means of uniting labor and capital in a
common enterprise, for their mutual advantage. It
seemed necessary to say so much to correct .certain
false ideas which are put forth and are gaining cur-
rency in these days. Interest, properl}- understood
and regulated, involves no extortion, works no in-
jury, but confers great and important benefits, by
encouraging both saving and the judicious employ-
ment of capital saved.
The Rate of Interest is determined chiefly by
four considerations, viz., risk, convenience of invest-
ment, profits of industry, and the ratio between sup-
ply and demand of capital.
1. Risk. When one makes a loan, he puts a
portion of his property out of his own hands into
the control of another. There is a chance that it
may never come back to him. His compensation
INTEREST AND DIVIDENDS. 103
inust be proportioned to that chance. If he holds
pledges which make him secure, he will be content
with a small interest ; if he has no security, and the
borrower proposes to embark in a doubtful enter-
prise, he can be induced to make the loan only by
the promise of a large compensation.
The risk depends upon several circumstances.
a. The personal character of the borrower qualifies
the risk. The character that can safely be trusted
involves industry and sobriety, fekill, good sense,
pecuniary abihty, and moral integrity. Where these
are combined in the borrower, the probabilities are
strong that he will succeed, and honestly fulfil his
promise to pay ; and the lender runs but little risk.
h. The character of the business in which the bor-
rowed capital is to be emploj^ed aflTects the risk.
Capital invested in a powder-mill is in great danger
of sudden destruction ; in farming operations it is
almost absolutely safe. Money loaned to a specu-
lator in mining-stocks is put into bubbles that a
breath may burst ; loaned to an industrious me-
chanic, it ma}^ not move so fast, but it is sure to
come around in time, with increase.
C. The character of the government aflfects the risk
incurred in lending capital. A despotic government,
which plunders its citizens by irregular and oppres-
sive taxation, makes all private property and all
industry insecure. Thus in a countr}^ like Turkey
a great risk attends all pecuniary contracts, and the
rate of interest is high. Where the laws are bad,
or are inefficient to maintain justice, for lack of
force in their execution, there is great risk in loaning
104 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
capitaL We do not wonder that in mediaeval times
the Jewish money-lenders charged enormous rates
of interest, when we understand that the laws fur-
nished no safeguards for their protection : they and
their contracts were subject to the caprice of petty
lords, who were little better than robbers b}^ pro-
fession. So, too, the stability of a government is
an important consideration. A revolution often
dissolves contracts, dissipates securities, and renders
obligations valueless. Hence in Mexico the rate of
interest is very high, while in Great Britain it is
very low for both public and private loans.
2. The convenience of the investment has an im-
portant bearing on the rate of interest. Three
points have here to be considered.
a. Facility of transfer. One who loans his capital
likes to have it so invested that he can easily com-
mand it for his own use in case of need. A bond
of the United States, or a certificate of stock in a
well-established bank, may be easily transferred and
made available.
6. Permanency of investment. A lender at the
same time desires that a good investment should run
on undisturbed as long as practicable, unless he has
occasion to recall his capital. A government-bond,
that runs twenty years will for this reason be taken
up at a less rate of interest than one that runs only
five years.
C. Punctuality in the payment of interest. Those
who loan their capital wish to count with certainty
on their interest, and to secure it without trouble.
A well-secured bond, with interest-coupons attached,
INTEREST AXD DIVIDENDS. 105
given b}' a prompt business man, will ordinarily
command money at a low rate of interest, because
of this convenience.
British consols, which represent the consolidated
debt of England, run at from three to four per cent
interest, because the}^ combine these three advan-
tages in the form of investment they offer. For the
same reason our United-States bonds are eagerly
bought up at a premium, though they bear only four
or four and a half per cent interest.
3. The profits of industry vary at different times
and in different countries, and affect the rate of
interest. Here we look at the matter from the
standpoint of the borrower. He must consider
what he can afford to pay, and that evidently must
depend on the profit he can gain by the use of capi-
tal. If, as sometimes happens, a business 3'ields so
large profits that the capital is doubled in a year,
one can well afford to pay twent3^-five or even fifty
per cent for capital to be employed in such a busi-
ness ; w^hereas, if through any cause a particular
industry yields only three per cent of profit, one
cannot afford to pay even six per cent for capital to
be embarked in that business.
4. Tlie ratio between supply and demand of capital,
more than any other one cause, determines the rate
of interest. This is only a recognition of the
principle of competition acting here as elsew^here.
When the number of borrowers is large, and their
wants are large, but the amount of capital available
is small, the competition is sharp on the side of the
borrowers, and they bid up on the rate of interest.
106 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
When the conditions are reversed, the competition
is sharp between the lenders, and the}' bid against
each other by offering loans at lower rates of interest.
The best adjustment? of supply and demand de-
pends on the freedom of capital; that is, the unfet-
tered liberty of ever}' man to employ his capital in
any innocent way he pleases. Such freedom tends
always towards a healthful equilibrium, which sup-
ports industry by securing to both partners a fair
and satisfactory reward.
In a new and prosperous country interest is al-
ways high, because the profits of industry are large,
and the supply of capital on the ground wis small,
while to distant capitalists the risk seems great.
But the constant tendency of civilization is to re-
duce the rate of interest, because wealth increases
rapidly both by immigration and by the natural
fruits of industry, and because risk is diminished
by more perfect securities. This process goes on
by certain fixed laws. The natural development is
healthiest. The action of those laws is only marred
and hindered by the untimely interference of legis-
lation.
Usury Liaws. These are laws designed to restrict
the rate of interest by a defined limit. They inter-
fere with the freedom of capital, and are in conflict
with the first principles of sound political economy,
as several considerations show : —
1 . They violate a right of property. A man has
the same right to the market-rate for the use of his
capital in money, as he has to the market-rate for
INTEREST AND DIVIDENDS. 107
the rent of his house, or the hire of his horse, or
the charter of his ship.
2. The civil law cannot fix a price for the use of
capital, any more than it can fix a price at which
flour, or iron, or any other commodity, must be sold.
In all these matters, the law of competition is supe-
rior to the civil law.
3. The price of capital is more variable than that
of other commodities. This is made evident in the
great marts of business, by daily quotations of the
rate of interest.
4. These laws, instead of diminishing, actually in-
crease the»burden of interest to the most needy bor-
rowers. The lender must be compensated for the
additional risk from the penalty of the law.
5. Such laws are never fully enforced, as is obvi-
ous from the daily newspaper reports just referred
to. Men who want money will pa}' what they please
for it, and those who have it to loan will get what
they can. Such laws only put law-abiding capital-
ists at a disadvantage, or drive them out of the
market for the benefit of unscrupulous sharpers and
Sh3^1ocks.
Money is a necessary of life in active industr}^
and trade, and for that reason it ought to be left
free to the action of the natural law of supply and
demand. In active commercial centres this is com-
ing to be understood. Every State should have a
statute defining a legal rate of interest for cases
in which the contract indicates no specific rate.
Beyond this, legal sanction and security for all
reasonable contracts in loaning capital, under free
108 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
competition, constitute the surest safeguard against
excessive interest. It is a hopeful sign that in
Great Britain, and in Massachusetts and other
American States, usury laws have been aboUshed.
Dividends. This term denotes the remuneration
of capital invested in stock companies. These com-
panies unite contributions of capital from a number
of persons for large operations, such as cotton or
woollen factories, banking, insurance, railways, tele-
graphs, &c. The whole capital is divided into
shares, usually of one hundred dollars each, which
are freely bought and sold in the stock-market.
With a company honestly managed, as the business
runs on, accounts are balanced semi-annually, and
the proceeds are ascertained. The surplus of these
proceeds, after providing for all expenses, and laying
aside a reserve to meet emergencies, is divided to
the stockholders, giving a certain percentage to each
share.
This form of compensation for the use of capital
is marked by two peculiarities : First, the remunera-
tion depends altogether on the success of the industry
in each case. Second, the dividend embraces two
elements ; viz., interest and profits. If the mill, the
railwa}^ or whatever, has barely paid other expenses,
capital will have no remuneration ; if it has earned
enough to pay the capital ordinar}^ interest, the
dividend is identical with interest ; if it has earned
more, so as to make dividends of ten or twenty per
cent annually, the capital receives extraordinary
remuneration. The chance or expectation of such
INTEREST AND DIVIDENDS. 109
extraordinary remuneration, and the convenience of
investments in that form, are the chief inducements
for putting capital into stocks.
The mismanagement, frauds, and defalcations
which attend the operations of stock-companies,
involve great sacrifices. A careful estimate of the
results of such investments would probably show
average returns much less than ordinary interest.
EXERCISES.
1. Show the rightfulness of interest in the case of a
farmer, who, growing old, sells for ten thousand dollars
the farm he has worked for forty years, and loans the
money at eight per cent, expecting the interest to support
him for the rest of his days.
2. Illustrate the advantage to a young skilled mechanic,
of borrowing capital to set him up in business.
3. If a manufacturer sells a farmer a reaping-machine,
taking his note for payment to be made in three annual
instalments^ why is it right to charge interest on the de-
ferred payments ?
4. Why should a grocer sell his goods at a less price for
cash than if he gives the buyer six months' credit without
interest ?
5. If it is right for a machinist to take a note with inter-
est in part payment for a steam-engine, is it wrong for a
banker to take a like note with interest, for money loaned,
that the buyer may pay for the engine at once ?
6. What considerations induce capitalists to prefer to
invest in government bonds which pay four and a half per
cent, rather than in notes and mortgages at eight per cent ?
7. Why is it that the government of Chili can hardly
borrow money at ten per cent, while the British govern-
ment borrows all it needs at three per cent ?
8. How could a poor man, who in 1843 pre-empted gov-
ernment land in Wisconsin at $1.25 per acre, afford to pay,
110 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
a year after, fifty per cent interest for money to complete
his purchase of the government ?
9. What reasons combine to cause a high rate of inter-
est in our young Western States ?
10. Account for the decline of interest in Illinois since
1840, from twenty-five per cent to eight per cent. How
much has direct legislation done to cause that decline ?
11. When is a high rate of interest a sign of prosperity ?
when of adversity ?
12. State some of the ways in which usury laws are
evaded. What is the moral effect of laws thus openly
disregarded ?
13. Can a stock-company be justified in declaring divi-
dends not earned, and borrowing money to pay them ?
14. Why are stock-companies specially exposed to frauds ?
15. What do you understand by the " bulls '' and *' bears "
of Wall Street ?
DISTRIBUTION OF PROFITS. HI
CHAPTER III.
DISTRIBUTION OF PROFITS.
Writers on Political Economy' have used the term
profits with much looseness and ambiguity. Many
define it to mean the remuneration paid for the use of
capital. Mill says profit embraces the three items,
interest, insurance, and wages of superintendence.
Mr. Walker represents profits as the share which
falls to the employer or manager. This loose and
varied use of an important term is not scientific.
Our science requires the term with a specific mean-
ing, properly expressed, we think, in the following
definition : —
Profits are the net proceeds, — the surplus of
values, after all necessary expenses of production
have been deducted.
According to the principles laid down in previous
chapters, the following items are to be included in
necessary expenses : —
1 . Wages paid for common and skilled labor of all
grades.
2. Salaries paid for oversight and management,
including all superintendence and administration,
mechanical and financial.
3. Interest on capital invested.
4. Insurance to guard against certain risks.
112 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
5. Taxes paid for protection from the government.
If the products of an industrial establishment
l^rovide for these expenses, and nothing more, the
business just sustains itself, but it 3'ields no profits.
In such a case, since all parties get their legitimate
compensation, the}' ma}' be satisfied to run on so
for years. But in general the expectation of profits
is the necessary stimulus of enterprising industry,
and the aim is to make profits as large as possible.
When one combines in himself the functions of
operative, manager and capitalist, wages, salary,
interest and profits if there be any, all come to
him. No question of distribution arises ; but even
in such a case, it is well for one to keep his accounts
so as to define what is properly to be reckoned as
wages for labor, salary for management, and inter-
est for capital : only so can the profits of the busi-
ness be accurately estimated.
Though a common usage, it is yet a serious error,
to express the measure of profits in a business, by a
percentage on the capital invested, as though the
profits belong exclusively to the capitalist. In many
cases, the labor is of more account than the capital.
A shoemaker with a capital of five hundred dollars
may, by untiring industry through a year, make his
proceeds count a hundred per cent on that amount,
and yet receive an insuflScient return for his labor.
Twenty per cent on five hundred thousand dollars
invested in a great manufacturing establishment
may pay well for labor and management and ordi-
nary interest on capital, with a large margin for
profits. Hence it is often better for one to work
DISTRIBUTION OF PROFITS. 113
for wages or a salary in connection with a large
establishment, rather than attempt an independent
business. So with truth is it said, "It is in the
nature of trade and manufacture that great capital
drives small capital out of the field : it can work for
smaller returns."
It is evident that, according to our definition,
profits can be legitimatel}^ increased only in one of
two ways, either by reducing expenses, or by increas-
ing the amount and the value of the products. It is
for a wdse and faithful manager carefullj^ to study
both sides of the problem ; and hence his is the
most important service, and it deserves the highest
compensation. But it does not follow, therefore,
that the entire profits should be appropriated to the
manager, or ^''entrepreneur^'' as the French term
him.
Fop a fair distribution of profits, there must be
combined with these views of the nature of profits,
a full recognition of that partnership which we have
seen to be a fundamental principle of productive
industry. In this partnership there are three mem-
bers,— the capital, the executive capacity, and the
labor. Each is entitled to a fair compensation for
the service rendered, and each is entitled to a share
in the surplus fruits of their co-operation. We may
not say either an equal share or equal compensa-
tion ; because capital takes the greater risk, and is
liable to the heaviest losses, and it is fair that this
chance of greater loss should be balanced by a
chance of greater gain ; because, also, the amount
114 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of profits is due chiefly to the executive wisdom and
energy of the manager, and he is entitled to a pro-
portionatel}^ larger share in the returns. After due
allowance for these considerations, however, there
is a share which justl}^ belongs to the labor, and
which should be distributed among those who make
up this third member of the firm, according to each
laborer's merit and grade in the service rendered.
The rising antagonism between labor and capital
will be best counteracted, we believe, by measures
adapted to secure a fairer distribution of profits on
this basis. To devise the best measures for this
will require much earnest stud}", and experiments
carefully conducted with good- will and patience on
both sides. No doubt it will be found that meas-
ures must be varied to suit different cases and cir-
cumstances. What works well in one case may not
do so in another. Tact and common sense must
be used to apply the principle which is one and
common. There are obstacles in the way of the
immediate adoption of siich measures. False ideas
on the part of both workmen and their employers
must be corrected, mutual confidence must be estab-
lished, and common usage must be changed. These
are things not to be accomplished in a day. Yet
there is good reason to believe that if attention is
turned earnestly on the study of this specific object,
obstacles will be overcome, measures will be defined
and successfully applied, and the result will be more
of justice, harmony, and efficiency, in the actual
operations of industry, and abiding relief from dan-
gers which threaten the peace and prosperity of the
nation.
DISTEIBUTIOK OF PROFITS. 115
Co-operative associations are designed to secure a
more equitable distribution of profits in the interest
especially of workmen. Their ordinary plan is for
a number of workingmen of some one branch of
industry to join their means and their hands to
carry on business, expecting to divide the entire
proceeds among themselves by some defined rule of
equity. Some such organizations have succeeded
for a time, but most of them have soon ended in
failure. The reasons are obvious. There is apt to
be a deficienc}' of capital, which puts the associa-
tion to a disadvantage in competition with other
establishments. Again, jealousies among the mem-
bers are apt to spring up, and prevent the harmony
and unity of action which are essential to best
results. A greater diflSculty is to secure the man-
aging ability, on which, after all, success mainly
depends. A majoritj-vote in mass-meeting cannot
fulfil the function of a " captain of industry'' of
judgment and will-power to plan and direct. Such
associations, it has been said, aim to dispense with
the " entrepreneur^^' and divide his proper remuner-
ation. This means onl}^ that the laborers are tr3dng
to appropriate all the profits to themselves, which
involves essentially the same mistake as when the
capitalists or managers try to take the whole. The
partnership heartily entered into, vigorousl}^ main-
tained, and so conducted as to insure the rights of
each class of members, is most liliely to estabhsh
an equitable distribution of profits.
116 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
EXERCISES.
1. A cabinet-maker with a capital of $15,000 employed
six men, the average of whose wages was $12 each per
w^eek; paid a bookkeeper a salary of $600, and managed
the business himself. He paid for rent, taxes, and insur-
ance, $1,200, and legal interest was seven per cent. After
replacing capital consumed, the proceeds of the business
for a year amounted to $12,000. Allowing $2,000 for his
compensation as manager, what were the profits for the
year?
2. For the subsequent five years the proceeds averaged
$15,000 per year, and ten per cent of the profits were annu-
ally distributed to the employes in addition to wages and
salary: what amount of profits fell to each of the parties
during that period ?
3. The next year, by sharp competition, increased cost
of lumber, and dull trade, the proceeds were reduced so as
barely to meet expenses, as before defined; why would it
be worth while to keep on in such a case ?
4. Then came a financial revulsion ; and for three years
the proceeds annually came $2,000 short of meeting ex-
penses, and the pay of all employes was reduced ten per
cent: what was the actual loss to the several parties?
5. With the return of better times, $5,000 added capital
was invested in the introduction of steam-power and
machinery, by which the annual products were doubled
in amount; and for the next five years the annual proceeds
rose to $20,000: what were the annual profits? Distributed
as before, what share fell to each of the parties ?
6. Estimate the profits of the business for the whole
period of fifteen years.
7. If the whole establishment had been burned up at the
time of greatest depression, with insurance to the amount
of only two-thirds the value, whose would have been the
loss?
8. Suppose a blacksmith, working by himself with a capi-
tal of $300, earns in a year $400: has he made any profits?
9. If a great cotton-factory produces annually 20,000,000
DISTRIBUTION OF PROFITS. 117
yards of cloth, and the superintendent contrives to reduce
the cost of production one mill per yard, how much will
the profits thereby be increased, supposing prices are un-
changed ?
10. The cost of production remaining the same, suppose
the market-price to advance one cent a yard: how much
will the profits be increased ?
11. What effect on the efiiciency of labor, and economy in
the use of materials, may be expected from allowing labor-
ers a share in the profits ?
12. State the main features of any co-operative associa-
tion you know of, and its results.
118 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER IV.
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT.
Good government, efficiently administered, is
essential to prosperous industry and social enjoy-
ment. Everj^ citizen derives a benefit from such a
government, and may fitly be called on to contribute
a portion of his wealth for its maintenance. The
government represents a common public interest
superior to any private interest : its claims there-
fore justl}^ take precedence of all others. Since the
public revenues must be drawn from the proceeds of
a people's industrj^, the consideration of this topic
coHies properly under this division of our science
which treats of distribution.
Taxation is the means employed to gather from
a people the revenues of its government. To devise
and apply an equitable sj'stem of taxation, is one of
the most difficult problems of legislation, — a prob-
lem which should be studied in the hght of political
economy, with reference to its one object ; viz., the
raising of a revenue for the state.
In despotic governments, the will of the ruler
determines arbitrarily both the measure and the
methods of taxation, and great inequality and op-
pression prevail. It is a fundamental principle of
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT. 119
free and just government, that taxes shall be im-
posed by representatives of the people through rea-
sonable and proportional assessments on all estates,
and that they shall be collected by agents acting
under defined powers and direct accountabilit3\
Adam Smith's Maxims. The father of modern
political econom}^ laid down four rules of equitable
taxation as follows : —
1. " The subjects of every state ought to contribute
tovrard the support of the government as nearly as
possible in proportion to their respective abilities;
that is, in proportion to the revenue which tliey re-
spectively enjoy under the protection of the state.
2. '' The tax which each individual is bound to pay
ought to be certain, and not arbitrary. The time of
payment, the manner of payment, the quantity to be
paid, ought all to be clear and plain to the contribu-
tor, and to every other person.
3 . " Every tax ought to be levied at the time and in
the manner in w^hich it is most likely to be convenient
for the contributor to pay it.
4. " Every tax ought to be so contrived as both to
take out and to keep out of the pockets of the people
as little as possible over and above w^hat it brings into
the public treasury of the state."
These maxims embody leading principles of equity,
b}^ which all schemes of taxation may be tested.
Direct and Indirect Taxation. According to
Mr. Mill's definitions, ''A direct tax is one which
is demanded from the very persons who it is in-
120 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
tended or desired should pay it. Indirect taxes are
those which are demanded from one person, in the
expectation and intention that he shall indemnify
himself at the expense of another." A poll-tax, a
tax on land, live-stock, tools, furniture, &c., and an
income tax, are examples of direct taxes. Duties
on imported goods, and excises on liome manufac-
tures, are examples of indirect taxation ; the im-
porter or manufacturer who pays the tax, adding
the amount of the tax to the price of the goods, to
be ultimately paid by the consumers.
Direct taxation fairly applied conforms most fully
to the principles embodied in the maxims just
stated. But it involves labor and expense in col-
lection, prompts concealment and evasion, especiall}^
with respect to personal property, and provokes dis-
satisfaction, because men, when they pay the tax,
know and feel the full force of the burden.
Indirect taxation violates nearly all of Mr. Smith's
maxims, and imposes the burden unequally, each
one paying not according to his abilit}^, but accord-
ing to his necessities^ so that a poor man with a large
family often contributes in this way for the support
of the government much more than his neighbor
with ten times his wealth. But indirect taxes, being
laid in gross on goods at the port of entry or at the
manufactor}^ are easily collected, and are cheerfully
submitted to, because no one thinks of the tax he
pa^'s when it is hidden in the price of the goods he
buys. Direct taxes are certainly most in harmony
with the genius of a republican government whose
strength lies in the intelligent support of a free
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT. 121
people. Such a people ought to know what taxes
they pay, and -when and how^ they pay them, that
they may watch with becoming jealousy over the
public expenditure, and make their voice heard in
all legislation on matters of finance. It must be
confessed, however, that no nation has yet attained
to such a standard of general intelligence, honesty,
and patriotism, as warrants the dispensing with the
convenient and easy method of raising revenues by
indirect taxation. We have need, therefore, to give
it some further consideration.
Tariffs. This term signifies strictly the lists of
imported articles subject to tax, with the duties
laid on each class. Protective tariffs, designed to
encourage certain home manufactures, will be con-
sidered in another place. The tariff is noticed here
only as a revenue measure, — one form of indirect
taxation.
Duties are imposed in two forms, specific and
ad-valorem. Specific duties are taxes laid on articles
by the piece, the pound, the yard, the gallon, &c.,
without reference to their value. Ad-valorem duties
are indicated by a defined percentage of the value
of each class of goods. Specific duties are simple
and clear. The collector needs to know only the
quantity of the goods, and easily reckons the duty
to be paid. But in this case the tax is unequal.
Suppose a dut}' of ten cents per pound laid on tea.
The value of the tea consumed by the poor is thirty
cents a pound, while that used by the rich is valued
at a dollar or more : hence the poor man pays a tax
122 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of thirty-three and one-third per cent, while the rich
man pays only ten per cent on the valuation. Ad-
valorem duties la}^ the tax more equalty, but involve
more difficulty in collection, since the value as well
as the quantity of the goods must be ascertained.
This opens the way to fraud by means of false
invoices : hence the government is compelled to
employ a host of appraisers, who come into alter-
cations with importers, and sometimes take bribes,
and sometimes refuse to recognize an invoice that
is honest and true.
For revenue purposes, the best tariff is one that
lays a specific duty of moderate amount on a com-
paratively short list of articles vrhich are not pro-
duced at home. In many countries, the heaviest
duties are laid on commodities, such as intoxicating
liquors, the consumption of which is regarded as
injurious. As a check on immorality, the measure
is of little avail, for experience shows that the con-
sumption of such articles is not materiall}' dimin-
ished by the tax ; but, as a source of revenue, it is
found to yield large results.
National and State Taxation. The Constitu-
tion of the United States authorizes Congress to
impose taxes in everj^ form, subject to the qualifi-
cations that direct taxes must be apportioned to the
several States according to their respective popula-
tions, and that all duties, imposts, and excises must
be uniform throughout the United States. It ex-
pressly forbids any State to lay any imposts or
duties on imports or exports, except for executing
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT. 123
its inspection laws. Hitherto, the National govern-
ment has been sustained for the most part by indi-
rect taxes, in the form of duties on imports, while
the State governments depend on direct taxes. To
provide for the expenses of the recent war of the
Rebellion, however, the general government adopted
four other forms of taxation, which deserve a brief
notice : —
a. Excises. Congress laid taxes on certain arti-
cles of domestic manufacture, to be collected by the
sale of stamps, which must be affixed by the manu-
facturer, or by an officer of the government, to the
goods, before they were thrown on the market.
This is an indirect tax, which involves great ex-
pense in collection, since the government must keep
agents in every part of the countrj^ to guard against
evasion of the tax. From a large list of articles
thus taxed at first, only liquors and tobacco are now
taxed in this way.
b. Stamps. This, too, is an indirect tax, levied
by requiring stamps to be attached to various in-
struments and forms of business in order to give
them legal force. By this means the postal ser-
vice is almost wholly provided for at a ver}^ slight
charge to the people. It was also applied to bank-
checks, deeds, notes, wills, &c. It is an economi-
cal and equitable mode of distributing the public
burdens, for it touches directly the wealth of the
countr}^ in transition, and at points where it needs
government protection to insure security. Great
Britain raises over fifty millions of revenue each
year from the sale of stamps.
124 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
c. Licenses. This is a tax imposed by requiring
men to bu}-, at specified rates, government certifi-
cates authorizing them to engage in certain kinds
of business. It is objected to such taxation, that
it discriminates unequally among industrial occupa-
tions. In its favor, it is urged that it draws from
parties such as peddlers, insurance-companies out-
side the State, and some professional men who
could not otherwise be reached, a just return for
the protection of the government which they enjo}'.
d. Income tax. This is a form of direct tax
levied by imposing a certain percentage on the
annual incomes of individual citizens. Theoreti-
cally, this is the most equitable of all taxes, since it
touches men exactly according to their abilities. If,
however, the percentage is uniform for all incomes,
it must bear heavily on those whose incomes are
small. To relieve this, two measures are adopted.
The first is to exempt all incomes below a certain
amount ; the other is to establish two or three
grades, and make the percentage greatest on the
larger incomes. The chief objections to an income
tax are the difficult}^ of ascertaining men's real in-
comes, and the labor and cost of collecting it. The
British government has nevertheless, employed this
method of taxation for forty-five 3'ears so success-
fully, that nearly one-sixth of the annual revenue
of the kingdom is derived from this source. The
United States collected an income tax for ten years,
from 1863 to 1872. In 1866 the amount- thus col-
lected was about sixty-one millions. Actual expe-
rience under the law tended to relieve diflSculties
and objections.
KEVENUES OF THE GOYERNMENT. 125
Under State authority, all taxes are direct, laid on
persons by poll-taxes, on property by assessment,
and on certain kinds of business by licenses. The
poll-tax is ordinarilj' a small amount levied on every
male citizen who has attained his majority. It
recognizes the protection which the government
extends to persons, and is often made in theory a
condition of the electoral franchise.
Taxes on property are imposed in all the States
b}' essential!}^ the same method. Assessors are
elected in ever}' town and city, who estimate the
value of all property subject to taxation. Real
estate is commonly set down at from twenty-five
to thirty per cent less than its market value. Per-
sonal property is sometimes returned in prepared
lists by the owners, and sometimes estimated by
the assessor. In the first case, the owners may be
required to make oath to the completeness and
truthfulness of their returns; in the other, if the
owner thinks the assessor's estimate too high, he
may " swear it down *' to what he believes to be the
true amount. The original assessments are in most
of the States referred to boards of equalization ap-
pointed for each county; and their judgment is
subsequently reviewed by a general board for the
State. Upon the basis of the valuation of property
so determined, the taxes for State purposes are
apportioned to each county, cit}', and town. Each
county, cit}^, town, and school-district is authorized
to levy taxes for its local purposes. These also are
apportioned on the basis of the State valuation,
except in case of certain city improvements, such
126 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
as opening, paving, and lighting streets, which are
charged upon the adjoining propert}^ Sound econ-
omy dictates that all these taxes be collected in
each town or city-ward at one time by one collector,
furnished with a tax-list covering all.
If other means fail to secure the taxes, goods
may be seized, and lands may be sold, to make up
the amount required, the title thus given being made
complete after a certain period allowed the original
owner for redemption.
Equitable taxation requires property of every kind
to be assessed. In actual experience, however, prop-
erty in the form of real estate bears the larger
share of the burd.en. Personal property can be
easily concealed or removed by those who wish to
evade their share of the taxes ; and, with men of
weak consciences, the temptation is strong to make
false returns, and even to commit perjury, when
detection is almost impossible.
Property in railways, banks, &c., is usually taxed
as a whole by the State within whose jurisdiction it
lies. If each individual stockholder is also taxed
for his share, there is evidently a double taxation
on that property.
The same thing happens often when one is re-
quired to pay a tax on the evidences of debt which
he may hold, such as notes, bonds, mortgages, &c.
These things are onl}^ S3'mbols, whose multiplication
makes no increase of real wealth. Suppose A B
holds his neighbor's note for two thousand dollars,
secured by mortgage on a farm worth four thousand.
The property is one, the farm. The note and mort-
REVENUES OF THE GOVERNMENT. 127
gage only indicate that A B has a lien on that
property for one-half its value. The credit given
and received has added nothing to that value. The
one property is justly subject to taxation. Who
shall pay the tax ? In strictest equity, each of the
parties should pa}^ a half; but, in the very terms of
the mortgage, the mortgagor engages to pay all
taxes that may be levied on the land. This is a
part of the contract, and the interest is adjusted to
that usage. If the mortgagor is taxed for the
whole farm, and the mortgagee is also taxed on the
mortgage he holds, there is evidently a double taxa-
tion on two thousand dollars.
These cases show the difficulty of adjusting a
system of taxation in accordance with strict equit3\
A perfect S3^stem seems an unattainable ideal ; but
it will be approximated just in proportion as senti-
ments of honesty and patriotism are cultivated among
a people, and as legislators apprehend and apply in
their action on this subject the fundamental princi-
ples of Political Economy.
EXERCISES.
1. Wliat source of revenue has our government other
than taxation ?
2. What was the effect on the people of Rome, when the
government was wholly maintained by the plunder of the
provinces, without taxation at home ?
3. Is it desirable that a people should be altogether re-
lieved from contributing to the support of their govern-
ment ?
4. On what grounds are the public taxes made a first
lien on all private property ?
5. Is it right that an aristocratic or priestly class should
be exempt from taxation ?
128 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
6. Can you tell how the Turkish government levies its
taxes, and what is the effect on the industry of its people ?
7. What question respecting taxes was a prominent
issue in the war of the American Revolution ?
8. Can you state the mode of collecting taxes in France
in the eighteenth century, by *^ farmers-general," and the
wrongs that attended it ?
9. How does taxation by duties on imports conflict with
the first and second maxims of Adam Smith ?
10. Why is the close of the year generally chosen in our
country as the time for collecting taxes ?
11. Is that an economical kind of tax of which half the
amount is consumed in the cost of collection ?
12. Illustrate the difference between specific and ad-
valorem duties.
13. Can you state some of the complications and absurdi-
ties of our American tariff in this year, 1879 ?
14. If by requiring stamps of small amounts on bank-
checks, notes, deeds, wills, &c., a revenue of several mil-
lions can be raised, with no expense for collection beyond
the cost of printing the stamps, is there any good reason
why the measure should not be adopted ?
15. What good reasons can be urged by honest and patri-
otic men against a moderate income tax ?
16. Is it a good sign for our nation, that the people seem
averse to direct taxation, the measure and pressure of
which they can exactly know and feel ?
17. Is it any less dishonest, by evasion, to cheat the gov-
ernment out of a legitimate tax, than to cheat a laborer
out of his wages, or a creditor out of his dues ?
17. Illustrate the method of assessing and collecting
State taxes, by the case of a tax-receipt from the collector
of your own town or city.
19. What is the meaning of a *' tax-title " to land ?
20. State any instance of double taxation which you
know of.
21. On what grounds may school and church property be
exempt from taxation ?
EXCHANGE. 129
PART IV.
EXCHANGE.
Wealth is transferred from producers to con-
sumers by manifold exchanges. The division of
labor which increases production necessitates ex-
change. With advancing civilization the processes
of exchange are systematized into a very compli-
cated and extensive social machinery, — how com-
plicated, one may see if he will try to trace the
cotton in the shirt he wears back to the field on
which it grew ; how extensive, will appear if one
will consider how many parts of the world contrib-
ute to the sum of daily comforts with which his
table and his home are furnished. Hence, in the
science of Political Economy, exchange holds the
place of highest importance ; and some have pro-
posed to adopt, as a title for the science, the term
Catallactics, the science of exchanges.
A full but concise presentation of the first princi-
ples of this part of our subject will be given in
several distinct chapters. Only b}^ a clear appre-
hension of these principles can the hard problems
of economics be solved.
130 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER I.
THE NATURE, NECESSITY, AND AGENTS OF
EXCHANGE.
As a specific act, exchange is a transaction in
-which two parties voluntarily transfer to each other
the right of property in certain items of wealth which
are regarded as equivalents. Observe that the trans-
fer must be voluntary, else it involves robber}' : it
must convey on each side a right of property, else
it is fraud.
It is often said that exchange may be either of
commodity for commodity, as when one gives a table
for a pair of boots ; or of commodity for labor, as
when one gives fift}^ pounds of flour for a day's
work at mowing ; or of labor for labor, as when a
mason gives a day's work in exchange for a carpen-
ter's work for a day. This is proper enough to
indicate the precise form of the transaction ; but in
reality it is not the labor itself, but the value in
some form of wealth, the product of the labor,
which is contemplated.
Value is thus the central term of this branch of
our science. Just here let the student turn back to
the definition and explanations of value as given on
pages 7 and 8. From the views there given we
THE NATUKE OF EXCHANGE. 131
derive the following formula, applicable to all ex-
changes : —
Value = cost + or— the effect of the ratio of demand
fto supply.
The general arena of exchange is called the
market, a term which signifies not so much a locality,
as the actual relation of demand to supply at the
place and time contemplated for making exchanges.
By demand is meant the extent of desire for an
article. Supply expresses the quantity of the article
at hand to meet that desire. Between these two
factors competition works continually variations in
the value of commodities. When demand is great
in proportion to supply, value is enhanced by com-
petition among the buyers. When supply is great
in proportion to demand, value is reduced by compe-
tition among the sellers. So, for the variation of
value under the law of demand and supply, we have
another simple formula, as follows : —
Value rises directly as the demand, inversely as the
supply.
The tendency of free competition is to produce an
equilibrium between supply and demand (see p. 79),
and so to make cost the general standard of value.
Mr. J. S. Mill distributes all things that are bought
and sold into three classes.
First, There are things of which it is physically
Impossible to increase the quantity beyond certain
narrow limits. Such are ancient sculptures, paint-
ings of old masters, rare books or coins, and wines
produced only under peculiar conditions of soil,
climate, and exposure.
132 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Second, There are things which at a moderate out-
lay of labor and capital can be multiplied indefinitely.
With laborers and machinery enough, such things as
cotton and woollen goods, shoes, hats, &c., might
be multiplied a thousand-fold, or at least till the
limit of the earth's capacity to yield materials is
reached.
Third, There are things which can be produced in
limited quantity at a given cost, but to increase the
quantity involves a much greater proportional cost.
Such are the agricultural products of a defined area
of land. A field that yields twenty-five bushels of
wheat to the acre ma}' be made to 3'ield forty bushels,
but the cost will be more than doubled.
With these distinctions in mind, the following
fundamental principles of exchange, as presented
for the most part by Mr. Mill, are plain and almost
self-evident.
1. Value is a relative term. All goods sold are
paid for in goods of another kind. Whoever sells
a thing becomes in the act a purchaser of some
other thing, and the value of each is simpl}^ what it
brings in the trade. The values of all things can
never, therefore, rise or fall at once. A rise of
value on one side implies a fall on the other side.
Here the distinction between value and price must
be observed. Price is value expressed in terms of
the single article money. If the amount of money
in a country be suddenly increased, as was the case
in the United States in the years from 1861 to 1865,
the prices of all things will rise together, because
mone}' is cheapened. The prices of wheat and
THE NATURE OF EXCHANGE. 133
broadcloth may thus be doubled at the same time
without changing the value of either : it will take
the same amount of wheat to buy a yard of broad-
cloth as before. If it takes twice as much wheat to
buy a hat this year as it did last, the fact imphes a
change of value on one side or the other. If the
hat holds the same relation to all other articles as
before, it is evident that wheat has for some reason
declined in value. If all other articles must be
doubled to buy the hat, it is evident that the hat has
risen in value.
2. The temporary or market value of a thing
depends on the demand and supply; rising as the
demand rises, and falling as the supply rises. As a
thing grows cheaper, however, under an increased
supply, the demand increases in greater proportion ;
because every step downward in the value widens
the circle of those who are able to buy the article.
3. Things have also a permanent, or, as it may be
called, a natural value, to which the market value,
after every variation, tends to return ; and the oscil-
lations compensate for one another, so that on the
average commodities are exchanged at about their
natural value.
4. The natural value of some things is a scarcity
value ; but most things naturally exchange for one
another in the ratio of their cost of production, or at
what may be termed their cost values.
5. The things which are natural and permanently
at a scarcity value are those of v^rhich the supply
cannot be increased at all, or not sufficiently to sat-
isfy the whole demand which would exist for them
at their cost value.
134 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
6 . A monopoly value means a scarcity value. Mo-
nopoly cannot give a value to any thing, except
through a limitation of the supply.
7. Every commodity of which the supply can be
indefinitely increased by labor and capital exchanges
for other things proportionally to the cost necessary
for producing and bringing to market the most costly
portion of the supply required. The natural value
is synonymous with the cost value ; and the cost
value of a thing means the cost value of the most
costly portion of it vrhich the market demands.
8. If competition be free, the perturbations of
value caused by variations of demand and supply
continue only during a period which cannot exceed
the length of time necessary for increasing or dimin-
ishing the supply. Under the pressure of competi-
tion, demand and supply rush towards an equilib-
rium; but the condition of stable equilibrium is
when things exchange for each other according to
their cost, or at what is fitly called their natural
value.
The Necessity of Exehangre springs from the
diversity of nature's resources, the diversity of human
capacities and tastes, and the ivide reach of human
desires, all of which prescribe for human industry
the principle of division of labor. As men advance
in intelligence, their desires are multiplied ; at the
same time, by discovery and invention the resources
of nature are unfolded in full proportion. Desire
stimulates invention, and successful invention wakes
new desires. There is no assignable limit to the
THE NATURE OF EXCHANGE. 135
development of either men's desires or nature's
resources.
Out of man's social nature spring sjinpathies,
attractions, interests, which widen his associations,
and multiply his opportunities, as both a giver and
receiver of good things. Hence comes a law of
interdependence, which forbids that any man should
live either for or by himself alone. Thus human
industry is varied ; and each does that for which he
is best fitted, or which he likes best, while mutual
exchanges enable each to get what he wants by
giving what he can spare.
Where the diverse labor of many is combined to
produce a single object, exchange is the indispensable
means of breaking up and distributing the value, SO
that each may receive his share, and use it to meet
his wants. The little screws which a man in a
watch-factory makes by the thousand will not them-
selves feed or clothe him. The part which each one
of a hundred men contributes to the building of a
steam-engine is of no use apart from the whole, and
yet no one can rightly appropriate the whole. But
the complete watch or engine may be exchanged for
food and clothing and other things which are desira-
ble and exactly suited to the needs of all concerned.
The same principles apply with equal force to
exchanges between different nations. In many cases
the aptitudes of different nations for the creation of
pecuhar products is fixed by unchangeable geographi-
cal and physiological law. Moreover, a nation at
one period of its history is best adapted to produce
certain articles. It is obviously best that each
136 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
nation should devote its energies to the production
of those things for which it has the greatest facilities,
and by exchange with other nations make the sur-
plus of its own products provide the products of
other countries which its people need. Through
the mutual intercourse of nations for trade, civiliza-
tion is developed, and the happiness of the human
race is increased. Thus the conditions of our being
demand the processes of exchange as imperatively as
the processes of production.
The Ag-ents of Exchangre. Exchange is a
distinct department of useful industry, by which
commodities are transferred from the producers to
the consumers, in such places, at such times, and in
such quantities, as are most convenient. It involves
labor, and so adds to the cost of objects ; it adds
also to their desirableness, by bringing them within
the reach of those whose wants are to be gratified.
Thus in both ways it enhances their value to the
benefit of both parties. By it the producer is helped
to dispose of his products, and the consumer gets
things just where and when and as they will best
meet his wants. Obviously this labor will be most
economically performed by persons who devote
themselves exclusively to it, receiving a fair com-
pensation for their service. This compensation is
made up by a percentage charged on the values
transferred, of which each party pays a portion ;
that is, the producer sells his products to the ex-
changer for something less than he would ask of the
consumer directly, and the consumer pays the ex-
THE NATURE OF EXCHANGE. 137
changer a little more than if he bought directly of
the producer. But the expense of conducting the
exchanges is far less than it would be without such
intervention.
Merchants is a general name for those who devote
themselves to the business of exchange ; but the
term embraces a great variety of agents. We can
attempt only a concise exposition of a few names
and services. In the commerce of every community
are to be recognized two great currents of trade, —
an outgoing current and an incoming current. The
outgoing current bears away what a people have to
spare ; the incoming current brings back what a
people want. In a new country a retail merchant
stands at the turning-point where these currents
meet. He gathers up in small quantities the surplus
products of his neighborhood, and starts them on the
current of outgoing trade, to float, it may be, half
round the world to find their ultimate consumers ; in
exchange for these, he dispenses to his neighbors
small quantities of foreign products which they need.
As population increases, and products are multi-
plied, another agent appears on the ground, called
a middle-man, a produce-buyer, a commission-dealer.
By arrangement he buys up for some house at a
commercial centre the grain, the cotton, the wool,
the pork, the butter, or whatever of one kind or of
many kinds of produce may be ordered, and is paid
by a percentage on the values purchased. With the
introduction of railways come in the warehouse-men,
doing the same thing at every station. From these
the goods are sent to the consignee or produce-broker
138 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
in the interior city, — Chicago or Buffalo, for in-
stance. They pass on the goods to the shipping-
merchant in the great seaport, like New York or
Baltimore, thence to be exported to the ends of the
earth.
In former times, when manufactured articles were
made by hand, in a small waj^, at the homes of
workmen, they were gathered and thrown on the
current of trade in much the same manner. But
since the use of machinery has concentrated manu-
facturing in large establishments, these products
are passed out upon the currents of trade through
the agency of factors or commission-merchants, each
factory or mill having its own agent of this kind at
the commercial emporium, who manages the sale of
its goods in the general market, and is compensated
sometimes by salary, oftener by a percentage on the
amount of sales. A domestic factor renders this
service in the countrj' in which the goods are made ;
a foreign factor attends to the business in another
country.
The incoming current of trade may be best traced
by taking a stand at a port of entry, — say New
York. Here the agency of the importer is first to
be noticed. He studies the wants of his own coun-
try, and the products and prices of foreign countries
generall}^ with respect to a particular class of com-
modities, and imports what he thinks the people will
use. These goods he sells generally in bulk, by
sample, to wholesale merchants in his own and other
cities. The}^ in turn open them more fully, and sell
by bale or case to jobbers. Of them the retail
THE NATURE OF EXCHANGE. 139
merchants buy by the piece or small package, to be
passed to individual consumers in such quantities as
they desire, and the distribution is complete.
To this list of agents must be added bankers,
brokers, &c., — the whole class of those who have
to do with money and credit, the instruments of
exchange ; also those who as underwriters and
insurers distribute the risks, by land and by sea,
involved in trade.
Thus in outline we get a view of the manifold
processes and agencies of exchange. Their compli-
cations are intricate ; yet by a hidden law of self-
adjustment the machinery works out its legitimate
result, so that the wants of men are met with little
waste of the products of industry. Rapid exchange
is the necessary stimulus to production. When
trade is dull, all industr}^ languishes : when it is
brisk, labor works on with cheerful hope, assured of
its reward. The legitimate service of exchangers
adds something to the utility of all things that pass
through their hands. It tends to cheapen every
thing offered in the market, and to enrich the market
bj'- a thousand-fold multiplication of comforts and
luxuries for the life of man. How absurd, then, the
outcry sometimes made against merchants, that they
produce nothing, and are but drones and leeches of
society !
Nevertheless sound economy requires that the
number and expense of these agencies be reduced
as far as practicable, consistently with the end to be
attained. There is also good reason to protest
against the abuse of a necessary instrumentality
140 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
sometimes witnessed, when a trader or a company
of traders combine to produce an artificial scarcitj^,
that by suddenl}^ raising prices they msiy rob the
people, and enrich themselves. Those operations
which produce corners in wheat, and the like, outrage
the first principles of justice and honesty. Too
many of our so-called ''boards of trade" tolerate
and encourage such abuses of trust and power.
EXERCISES.
1. Trace the exchanges through which the material of
your knife has passed, from the iron-ore in the mine, to your
hand.
2. If you pay a hundred dollars for a stolen horse, why
is it not a valid exchange ?
3. What two elements define the extreme limits of value?
4. Why does a merchant need to study daily the news-
paper-list of current prices ?
5. How does the failure of the crop in England increase
the value of American wheat ?
6. When we have a large American crop and no foreign
demand, how is the value of wheat affected ?
7. What gives the extraordinary value to a genuine
painting done by Raphael ?
8. If it required eight bushels of wheat to pay for a ton
of coal last year, and only six bushels: this year, how can
you tell which article has changed in value ?
9. When will a change of price indicate a change of
value ?
10. The introduction of the power-loom increased the
supply of cotton-cloth a hundred-fold. What effect had
this on the value of the article ? What effect on the
demand ?
11. What is the effect of a patent-right on the value of a
patented article ?
12. What does the maxim, "Competition is the life of
trade," mean ? Is it true ?
THE NATUEE OF EXCHANGK 141
13. What useful functions do merchants perform ?
14. By which of the three occupations, agriculture,
manufacture, or commerce, do men grow rich fastest ?
Which involves the greatest risks ?
15. When the commerce of a nation is prosperous, which
will have the greater value, its exports or its imports ?
16. Why is it right that the retail merchant should charge
a higher percentage on the price of the goods he sells than
the wholesale merchant ?
142 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER 11.
MONEY AN INSTEUMENT OF EXCHANGE.
We have seen that the processes of production
are much facihtated and improved b}^ the use of
proper instruments or tools. Proper instruments
are no less necessary for the processes of exchange.
Barter, that is, the direct exchange of one commodity
for another, involves man}- inconveniences and seri-
ous difficulties.
For instance, a man has made a table which he
wants to exchange for bread, shoes, and a hat. His
product is one thing, and indivisible : the things he
wants are many and diverse. How can he effect the
desired exchange ? It will take a builder, with six
hired carpenters, three months to build a house :
how shall he provide his workmen with daily food,
&c. , unless by some device he can draw on the value
of the house before it is finished? When a man
does nothing but make rivets for knife-handles, how
is he to subsist b}^ exchange in kind ?
A yet greater embarrassment in exchange by bar-
ter comes from the difficult}^ of adjusting the equa-
tion of value between different articles. How is it to
be determined whether a shovel is a fair equivalent
for a pair of boots, or a bushel of wheat for a book ?
By what rule shall it be settled that a farm-laborer
MONEY AN INSTRUMENT OF EXCHANGE. 143
is fairl}" compensated for a month's work by a suit
of clothes?
Under the pressure of these difficulties, men have
been driven to invent means of relief. Savages
have adopted certain pretty shells, which they called
wampum, as counters for exchanges. By a common
instinct, civilized peoples of different ages and coun-
tries have used silver and gold as a medium of
exchange.
In the complicated operations of modern com-
merce, money and credit are the two great instru-
ments of exchange. In the order of both time and
importance, money comes first ; and without it the
other has no meaning. Yet credit, though only a
symbol of money, is the grand instrument which ac-
complishes the greater part of the world's exchanges ;
when properl}^ regulated, rendering a service whose
value cannot be measured, but, when abused, caus-
ing unspeakable convulsion and disaster.
The nature and functions of these two instruments
will be presented in this and the next chapters.
Money Is some useful product of labor, universally
desired, to which all other commodities are referred
as a measure of their relative values ; Tvhich is em-
ployed also as an intermediary instrument for the
actual exchanges of different kinds of virealth for each
other.
It is of the highest importance that all which is
embraced in this long . definition be clearly appre-
hended. To unfold and illustrate the chief points,
we present them in two sections.
144 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
SECTION I. — THE FUNCTIONS OF MONET.
Our definition indicates two functions of money.
First, Money establishes a universal standard of
value.
Second, Money is a medium for the exchange of
values.
As a standard of value, money performs an office
like that of a pound- weight, or a yard-stick, or a
gallon-measure. These instruments are adjusted to
measure each a certain quality, viz., weight, or
length, or bulk. Just so the money-dollar is adjusted
to measure the quality called value. Obviously,
whatever is used to measure a quality in another
thing must itself possess that quality. Hence, only
a thing of value can measure value.
But, according to the definition of value heretofore
given, two elements combine in the value of any
object; viz., utility, or desirableness, and cost, the
exponent of labor. Whatever substance, then, is
used as money, must be desired as a means of grati-
fication ; and, the nearer it comes to being always
and everywhere desired, the better is it fitted for its
purpose. It must be also a substance which can be
obtained only by labor ; and, the more uniform the
amount of labor necessary to obtain it, the better
will it serve its purpose as money. It is indis-
pensable that these two elements be combined.
Hence our definition says money is " some useful
product of labor," for nothing else can have value.
THE FUNCTIONS OF MONEY. 145
Furthermore, it is important that any standard of
measurement be fixed -with exactness, and kept as
invariable as possible. An India-rubber j^ard-stick
would be a very uncertain standard of length. The
French metric system has for its base the ten-
millionth of the quadrant of a terrestrial meridian,
called a metre. It cost seven years of great labor
to determine it with exactness ; but, once ascer-
tained, it stands forever unchangeable, and furnishes
a standard unit of measurement for all the mate-
rial qualities, length, surface, volume, and weight.
Nature furnishes no such absolutely fixed and in-
variable unit of value ; but certainly, for their stand-
ard of value, men need to select the thing in nature
which is most stable and unalterable in the elements
of utility and cost.
Such a substance, once adopted and generally
accepted, determines by comparison with itself a
price for every thing; and then, in the transactions
of trade, all things are exchanged directly or indi-
rectly by these prices. But let it be ever remem-
bered, that the price of a thing is simply its value
measured by money; and, just in proportion as the
value of money is variable, all operations of ex-
change must be attended with uncertainty and
confusion.
In its second function, as a medium of exchange,
money performs an office like that of a basket, or a
wheelbarrow, or a cart, — it is simpl}^ an instrument
of transfer. The real object of all trade is to eflect
an exchange of commodity for commodity. The
146 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
difficulty of doing this directly by barter has been
already noticed. Money comes in to relieve that
difficulty. B}^ means of it, two simple exchanges
readily accomplish what could not be effected by
one. Thus the man can sell his table for money ;
that is, he puts the value of the table into mone}^,
just as the farmer puts his eggs into a basket.
The money is easily divided ; and the baker, the
shoemaker, and the hatter are ready, each for a
portion of the money, to give him the bread, the
shoes, and the hat he needs. In all the manifold
and complicated operations of trade, money, as it
passes from hand to hand, is fulfilling this simple
office of a vehicle of transfer, or, as it is better
termed, a medium of exchange. One silver dollar
may thus effect twenty different exchanges in a day,
just as a wheelbarrow may be used to transport
twenty different loads.
Such a common medium of exchange must have
three essential qualities.
First, Precision and stability of value : the same
qualities which we saw to be essential for the first-
named function of money.
Second, Universal acceptableness, so that it will
be readily received by everybody for things offered
in sale.
Third, Divisibility into parts, representing, with-
out loss of value, different degrees of value, so as
to furnish an exact equivalent of any required
amount.
We can conceive that one substance might be
adopted as a standard of value, and another em-
THE FUNCTIONS OF MONEY. 147
ployed as a medium of exchange ; but this would
involve many practical inconveniences. For the
wide and varied operations of exchange, it is quite
necessary that the same substance should fulfil these
two functions, combining in itself the qualities es-
sential for both.
This does not imply, however, that money must
be actually used as a medium in every exchange.
With a standard of value once fixed, commodities
can be measured b}^ it, and have their price fixed,
and then be directly exchanged for each other.
Thus the farmer's wife brings her basket of eggs
and her firkin of butter to the village grocer. The
price for these articles is fixed in terms of money ;
the prices of the grocer's tea and sugar and spice
are fixed in the same way. Then, by a simple com-
parison of prices, the one class of articles is set
over against the other, and the trade is consummated
without any payment of money on either side. Just
this thing is going on all the time -in the commerce
between New York and Chicago. By processes
hereafter to be explained, car-loads of goods are
balanced off against car-loads of wheat, to the
amount of millions of dollars, without any actual
pa3'ment of money. Thus most of the world's trade
is really exchange in kind. At every step the
reckoning is kept in terms of money, and in the last
settlement the balance must be paid in money.
In the multifarious transfers of trade, money
comes into close identification with all wealth ; for
every thing that has value comes at some time to have
its price, that is, to be estimated in terms of money.
148 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Hence the great mistake, to which thousands of men
still cling, of regarding money as the most desirable
of all things to be brought into a country. This mis-
take can be best corrected by a clear apprehension
of the fact that money is but an instrument of ex-
change, itself forming but a ver}' small part of the
world's wealth, and capable of increasing wealth only
as it carries every other kind of wealth where it is
most needed to satisfy human wants.
Any article which has value may perform the
functions of money. Thus, b}^ different nations, and
in different ages of the world, various articles have
been emplo^'ed. Peoples who live b}^ hunting use
skins as money. In the territory of the Hudson
Bay Company the beaver-skin is the unit of value,
and their money-table runs thus : ' ' Three martens
are equal to one beaver, one white fox to two
beavers, one black fox or bear to four beavers, a
rifle to fifteen beavers." Pastoral nations use cattle
as an instrument of exchange. Homer tells us that
the armor of Diomede cost nine oxen. The Greeks
and Romans stamped their earliest coin with the
figure of an ox or a sheep. Hence the Latin word
for money, pecunia, from pecus^ cattle. In ancient
S3Tacuse and Britain, money was made of tin ; in
Sparta, of iron ; in Carthage, of a preparation of
leather ; in Burmah, of lead ; in Russia, of platinum.
In Scotland, former^, nails were used ; among the
Chinese, pieces of silk ; in Tartary, cubes of pressed
tea ; in Abyssinia, salt. Slaves passed as money
among the old Anglo-Saxons, tobacco in Virginia,
THE FUNCTIONS OF MONEY. 149
codfish in Newfoundland, bullets and wampum in
the early history of Massachusetts, logwood in Cam-
peachy, sugar in the West Indies, soap in Mexico.
* But from the time of Abraham, who paid to the
children of Heth ''three hundred shekels of silver,
current money with the merchant," until now, silver
and gold have been the chief monc}^ of the civilized
world. It should be noted, however, that, when any
thing used as mone^^ is devoted to another use, its
functions as money cease. Gold or silver coin turned
into plate, just as really as tobacco or sugar passed
to a consumer, is no longer money.
We have seen that whatever is used for money
must be a thing universally desired. If a nation
were isolated from all others, so that its exchanges
were wholly internal, it would be enough that its
money be acceptable to its own people alone. But
with the advance of civilization, more and more
does the stream of each nation's trade flow outward
to meet and cross and blend with the streams from
every other natioji, in the great ocean of a world-
wide commerce. Hence the necessity that the sub-
stance adopted for the standard of value and the
medium of exchange be the same and uniform in all
countries, the world over.
The most profitable exchange for any country is
to export what is most abundant and therefore least
valuable at home, and to import what is most wanted
and therefore most valuable at home. Mone}^ may
accumulate in one country so as to be lower in value
than other commodities. Then it is of advantage
150 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
to send away the mone}^, and in exchange to bring
in needed commodities. This can easily be done, if
the money of each country is the same with that of
every other.
Such a uniformity of mone}- throughout the civil-
ized world would tend to prevent that fluctuation in
the value of money which disturbs and deranges all
operations of exchange. With freedom for monej^
to flow out or to flow in to one and another country,
as a temporarj^ surplus or deficiency may demand,
universal commerce becomes a great reservoir, to
maintain its value at a common equilibrium every-
where, just as the ocean maintains the sea-level
uniform for the world.
It is obvious that the adoption by any community
or state of a kind of money that is not acceptable
in other countries must exclude that people in great
measure from the commerce of the world. Hence
the mischief of an irredeemable paper money, or of
a standard of specie at variance with that of other
commercial nations. For a country which adopts
these expedients, the result is inevitably to impede
trade, and to impair industry.
EXERCISES.
1. Show how division of labor creates a special necessity
for money to aid exchanges.
2. Illustrate the special difficulty which a painter would
find, under strict barter-exchange, in disposing of a fine
picture that cost him two months' labor.
3. Can you conceive of the conditions of trade, if there
were no means of fixing prices for commodities ?
4. If there were no money, what inducement would
THE FUNCTIONS OF MONEY. 151
there be for one to produce more than he needed for him-
self, or how could one accumulate wealth by saving ?
5. It has been said, "There is no machine which saves
as much labor as money does." Is the statement true?
Show how money is a means of saving labor.
6. Why might not the pebbles of a gravel-hill be used as
money ? How are slips of pictured paper any better for the
purpose ?
7. What qualities for use as money have precious stones,
such as rubies, sapphires, and diamonds ? What important
quality do they lack ?
8. A farmer sold fifty bushels of wheat for $50. He then
bought a suit of clothes for $20, paid $10 for a gown for his
wife, and $10 for shoes for his children, and bought $10
worth of sugar, rice, tea, and coffee. Illustrate the two
functions of money in the transactions.
9. Wliat would be the effect on trade, if gold and silver
coin were liable, as formerly, to be debased at the arbitrary
will of a sovereign ?
10. The values exchanged during a single day In New
York have been reported as high as $400,000,000. In what
respect was money concerned with them all, and in what
respect with but a small part of the exchanges?
11. Can you account for the fact that during this year
(1879) the foreign trade of the United States brought home
large amounts of gold and silver money ?
12. How will the importer in New York decide whether
to send out wheat, or money, in payment for his goods
bought in Liverpool ?
13. Is it good policy for a government to forbid the expor-
tation of specie, when that will buy the goods wanted from
abroad to better advantage than any thing else ?
14. For what utilities besides their service as money are
gold and "silver desirable ? Would they be used as money,
if they could be used for nothing else ? Are they still
money, when wrought into gold-leaf or silver spoons?
15. The Spartan government tried to guard the people
from avarice and luxury by making iron money for the
country: can you tell with what result?
162 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
16. If other leading commercial nations make gold the
one standard of value, what will be the consequence if
our government insist on making silver the standard for
this country ?
SPECIE. 153
SECTION II.— SPECIE.
The precious metals, gold and silver, possess
certain qualities, peculiarly combined, which give
them special fitness to fulfil the functions of mone}'.
Hence, when prepared and marked for that pur-
pose, they are called specie. These qualities may
be particularly noticed as follows : —
1 . Gold and silver have an intrinsic utility. Their
brilliancy, their malleability, their resistance of cor-
rosion, and th^ir permanence, make them desirable
for personal ornaments, for plate, and for the mani-
fold decoration of temples, houses, and equipages.
For this reason they have always had a charm for
all sorts of people. Their use as money only en-
hances, and makes more constant and stead}^, their
general desirableness.
2. These metals are obtainable only by labor; and
the amount of labor necessary to obtain them is more
invariable than that which pertains to other sub-
stances. Now and then one has stumbled upon a
nugget of pure gold of great value ; but ordinaril}'-,
gold and silver are obtained bj- labor in long and
patient search, in washing sands, breaking rocks,
reducing ores, and separating the pure metals from
other substances. The amount produced is depend-
ent on the labor employed.
In respect to the two elements of value, desirable-
ness, and cost measured by labor, gold and silver are
permanent and uniform beyond any other products.
154 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
Hence their value is more stable than that of any
thmg else.
3 . These metals concentrate a large amount of value
in a small bulk. The}^ are conveniently portable.
One may easily carry in his pocket the value of a
wagon-load of wheat or a car-load of cattle when
put into the form of gold.
4. These substances are capable of minute division
vv^ithout loss. A gold eagle or a silver dollar may
be divided into ten equal parts, and each part will
have the value of just one-tenth of the original coin.
Not so with diamonds, which also concentrate value.
A large diamond is worth many times its weight in
small diamonds ; and, once broken into pieces, its
original value can never be restored.
5. These metals are of uniform quality. Pure
gold or silver is the same always and ever^^here ;
readil}^ allo3'ed to make the coin harder, but easily
restored to its original puritj^ without loss.
6. The value of a definite portion of these sub-
stances can be easily verified. They are malleable,
easity wrought into any shape, and capable of re-
ceiving and retaining a distinct impression. Their
lustre, uniform weight, and resistance to the action
of acids, make it easy to detect adulteration.
7. These metals are nearly indestructible by acci-
dent or use. No ordinary fire consumes them ; the}'
are not decomposed by atmospheric influences ; they
wear away very slowly.
8. These two metals are adapted to each other for
the different exchanges, large and small, which the
trade of the civilized world requires. Gold too mi-
SPECIE. 155
nutely divided would be counted with difficulty, and
easily lost. For large exchanges silver would be
inconvenient, on account of its great bulk. They
are thus well adapted in use to supplement each
other.
These metals are emplo^^ed as the money of the
world, not because ordained to this by authorit}^ of
human governments, but because in the ordinance
of nature the}' possess in peculiar degree those
qualities so essential to represent precise amounts
of value, and are ever exchangeable for the same
amounts of value. In the strictest sense, these
metals coined constitute the only real money uni-
versally recognized.
There is nevertheless a legitimate agency of
government with respect to money. Men use
mone}^ in exchanges for the same reason that they
use hammers in driving nails, — because they thus
save time and labor, and the work is thereby better
done. Yet the convenience of money may be in-
creased by the action of the government in two
ways.
First, By indicating a uniform instrument of ex-
change; that is, by establishing the precious metals
as a legal tender. If I owe a man for a hat, and he
will not take the silver I offer in payment, but de-
mands beaver-skins, I may not be able to procure
them : if, on the other hand, I offer him leather, and
refuse to give him any thing else, he ma}^ be de-
frauded. To prevent disputes, the government
needs to enact a law, specifying what shall be a
156 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
full and valid discharge of such an obligation when
nothing definite has been agreed upon. Such a law
need not interfere with special contracts for the
exchange of particular objects.
Second, The government can, better than any
other party, prepare the metals used as money for
the purpose by coining. It is evident that the coin-
ing of money cannot be safel}' intrusted to individ-
uals. It would present temptations to dishonesty,
too great for ordinary human virtue. Hence, in all
civilized countries, the coining of money is regarded
as the sovereign act of the government through care-
fully selected agents. In our country, this, with all
other rights of full sovereignty^ is vested in the
National Government alone. Congress has the ex-
clusive power to coin mone}'.
In the coinage three things must be regarded : —
First, The quality of the coin. The metal of the
coinage must be of uniform purit3\ It is of advan-
tage to mingle with the pure metal some portion of
alloy, to make the coin harder, and the better to set
the standard of purity at an exact i3oint. But the
precise measure of this adulteration should be fixed
by law, invariable and clearlj' made known.
Second, The size of the coins should be adjusted
to the convenience of exchange. If too large, they
cannot well be carried about, nor fitted to different
values ; if too small, they are liable to be lost, and
increase the trouble of counting. Also, different
pieces should be adjusted to each other so as to be
conveniently enumerated. For this, the decimal
system, as adopted in the United States and in
France, is pro1)a])ly prefcM-ablo to any otlier.
SPECIE. 167
Third, The form of the coins should be such that
each piece shall indicate definitely its value at sight.
For convenience in counting and piling, flat coins
are best. To diminish friction, some thickness is
requisite. The surface should bear a well-marked
impression ; common so far as to indicate the na-
tionalit}' of the coinage, differing so far as to dis-
tinguish different pieces, and in full relief so as to
make apparent any filing or wearing-away of the
metal. The same end is subserved by milling the
edges, and raising the rim. It is advisable, also,
that the amount of pure metal be stamped on the
face of each coin.
Since the manufacture of coins requires labor with
expensive machinery, and since the act of coinage
does impart a slight addition of value to the metal,
it is right that the owner should pay for the service
rendered. The charge made for coining bullion
brought to the mint is called seigniorage. At the
United-States mint the seigniorage for gold coins is
only one-fifth of one per cent.
In continual use, coin becomes worn, its impres-
sion is effaced, and its value is diminished. Being
thus unfitted for circulation, it is but fair that the
government should repair the loss, and not leave it
to fall wholly on the last holder. Accordingly our
government provides that gold coins of the United
States may be received at the treasury at their
denominational value, provided that, after a circula-
tion of twenty 3'ears, they are not reduced in weight
more than one-half of one per centum.
The government has also authority to control the
158 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
circulation within its own territory of foreign coins.
Otherwise, worn and depreciated coin of other coun-
tries may come in, and drive out its own superior
money. Thus some years ago, our government
ordered that worn Spanish and Mexican silver coins
should be received only at a discount of twent}^ per
cent on their face-value, though they were really
depreciated only ten per cent. This made the old
coins worth more as bullion than as coin ; and they
were collected and melted.
The heterogeneous monetary sj^stems of different
countries involve troublesome fractional operations
in reducing the coinage of one country to that of
another. It is therefore very desirable that the
attempts to secure a system of correlated interna-
tional coinage for the civilized nations of the world
should succeed. A slight change in the systems of
the leading commercial nations will secure uniformity.
If with this change a uniform sj^stem of weights and
measures could also be adopted, the exchanges of
the world would be greatly facilitated.
Governments have often transcended their legiti-
mate powers in legislation about money. Thus
laws forbidding the exportation and importation of
money, laws arbitrarily changing the value of the
coinage, and laws making any thing but gold and
silver a legal tender, involve injustice, mischief, and
often absurdit3\
The Question of a Double Standard. The use
of both gold and silver as money is highly advan-
tageous, almost indispensable ; but the question is
SPECIE. 159
raised and miicli agitated, Should the standard of
value be defined in terms of each metal, and both be
made legal tender to an unlimited extent? If the
relative value of the two metals were constant, so
that they would always rise or fall together, there
would be no objection to the double standard. But
in the nature of things this is impossible ; for each
metal has its independent sources of supply, and
value, as we have seen, varies with the fluctuations
of supply. When two kinds of money of different
valuation are thrown into the trade of a country
together, it is a law, as fixed as the law of gravita-
tion, that the cheaper money, of inferior value, w^ill
drive out the dearer money, whose value is greater.
If the government comes in often to adjust the
relations of the two metals, this interference dis-
turbs the operations of trade. This difficulty would
be relieved in measure, if all commercial nations
were to adopt the double standard ; but even then
some international congress would need from time
to time to define the relative value of the two
metals.
For its function as a standard of value, it is of
the highest importance that the value of money be
as invariable as possible. Thus far in the history
of the world, gold has been the more stable of the
two metals. It would seem, therefore, most advan-
tageous that gold should be adopted as the main
standard, w^ith a wide range for the employment of
silver as subsidiary coin. In that case, the advan-
tages of the two metals would be secured ; each
would become the complement of the other, fulfil-
160 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
ling its function as money in a sphere to which the
other is not adapted.
The views given of the nature and functions of
mone}' warrant the following propositions as infer-
ences or corollaries : —
1. In every exchange, the cost of the money em-
ployed is to be regarded as equal to the cost of the
article for which it is exchanged. If ten dollars is
the price of a barrel of flour in Lima, it is because
the cost of producing so much silver there is equal
to the cost of producing the flour and its transporta-
tion. This is the natural law of exchange, varied
only by incidental circumstances and artificial ap-
pliances, which temporarily affect the supply of
money or of goods.
2. The universal freedom of commerce, and the
use among all nations of the same kind of money as
the instrument of exchange, must tend to equalize
any variations in the cost or in the supply of money.
The commerce of the world is the great reservoir,
the ocean encompassing the globe, into which all
contributing streams of mone}' flow ; and its level is
essentially the same everywhere. By a law as sim-
ple and constant as that of the tides, the money-
market will regulate itself, provided trade is free
and money real and the same everyvrhere.
3. The amount of money in any country and in
all countries is very small in proportion to the whole
amount of vs^ealth and of values exchanged. As a
standard of value, money regulates all exchanges.
As a medium of transfer, it is actually employed in
SPECIE. 161
bnt few. It performs its office best when it moves
rapidly. It flows from one country to another only
in the process of equalisation just spoken of.
4. It is of no advantage to increase the amount
of money in a country, unless it is demanded by an
increase of production and of active trade. Money
is only an instrument like a plough or a power-loom.
It is of no advantage to a community to have a
hundred ploughs when only fifty can be used, or
forty looms when twenty will do all the work. In
a city isolated from the rest of the world, to double
the amount of money will merely double prices. If
its trade with other places is free, the superfluous
money will float away on the tide of commerce to
some place where it is needed, just as a surplus of
wheat or cotton goods must do.
5. The abundance or scarcity of money in a coun-
try is not of itself a trustworthy index of prosperity
or adversity. We must look back of the fact to its
cause. A scarcity of money, caused by an increase
of products and great activity of trade, is a sign of
prosperity. Money abundant because business is
stagnant, and exchanges are few, indicates adver-
sity.
6. The maxim, "It matters not what becomes of
property, so long as the money is in the country," is
false and delusive. Labor and capital valued at a
million dollars were expended on a great manufac-
tory which proved an utter failure. So much prop-
erty was lost, none the less so because the money
paid out in setting up the- establishment is still cir-
culating among the people. The money was in that
162 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
case but the instrument of throwing away so much
of value. It cannot bring back the values lost. If
a thief should empty your storehouse in the night
with a wheelbarrow, it would not relieve your loss to
find the wheelbarrow in the morning, left for some
honest use.
The minds of many are mystified on this subject
by the complications of credit with mone3\ A great
part of the apparent variations in the value of money
in diff*erent countries and at different epochs is due
to the same cause.
Real money held to its rightful 'functions is one
of the most useful inventions ever devised. One
sa3^s, not extravagantly, " Money, in a nation's
economy, is what the blood is in the life of the
animal. It is, so to speak, the common reservoir
in which all food is first dissolved, and by which, at
a later stage, the elements of nutrition and preserva-
tion are distributed to the several organs. There is
indeed no machine w^hich has saved as much labor
as money."
EXERCISES.
1. Specify some of the purposes, other than money, for
which gold and silver are used.
2. Is the absorption of the precious metals for these
purposes a benefit, or an injury?
3. In estimating the cost of gold, what must be set off
against the good fortune of some who obtain rich lumps
with only the labor of picking them up?
4. If gold should become as abundant and as easily ob-
tained as iron, how would its fitness for money be affected ?
5. Platinum is a rare and useful metal; why is not it as
well fitted for money as gold ?
SPECIE. 163
6. What means are adopted to test the genuineness of
gold and silver coins?
7. We have coins made of copper and nickel : what
qualities of real money do they lack?
8. Could a mere enactment of government prevent the
use of gold and silver for money ?
9. Could a law of Congress cause circles of leather,
stamped, to pass as money ? Why not ?
10. Illustrate the necessity that the government should
define some legal tender.
11. When Jesus was asked whether the Jews ought to
pay tribute to Caesar, what was the pertinence of his asking
in reply, whose image the coin of the country bore ?
12. Why would not little solid globes of silver, such as
the Chinese use, answer the purpose of money as well as
our coins ?
13. Why do the manufacturers of silver prefer silver coins
for the material of spoons, &c. ?
14. Where large amounts of specie are transferred, is the
transfer made by count, or by weight ? Why ?
15. When Germany was composed of a great number of
petty sovereign states, what inconvenience did travellers
meet with respect to their money ? How is that incon-
venience now removed ?
16. If commercial nations should adopt a uniform stand-
ard and system of coinage, and uniform weights and meas-
ures, how would the study of arithmetic in our schools be
affected ?
17. Can any act of Congress keep the ratio of value be-
tween gold and silver permanent ?
18. If silver dollars are worth more than gold dollars,
which will disappear?
19. How is it detei-mined that you must give a silver dol-
lar for a good pocket-knife ?
20. The great fire in Chicago consumed property valued
at $200,000,000, but scarcely any of the money in the city
was destroyed : was the loss any less because the money
remained ?
164 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
CHAPTER III.
CREDIT AN INSTRUMENT OF EXCHANGE.
In its broadest sense, credit is confidence in the
truthfulness and integrity of a fellow-man. Some
exercise of it is essential to the very existence of
human societ3^ The simplest services cannot be
interchanged without credit. If 3'ou hire a laborer
for a day's work, you trust him as one able and
faithful to do the work, and he trusts you for his
pay till the end of the da3\ Civilization advances
with the growth of such mutual confidence.
As a technical term of Political Economy, credit is
trust in the promise of an equivalent to be rendered
at a future time, for values immediately transferred.
In the processes of exchange , credit becomes a
substitute for money, and so a distinct and indis-
pensable instrument for effecting all kinds of ex-
changes. A very small part of the exchanges of
the world's commerce is effected by the direct
agency of money. Credit is the instrument em-
ployed for all the rest. Its utility can hardl}^ be
over-estimated. At the same time it is a dangerous
instrument, because so liable to abuse.
In treating the subject, we need to notice sever-
ally, the forms of credit, the useful functions of
credit, and the mischievous abuses of credit.
THE FORMS OF CREDIT. 165
SECTION I.— THE FORMS OF CREDIT.
The leading forms in which credit enters into the
operations of exchange are, —
1. Book-accounts. A seller extends credit to a
bu3'er by simply charging the value of his purchase
to him on his book. The butcher wants the baker's
bread, and the baker wants the butcher's meat.
Each makes his morning purchase of the other, to
be charged in account. On the da}^ of settlement
the two accounts are summed up, and th^ difference
on the one side or the other is paid in money, or
carried forward to new account. So, too, a farmer
anticipates the returns of his harvest by a running
account at the store. In either case the direction to
make the charges implies the promise to pa3^
2. Loans. A lender trusts the promissory note
of the borrower, engaging to pay with interest, at a
definite date in the future, the money now loaned,
or the mone}'- value of the goods now sold. The
borrower may give securitj^ for the promise of his
note by a chattel-mortgage, or a mortgage on real
estate.
3. Mercantile paper. In this case the promise
takes the form of a negotiable note, given by a job-
ber to a manufacturer or importer, or b}^ a retailer
to a jobber for goods bought to be sold again. 'The
note runs for a short time, — thirty, sixty, or ninety
da^^s, — to be provided for by the avails of a second
sale. Such paper is often passed to second hands,
166 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
and ma}' itself become a marketable article in the
communit}', subject to the regular dealings of
brokers.
4. Bank-deposits. The depositor gives his banker
credit for money put into his hands to be paid on
his order, and accepts a certificate of deposit, or an
entr^'- on his bank-book, as the promise, the voucher,
for the transaction. The orders by which the de-
posits are drawn out are called checks. These may
float about, with a limited circulation, as tokens of
credit at home. Or, on a wider range, taking the
form of bills of exchange, the credit thus originated
may reach round the globe, doing good service in
the exchanges of individuals and of nations.
5. Stocks. A number of persons wishing to com-
bine their capital for manufacturing, banking, build-
ing a railway, or whatever, form a stock-company.
Each gives credit to the company for the capital he
puts in, and accepts a certificate of stock as the
promise, or voucher. These stock- certificates are
transferable ; and credit in this form becomes an
article of merchandise with a current price, more
or less variable, from causes natural or artificial.
6. Bonds. These are issued b}' corporations,
cities, states, and nations, as evidences of debt.
Whoever holds these gives credit to the bod}^ cor-
porate or politic, whose promise is embodied in the
bond. These, like stocks, are made articles of
merchandise, and are sought by many for the invest-
ment of money. They are also often made the
sport of wild and reckless speculation, and so credit
furnishes instruments for stock-gamblers to play
with.
THE USEFUL FUNCTIONS OF CREDIT. 167
7. Promissory notes, issued by banks or govern-
ments, and designed to pass from hand to hand as
currency. Such are our United-States " green-
backs " and national-bank notes. In this category
are included all forms of " paper money." The pub-
lic, receiving and using these, gives credit to the
governments or banks, and confidence rises or falls
with all causes which affect the ability or the sta-
bility of the promissor. In this form credit flies
everj'where, and attaches itself to every transaction
of business ; safe and helpful, or liable, like a bub-
ble, to sudden inflations and collapses, which shake
and unsettle all trade and all industry.
It is believed that all forms of credit in use may
be classed under one or other of these heads. In
all cases the true basis of credit is real wealth,
existing or prospective, supposed to be at the com-
mand of the party trusted. Its essence is confidence
in the ability, truthfulness, and integrity of the party
trusted.
SECTION n. — THE USEFUL FUNCTIONS OF
CREDIT.
As we take up this topic, a few words are needed
in the outset to correct some false notions quite
common.
Credit is not capital. It is only a means of
transferring capital from one person who cannot
use it, to another who can. If a man has borrowed
ten thousand dollars to set up a flouring-mill, giving
108 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
his note for the amount, there is but one capital,
and it is all in the mill. The note which the lender
holds is a simple sj-mbol of the one capital, indi-
cating that it belongs, not to the miller, but to the
holder of the note.
Credit does not of itself create capital. It has no
magical power to make something out of nothing.
Wealth does not grow by the mere act of passing
from hand to hand. It can be increased only by
union with labor. Credit transfers it for such a
union : it can do no more.
The same capital cannot be used by both the bor*
rower and the lender at the same time. A farmer
who has lent a neighbor his plough, cannot at the
same time use the plough on his own field. No
more can B use for his own purposes the thousand
dollars which he lent to A. He may get a thou-
sand dollars b}^ selling the note to C at its face
value, and C ma}^ sell it to D, and so on till it gets
to Z ; but each move onl}" changes the lender of the
one original sum. In the end the whole series of
transactions will be settled b}^ one act, when A pays
Z, and takes up the note.
But credit, when held to its legitimate functions,
renders important services to all departments of
industry.
1. Credit brings wealth into the form of capital,
and makes it available for the increase of w^ealth.
Widows, minors, aged persons, professional men,
otherwise occupied, and unfamiliar with manufac-
tures and trade, are often the owners of property
from which they need an income ; but they cannot,
THE USEFUL FUNCTIONS OF CREDIT. 169
by their own labor, make it productive. By means
of credit this wealth is made productive capital for
the benefit of all parties. Credit also gathers up the
small savings of man}-, and puts them into union
w^ith labor for profitable use.
2. Credit gives efficiency to the industrial talent
of a people. By means of it many a poor man, of
strength and skill, obtains the needed capital b}''
which alone his powers can be emploj^ed and devel-
oped. A large portion of the most successful busi-
ness-men in our country have begun w^ith only their
own faculties and energies, and a character to com-
mand confidence, and bring them capital on credit.
In the light of these two of its functions, credit
is indispensable, both to the full drawing out of the
capital of a countr}', and to the full development of
its industrial talent. Thus it touches both the
springs of productive industry, — capital and labor.
3. Credit quickens exchanges. The crops of the
farmer stored in his granar^^, and the products of
the manufacturer waiting for purchasers, are capi-
tal lying idle. By selling to the middle-man or the
jobber on credit, this wealth is set moving at once
towards the consumers who need it, and the pro-
ducers have means for new products. Rapid ex-
changes turn over capital often, and with every turn
wealth is multiplied. The most important functions
of credit fall within the sphere of exchange.
4. Credit serves directly as an instrument of ex-
change. This is evident in book-accounts. A buys
of B, and B buys of A ; the values being entered in
the account on either side. On settlement there
170 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
may be a small balance to be paid in money. But
for the greater part of the transfers, the credit-entry
has sufficed. The aggregate of exchanges thus
effected is very large.
The same thing is done on a larger scale by credit
in the form of bank-deposits. Suppose four men do
business at the same bank. A pays B a hundred
dollars for a horse, by his check on the bank. B
msiy make a payment of the same amount on the
same day and in the same way to C, and C to D,
and D again to A. The four checks are passed into
the bank. On each of four accounts in the bank
corresponding entries are made. At the close of
the day the accounts stand as they did at the
beginning. But those entries have effected four
exchanges, without drawing out or even counting
a dollar of money.
The New- York Clearing House is a central bank
of deposits for all the banks of the city ; and the
scale on which credit fulfils the function we are
speaking of is illustrated by the fact that transac-
tions of exchange for one da}', amounting to more
than two hundred million dollars, are settled in the
space cf one hour, requiring the transfer of only a
few thousand dollars in money to provide for small
deficiencies here and there.
Credit fulfils a like office in adjusting exchanges
between distant cities. The sales and purchases of
every community, as well as of every individual,
must be substantially^ equal. The agricultural prod-
ucts sent from Chicago must pay for the goods
brought from New York. The chief instrument of
THE USEFUL FUNCTIONS OF CREDIT. 171
this exchange is credit, in the fonn of drafts, passed
through the banks of the two cities. Thus produce-
dealer A in Chicago ships five thousand dollars'
worth of wheat to B, his consignee in New York,
and makes a draft on B for the amount, which he
deposits in his Chicago bank. The bank forwards
the draft to the bank in New York with which it
deals, and the same day sells to C, a Chicago mer-
chant, its draft on the New- York bank for five
thousand dollars, to pay for goods h& has received
from a New- York importer. The return of the
drafts all around closes the transactions ; and credit
has eff*ected the exchange of wheat for dry goods,
with only the labor of making a few ledger-entries,
and writing two or three letters.
The case is essentially the same between the
chief trading cities all over the virorld. The foreign
trade of Boston is mainly an account-current with
all the cities of the world with which she has com-
merce. Provisions sent from Boston to the West
Indies are made to pay for tea imported from China,
by means of credit in the form of bills of exchange,
passed through Liverpool as an intermediate centre
of trade.
5. Credit, to a limited extent, may be safely put
into the form of currency or paper-money. It is a
rule of sound economy, to use the cheapest tools
which will serve the desired purpose. If promissory
notes of banks, to an amount equal to double the
specie they hold, will effect exchanges well and
safely, the real value of half the gold and silver,
fixed in money, may be devoted to other purposes.
172 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
So far the instrument of exchange is cheapened, to
advantage. This use of credit, however, runs close
upon the line of danger, and needs careful restric-
tions.
For all these functions of credit a basis of sound
money is indispensable. Nothing but real money
made of gold and silver can furnish the universal
standard of value required. This is the ballast of
the ship of trade. Credit furnishes the sails. Any
ballast that easily shifts in a storm brings danger to
the ship. The credit which circles the world, and
binds all civilized nations together hy the common
interests and mutual service of universal commerce,
must be sustained by the all-pervading presence of
money, whose value is uniform and stable.
sectio:n- iil — the abuses of ceedit.
Credit is in its nature illusory, since it springs out
of men's hopes, and rests on prospective rather than
real wealth. Hence there is an element of danger
alwaj's in close connection with its legitimate use,
and it is especially hable to abuse. Some of its
abuses may be named, as follows: —
1. Credit is abused when too freely granted.
Thus the thriftless spendthrift runs up an account,
never to be paid. In his eagerness to trade, the
New- York jobber trusts his goods to a swindling
adventurer, who runs to some little AYestern cit}^
rushes off the goods at less than cost, and disap-
pears just as his notes fall due. Too often bankers
have to moiu-n over their too easy allowance of over-
drafts.
THE ABUSES OF CREDIT. . 173
2. Credit is abused by the wild speculation of
borrowers. One who does business with borrowed
capital is bound to avoid great risks. But often
men working with the capital of others embark
recklessly on uncertain ventures, in which they
would not risk their own property. Thus the capi-
tal of banks is sometimes involved in gambling
operations of the stock-exchange.
3. Credit is abused by the extravagant living of
debtors. It is said that of those who enter the
mercantile profession, ninety-nine of every hundred
fail. Nine-tenths of these failures are due to rash
ventures and extravagant expenses, incurred with-
out regard to pending debts.
4. Credit is abused by confidence-operations. The
term includes schemes of speculation, which have
only credit for their basis, whether organized under
a temporary illusion, like the operations in Western
lands in 1836, or with a fraudulent purpose, like
many mining-companies. The commercial history
of the world is full of instances of the strange facil-
ity with which the imagination and credulity of men
are imposed upon.
5. Credit is abused by the betrayal of trusts.
Cashiers and bookkeepers conceal their thefts by
false entries ; presidents perjure themselves, swear-
ing to false statements ; stockholders' notes are
counted as cash capital ; trusted agents run away
with funds of their employers. Such acts are pos-
sible, and all too common, under loose methods of
credit.
6. Credit is abused by the over-estimate of assets,
174 POLITICAL ECOI^rOMY.
sometimes for purposes of fraud, sometimes through
simple self-deception ; every man desiring to see the
bright rather than the dark side of his business-
prospects.
7. The most sweeping and mischievous abuse of
credit appears in the excessive issue of paper-money.
This touches all the processes of exchange with
disturbing force, and is the source of panics and
commercial crises.
Some of the mischiefs caused by these abuses of
credit may be mentioned.
a. They cause ruinous fluctuations of prices. Mr.
Mill says, " In a state of commerce in which much
credit is habitually given, general prices at any
moment depend much more on the state of credit
than on the quantity of mone}'.*'
6. Honest men are compelled to pay for the losses
"Which proceed from bad debts. The profits of the
merchant must be enough to guard him from loss in
the risks he runs, and these come from his paying
customers.
C. These abuses of credit tend to turn all trade
into a game of chance. Here and there a splendid
prize is won, and it dazzles men's eyes,
d. Through familiarity with failures and frauds,
the moral sense is deadened -with respect to a debtor's
obligations. How can it be otherwise when a bank-
rupt's settlement with his creditors at fifty cents on
the dollar is a common fact ?
e. The abuse of credit tends to relax the bonds
of law for the enforcement of contracts. As a
matter of fact, under this influence, the collection
THE ABUSES OF CREDIT. 175
of debts b}^ legal process has become difficult, almost
impossible.
These evils call for earnest and persistent efforts
to raise the tone of public sentiment and common
practice respecting credit. The honest part of the
debtor class are most of all interested in securing
such a reform.
EXERCISES.
1. What would be the effect on the social life of men, if
mutual distrust prevailed ? Illustrate.
2. Illustrate by an actual or supposed case each of the
forms of credit named: viz., book-accounts, loans, mercan-
tile paper, bank-deposits, stocks, bonds, and circulating
promissory notes.
3. A bought fifty dollars' worth of goods of B ; B bought
nothing of A, but bought fifty dollars' worth of C, and C
bought fifty dollars' worth of A; corresponding charges are
made on the several book-accounts : how can the whole be
settled by credit, without the payment of any money ?
4. Explain a usage common with banks, called "dis-
counting mercantile paper.''
5. Suppose you buy twenty-five dollars' worth of books
in New Haven, Conn., and send in payment a draft for the
amount made by a Kenosha bank on a New- York bank:
explain the functions of cre^lit in the transaction.
6. B holds a certificate for a thousand dollars of the
stock of the First National Bank of Chicago: what does
that certificate mean ? What is meant by the expression,
"hypothecating stock" ?
7. A grocer pays a farmer a five-dollar United-States
greenback for a firkin of butter: is it a money-payment or
a credit-payment ? Prove your answer.
8. Suppose Congress at its next session should order a
hundred million dollars additional greenbacks to be issued :
would the act add that amount to the capital of the coun-
try?
176 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
9. Suppose, instead, a hundred million gold dollars
should be issued from the mint : would the capital of the
country be increased by so much ?
10. How does a savings-bank increase capital ?
11. How does credit help a manufacturer to anticipate the
sale of his products for the payment of his employes ?
12. Can you explain the "letters of credit" which many
use to provide for their expenses in travelling in Europe ?
13. Is it a wrong to a man to ask for some evidence of
his character before extending credit to him ?
14. Is it right for one who is doing business on borrowed
capital to embark in doubtful speculations ?
15. What is the real cause of most of the defalcations
which so often occur?
16. Is it generally either unjust or unkind to insist on the
prompt and faithful fulfilment of pecuniary obligations ?
17. Is it advisable to restore the laws of imprisonment for
debt which were in force in all our States sixty years ago ?
18. Why should not defalcation be classed with theft and
robbery as a grave crime ?
BANKS AND PAPER-MONEY. 177
CHAPTER IV.
BANKS AND PAPER-MONEY.
The word bank is of Italian origin. In the
infancy of European commerce, the Jews in Italy
were wont to assemble in the market-places of the
principal towns, seated on benches, ready to lend
and exchange money: hence the term "bank,"
from banco ^ a bench. When any of these money-
lenders failed, his bench was broken, and so we
have the word bankrupt.
In the sj^stem of modern commerce, banks are
the chief agents of credit. Credit, as we have
seen, holds an important place in the processes of
exchange. The principle of division of labor re-
quires that some persons should make it their spe-
cial business to direct and manage its complicated
machinery. In banking institutions, men devote
themselves to the systematic administration of credit
for the manifold service of trade and industry, a
service which is indispensable and invaluable. Like
all other good agencies, this may be abused and
misdirected. This danger will be best guarded
against, when the legitimate functions and uses of
banks are well understood by all classes of people.
178 • POLITICAL ECOiS^OMY.
SECTION L — THE OFFICES OF BANKS.
Banks fulfil four distinct offices : —
1 . The collection and custody of money-deposits to
be the basis of credit in trade. If all the exchanges
of a community were to be effected by money alone,
every business-man must have in his own keeping
a considerable amount of money. To guard this
from robbery and loss, would involve no little pains
and expense. In doing any large business, the
mere counting of the specie paid and received would
require much labor. It is an important office of a
bank to relieve these risks and labor, by establish-
ing, in a convenient locality, a safe central reposi-
tory' for the specie of a communitj-, and charging a
cashier and other officers with the responsibility of
its safe keeping and transfer. Then, as individ-
uals deposit what the}" receive, and draw for what
they pay, credit is made, in the manner heretofore
described, to effect a great part of each day's ex-
changes, while the money lies secure in the vaults
prepared for it. It would be good economy to
make such an arrangement, even if all who enjoyed
its benefits had to contribute directly to pay the
banker for his service. But the compensation de-
rived from their other offices enables the banks to
do all this gratuitously.
2. Closely allied to this is the office of banks in
negotiating money-exchanges. The coin issued by
one nation does not pass freely in another country
THE OFFICES OF BANKS. 179
where it is not known. A German immigrant com-
ing into New York will need to turn the thalers he
brings from his native land into American dollars.
At the bank he can do it safely b}^ pa^^ing a small
fee, for there the relative value of the two coinages
is well understood ; and the next da}^ perhaps, some
one going abroad will call on the bank for exchange
the other way. But a more important and exten-
sive business of this kind is needed to provide for
pa3'ments to be made in distant and foreign places,
by drafts and bills of exchange. A genuine draft
on Chicago is acceptable in all the North-western
States. A draft on New York is good in any part
of our country. A bill of exchange on London will
command money for its possessor in any city of the
civilized world. Banks, through the credit they
have with each other, are prepared to furnish their
customers with orders of this kind as the}' may
desire, their payment being for the most part actu-
ally made by the exchange of goods shipped to and
fro. This resolves the commerce of the world into
barter-exchange. The banks charge a slight pre-
mium for exchange of this kind, the rate varjing
with the balance of trade between different places.
The daily newspapers of leading cities give the
prices-current for exchange as they do for goods
bought and sold.
The quotations for British exchange are peculiar,
and need explanation. The premium for exchange
on London will be seen ordinarily stated at from
nine to ten and a half per cent. This apparently
high rate is due to the fact, that, at the time our
180 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
government was formed, the old Spanish milled
dollar was in use, and $4.44 was fixed as the rate
at which the pound sterling must be computed at
our custom-houses. Since then our American coin-
age has been changed ; and the relative value of
gold and silver has changed, so that now a pound
sterling equals $4.86 of American coin, but the old
mode of computation is continued : hence British
exchange in New York is at par when it is quoted
at nine and a half per cent premium, the difference
between $4.44 and $4.86. This needs to be borne
in mind in all calculations of the cost of bills on
London.
3. To make loans and discounts is another office
of banks. The union of capital and labor is neces-
sary to produce wealth. But often one has the
capital, and another the capacity to labor. A bank,
as an agent of credit, brings the two elements to-
gether in the most expeditious and convenient way.
He who has capital puts it into the bank to be
loaned for him. He who needs capital can go to
the bank, and borrow. The banker, devoting him-
self to this occupation of loaning, becomes expert
in the negotiations, keeps himself informed as to
the character and responsibility of borrowers, and
understands all the legal forms essential for a valid
contract.
The terms loan and discount indicate two dif-
ferent modes of lending, adopted b}' different classes
of banks. Savings banks receive on deposit the
small savings of great numbers of people, make
loans for long time secured b}^ real estate or other
THE OFFICES OF BAXKS. 181
ample securities, and collect the interest semi-annu-
alty as it accrues. Commercial banks gather funds
of the wealthy as their capital, and the temporar}^
I deposits of men in active business, and make their
loans for short time, sixty or ninety daj's, on per-
sonal security, taking interest in advance as a dis-
count or deduction from the principal sum borrowed.
4. A fourth office performed by many banks is
to issue promissory notes for general circulation as
a substitute for specie. This creates one kind of
paper-money, which will be treated of in a subse-
quent section. A few words here will suffice to
indicate the manner in which such notes are thrown
into circulation. A portion of specie is set apart
as the basis of the issue. Thus the bank loans not
the specie which it holds, but its own notes paj-able
in specie, receiving in return the notes of individ^
uals guaranteed by indorsers for the amount loaned,
to be paid at a future day. Really, the bank loans
its own credit. The notes thrown out are mere
symbols of value, not representatives of it as specie
is. If the amount issued is just equal to the amount
of specie in the vaults, the holders of the notes
have a double securit}" ; viz., the specie in the bank,
and the obligations of those to whom the notes
were loaned. The security might be considerably
reduced with safet}', by issuing notes somewhat in
excess of the specie in reserve, since they could
never be all presented at once. But, without well-
devised checks, this course leads to danger. This
office is not necessarily associated with the others
named.
182 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
In the fulfilment of these offices, banks, as public
corporations of known character, offer inducements
for the introduction of foreign capital. This inci-
dental benefit is of great importance to the advance
of a new country.
Through these offices, banks render important
services to the finances of sovereigns and states,
steadjdng and strengthening the bands of govern-
ment, and furnishing timely aid in the emergencies
of war and of great national enterprises.
SECTION XL — THE UNITED-STATES NATIONAL-
BANK SYSTEM.
The limits of this work do not give place for a
history of banking, or an}^ notice of foreign banks.
The present bank-system of our own countr}^ must,
however, be briefly presented.
This sj'stem was established b}^ Act of Congress
in 1863. It is under the charge of a bureau of the
Treasury Department, the chief officer of which is
the comptroller of the currency.
Under this act a national bank may be organized
b}' any number of persons not less than five, the
capital in any instance to be not less than $100,000,
except that in cities containing a population not
exceeding six thousand, banks ma}^ be established
with a capital of not less than $50,000; in cities
having a population of fifty thousand or more, the
capital of each bank must be not less than $200,000.
Not less than one-third of the capital must be
invested in United-States bonds, upon the security
UNITED-STATES NATIONAL-BANK SYSTEM. 183
of which circulating notes may be issued equal in
amount to ninety per cent of their current market-
value, but not to exceed ninety per cent of the par
value of the bonds deposited. The notes, officially
certified by the Treasurer of the United States and
the Register of the Treasury, are receivable at par
in the United States in all payments to and from
the government, except for duties on imports, inter-
est on the public debt, and in redemption of the
treasury-notes. They are redeemable on demand
in lawful money of the United States.
A subsequent act of Congress laid a tax of ten
per cent on the circulating notes of previousl}' exist-
ing State banks, in consequence of which most of
those banks re-organized under the national system.
Thus our present bank- currency consists of notes
of national banks, which are of uniform value in
all parts of the country, the payment of which is
guaranteed by the government. Provision is made
for frequent visitation of the banks by government
officials, to investigate their operations ; stated re-
ports are called for ; and the comptroller of the cur-
rency may appoint a receiver to wind up any bank
which is in an unsound condition.
The national banks may receive deposits, sell
bills of exchange, and loan mone}^ at the rates of
interest allowed by law in the States where they are
located. For the circulating notes this system pro-
vides all the securit}^ which the credit of the United
States can give. But it provides no security for
deposits and other liabilities, except that all share-
holders are held individually liable to the extent of
184 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
the amount of their stock, in addition to what they
have paid for their stock. The law now fixes no
Umits to the number of banks that may be organ-
ized, or to the total amount of notes that may be
thrown into circulation. The circulation has ranged
from three hundred to three hundred and fift}^ mil-
Hon dollars. Of the more than two thousand na-
tional banks which have been organized, very few
have failed, and the public has incurred no loss on
the currency.
From Feb. 25, 1863, to Nov. 1, 1879, there had
been organized 2,438 national banks. Of these
only 81 had been placed in the hands of receivers
to be closed, 307 had gone into voluntary liquida-
tion ; leaving 2,050 in operation at the last-named
date, with capital $455,240,000, deposits $713,400,-
000, and circulating notes outstanding $337,181,-
418.
The system will be further illustrated by a state-
ment of the liabilities, the resources, and the profits
of the banl^s.
The Liabilities are as follows : —
1. Tlie capital stock.
2. Tlie circulating notes.
3. Deposits.
4. Balances due to other banks, especially from
banks in the great cities to those in the country.
5. Surplus funds and reserves, held to strengthen
the banks against contingencies, which are a virtual
addition to the capital, and belong to stockholders.
6. Undivided profits and unpaid dividends.
UNITED STATES XATIONAL-BANK SYSTEM. 185
7. Miscellaneous liabilities, small obligations not
classified.
The Resources embrace the following items : —
• 1. Loans, which represent the chief business of
the bank.
2. United-States bonds deposited with the comp-
troller.
3. United-States bonds and other stocks and bonds
held as investments. The reserves take this form.
4. Balances due from other banks.
5. Real estate, a place for business and property
taken for debts.
6. Exchanges and cash items, — bills of exchange,
drafts, &c., on hand.
7. National-bank notes and legal-tender notes,
held to meet daily calls for currency.
8. Legal-tender notes and specie, for the redemp-
tion of circulation.
9. Miscellaneous resources, small items not classi-
fied.
In a regular bank statement the liabilities and
resources thus pi'esented balance each other, and
the items on either side show the actual condition
of the bank.
The sources of Profits of banks are, —
1. Interest, from several distinct sources.
a. Interest on United-States bonds deposited
with the comptroller.
b. Interest on circulating notes loaned.
c. Interest on the remaining capital and reserves
loaned, or held in productive stocks.
d. Interest on a portion of the deposits also
loaned.
186 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
2. Premiums on exchange.
3. Commissions for collections. Claims from
abroad are often sent to a bank, as an agent of
established character, for collection.
With prudent management the profits of banking
are sure, and compare favorabl}^ with those of any
other business. The undue expansion of loans, in
order to increase profits, involves the danger of
throwing the centre of gravity outside the base,
with a consequent downfall.
Private banking-houses exist in all parts of the
country, and fulfil all the oflflces named except the
issue of circulating notes. Some of these have
gained a character and standing which command
a world-wide confidence. Their credit rests upon
personal integrity, wise management, and large
resources accumulated through years of devoted
industry.
Savings banks, mostly without capital, simply re-
ceive and loan deposits.* The savings banks of our
country, 673 in number, thus manage funds amount-
ing to over $750,000,000, drawn from some millions
of depositors.
In May, 1879, the entire banking business of our
country was represented by 6,360 institutions, whose
aggregate capital was $656,500,000, and which had
credited on their books deposits amounting to $1,-
893,500,000.
The comptroller of the currency, in his report
dated Nov. 1, 1879, estimates the circulating me-
dium of our country as follows : —
PAPER MONEY. 187
Treasury-notes (greenbacks) outstanding . $346,681,016
ISTational-bank notes outstanding . . . 337,181,418
Gold in the treasury . . . • . 157,960,193
Silver in the treasury 50,078,620
Coin in the banks 42,173,741
Estimate of coin held by the people . . 231,478,515
Total $1,165,553,503
SECTION III.— PAPER MONEY.
Real Money is made of the precious metals, and
is capable of representing all kinds of values, be-
cause it has value in itself. But on account of its
bulk, its weight, and its costliness, some more con-
venient instrument is desirable for many operations
of exchange. The ancient commercial nations felt
this need, and took various measures to meet it.
The Carthaginians adopted a s^^mbolic money, made
of any object of the size of a coin, enclosed in a
leather envelope, and stamped with the seal of the
state. The Doge of Venice, and other sovereigns
of the middle ages, issued leather money as a prom-
ise of future paj^ment. The Chinese, as far back
as the seventh centur}' A. D., had various kinds
of paper mone}^ which they called ''fljing coins.'*
The necessity is acknowledged to-da}^, and all com-
mercial nations are using some kind of paper money.
Roscher notes well a distinction to be made be-
tween paper money and money paper. The latter
term embraces drafts, bills of exchange, certificates
of stock, bonds of cities, states, &c., and like forms
on paper, which are definite calls for mone}^, titles
of ownership, evidences of debt. These are bought
188 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
and sold, and so, in a sense, circulate ; but, like
substantial goods, they require money to circulate
them. Paper money, on the other hand, is intended
for circulation, in the place of mone3\ It must be
itself ever afloat, as a means of floating every thing
else. It is made up of promises to pay monej', but
to no definite person, in no definite place, at no
definite time ; good for the functions of money in
purchases and sales, just so far and just so long as
men believe the promise.
Several kinds of paper money ma}' be specified.
1. There is what Mr. Walker terms mercantile
currency. This signifies promises of banks to pay
certain amounts of money on demand ; the bank
holding the full amount of coined money or bullion
in reserve to fulfil the promise of ever}^ bill issued.
Such were the notes of the Bank of Amsterdam as
first issued ; such are, and have been for more than
two hundred and fifty 3- ears, the notes of the Bank
of Hamburg. Such are the gold- certificates of the
United-States Treasury. These involve only truth-
fulness and integrity on the part of the bankers or
oflficers of the government to insure entire credit.
Such notes combine the convenience of paper with
the security of specie. Its basis is solid and im-
movable. It is paper money resting on real money.
2. There is our national-bank currency, which
consists of bank-notes secured by a reserve of gov-
ernment-bonds instead of specie ; the government
holding the securities, guaranteeing the fulfilment
of the promises, and requiring the banks to hold
specie in readiness, sufficient to make payments
PAPER MONEY. 189
when called for. Here the strength of the security
is measured by the credit of the nation. It is
paper mone}' resting on money paper.
3. Mixed currency. This is composed of written
promises to pay specie on demand, issued by banks
in excess of the actvial amount of specie held for
their redemption. It is called mixed because its
basis is partly coined mone}^, and partly credit in
the notes of their customers discounted by the
banks. The notes of the Bank of England and of
the Bank of France are of this character ; and such
were the notes of the old State banks and of the
United-States Bank in our country. The strength
of the securit}' in this case depends on the propor-
tion of specie to credit. When so-called "wild-
cat" banks were started, with no capital except the
notes of stockholders, and no specie, there was
notliing but credit to sustain the circulation, and
banks and circulation soon collapsed together.
4. Credit currency. This consists of engraved
notes, bearing promises of a government to pay
specified sums of money. The Continental money
of Revolutionary times, and the present United-
States treasury-notes, are examples of this kind of
paper-money. On the face of the greenback we
read, "The United States will pay the bearer ten
dollars." On its back we read, "This note is a legal
tender at its par value for all debts, public and
private, except duties on imports, and interest on
the public debt." This engraved slip of paper is,
then, only an evidence of debt. The legal tender
clause on its back forces men to take it in payment
190 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of goods. But as it passes from hand to hand it
simply transfers debts : it cannot pay them. You
owe your butcher ten dollars, and give him a green-
back in payment, l^'ou are released thereb}^, but
the government is now the debtor in your place. It
is not itself, as a gold eagle would be, a quid pro
quo for the butcher's meat : yet it will serve as a
medium of exchange, while men have faith in the
government. But let the suspicion arise that the
government can not or will not fulfil its promise, and
the purchasing power of these paper slips at once
declines, and quickl}^ comes to nought, as did the
Continental money and the paper money of the Con-
federate States.
5. Paper money secured by real estate. Such
were the assignats of France. In the Revolution
of 1789, large estates of the Church, and of wealthy
nobles who had fled from the countrj^ were confis-
cated, and made the basis of paper money, made up
of promises of the government for a certain number
of francs, each note being at the same time a cer-
tificate of title to a certain amount of land of the
same value. But the troublous times caused the
value of lands to depreciate ; and, when the amount
of assignats issued rose to more than forty-five
billion francs, the promise and the assigned land-
title became worthless.
From this view of what paper money is, the fol-
lowing statements are evidently true. They are
also confirmed by actual experience.
1. It is a very convenient instrument of exchange.
PAPER MONEY, 191
2. As respects its material it is economical; so
far as it can safely be used in place of real money,
it sets free, for other uses, the more costly gold and
silver.
3. It has in it always the element of credit. Even
a gold- certificate is nothing to me except as I cred-
it the statement that the treasurer holds the gold
read}'^ to pay it. The managers of the Bank of
Amsterdam betrayed their trust ; and, as soon as
the fact was known that the gold was gone from its
vaults, its notes were good for nothing.
4. While paper money ma}' be a convenient me-
dium of exchange, it can never serve as a standard
of value. Its promise must be expressed in terms
of real mone}^, dollars ; and a dollar means a speci-
fied number of grains of silver, a defined, substan-
tial value. The paper note must carry with it the
vision and the hope of a silver dollar, at some time
to be realized, or it can have no purchasing power.
If our government should say, by word or act, that
the actual redemption of its greenback promise is
not to be expected, its treasury- notes would drop
to the ground like autumn leaves, utterly worthless.
5. Paper money can ordinarily circulate only in
the country where it is issued.
6. Paper money is itself liable to fluctuate in
value. It will be always compared with gold ; and
if, by increased issues, it is out of proportion to the
standard, gold will be at a premium, which means
always that paper is depreciated.
7. By the expansion and contraction of its issues,
paper money tends to keep the prices of aU com-
modities fluctuating.
192 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
8. Governments, whether republican or monar-
chical, when once they have begun to issue paper
money, are under strong temptation to go on increas-
ing its volume, till its redemption is impossible. It
is said that no paper money issued by a govern-
ment on its own credit alone has ever been re-
deemed. It is to be hoped that our nation will
prove an exception to this statement, and give to
the world an example of truthfulness and honesty
worthy to be imitated.
9. A law, like our " legal- tender act,'* making the
circulation of the government's paper money compul-
sorj^^, simply forces a loan from a people. In its
exigenc}' the United States wanted guns, ships, pro-
visions, &c. It ordered them of the manufacturers,
and paid in promises, which was, in effect, borrow-
ing instead of purchasing. Then, to relieve the
manufacturers, it passed a law compelling the people
to take the promises, and so to carry the loan.
10. The expansion and contraction of paper
money disturbs all the functions of credit, and is
to a great extent the real cause of commercial
crises, panics, and hard times.
11. The instabilit}' of paper mone}" tends to re-
solve all commercial transactions, and especially
credit transactions, into games of chance, — losing
games for the many.
12. The promises of paper mone}^ unfulfilled tend
to blunt and deaden the public conscience, and to
demoralize a people.
The upshot of all is, not that paper money is to
be altogether banished, for that is impossible, but
PAPER MONEY. 193
that its issue and its use must be carefully restricted
by all the appliances of wise legislation and sound
public sentiment.
EXERCISES.
1. What inconveniences would be experienced in the
business of a town of six thousand people without a bank ?
2. How does a bank increase the capital of a com-
munity ?
3. What benefit do farmers derive from banks ?
4. If you have a doubtful coin, why do you take it to
the bank to be tested ?
5. What is the effect of a large shipment of grain from
Chicago to New York on the premium charged in Chicago
for New- York exchange ?
6. What advantage is it to the owner of capital to loan
his money through a bank ?
7. What advantage is it to the borrower to get his loans
from a bank ?
8. Which involves the larger outlay for interest, a pri-
vate loan for a year of $10,000, at eight per cent, or the
same amount taken from the bank by discount, renewed
every sixty days through the year? Calculate the differ-
ence.
9. In what respects is our national-bank system more
advantageous than the former system of State banks to the
general business of the whole country ?
10. Is it as profitable to the bankers ?
11. In the bank-statements of liabilities and resources,
which are the items, on either side, of chief consequence,
as indicating the soundness of a bank ?
12. Which are most important with reference to its
profits ?
13. What profit has a national bank from its circulating
notes ?
14. What embarrassment may they cause to the bank ?
15. If another war should compel our government to
194 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
double the amount of its bonded debt, what would be the
effect on our national banks ?
16. Explain the relation between sound and prosperous
banking, and the general prosperity of business.
17. State in detail the conveniences of paper money.
18. State in detail its evils or dangers.
19. Which kind of paper money named in the text is
safest ?
20. Which involves the greatest risks ?
21. What is the special danger of paper money issued by
governments ?
22. What caused the rapid advance in prices from 1863 to
1870?
23. How were the profits of business affected by that
inflation ?
24. Was the re-action from 1873 to 1879 avoidable ? Was
it healthful to business, though trying and painful ?
25. If no attempt had been made to resume specie pay-
ments, what must have happened to our paper money?
What to business generally ?
26. Who get the advantage of fluctuations incident to
the too free issue of paper money ? Who suffer most from
its disastrous effect ?
27. Read the story of the "Mississippi Scheme,'' and
state John Law's fallacy. Is not the same fallacy involved
in the reasoning of those who advocate the continued and
unlimited issue of American paper money ? Are not like
consequences probable ?
28. What would be the effect of prohibiting the issue of
circulating notes of less denomination than ten dollars ?
How is it in England and in France ?
INTEEJS^ATIONAL TKADE. 195
CHAPTER V.
INTERNATIONAL TRADE.
1 . The nations of men are of one blood, and con-
stitute one family.
2. All the face of the earth, with its great diver-
sity of resources and productions, is given to the one
human race.
3. The blessings which the earth has to yield are
developed in largest measure as the people of every
land devote themselves to the production of those
forms of w^ealth for w^hich their country is best
adapted.
4. The happiest distribution of those blessings is
secured by Intercommunication and mutual ex-
changes, made as free as possible between all
nations.
Accepting the first of these propositions as the
teaching of Christianity, confirmed by reason and
common sense, the other three embody the first
principles of Political Economy in their broad ap-
plication to the highest welfare of mankind. After
the lapse of centuries, the world is now fast coming
to act on the practical belief of these simple funda-
mental truths. Within the last hundred 3'ears the
discoveries of science and the activit}^ of invention
combined have astonished the world b}^ the new
196 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
facilities furnished to give extension and freedom to
the mutual intercourse and trade of nations. All
civilized people hail with joy the beneficent changes
which have come to each countr}^ and to the world
b}^ the introduction of steam to give speed and cer-
tainty to navigation, of the locomotive and rail-car
to shorten distance as measured by time, and of the
electric telegraph, which annihilates time and dis-
tance, and permits contracts and all commercial
negotiations to be adjusted to present facts in all
parts of the world. The common sense of men,
expressed by their instinctive, prompt adoption of
these inventions, pronounces universal freedom of
trade a common blessing. In accord with this prin-
ciple, the civilization of the world is advancing with
rapid strides.
Until a comparatively^ recent period there was
nothing which could properl}^ be called iiiternational
trade. We do indeed read in historj-, as far back
as its records go, of overland merchantmen, like the
caravan of Ishmaelites to whom Joseph was sold ;
of cities like T^tc and Carthage, and some of the
Greek cities, which grew rich and great b}- a sort*
of world-wide commerce ; and in the mediaeval time
of the Italian cities, Venice, Genoa, and others,
whose trade swept the seas, and brought in to indi-
vidual merchants and to the coffers of the state
wealth untold. But those merchant- caravans and
fleets of commerce were mere go-betweens for peo-
ples who stood aloof, in antagonism towards each
other. These traders went ever}' where, buying
whatever the}' could at the cheapest, and selling
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 197
what they could at the dearest, and took the chief
advantage to themselves. They grew rich out of
their contact with all, but they awakened no com-
mon interests between the different peoples they
visited. They left only the incidental benefit of
furnishing each with some things they did want, and
carrying away some things they did not want. That
trade fostered no international good-will, and gave
rise to no free international intercourse.
False doctrines then prevailed, as, that '' Nations
are natural enemies to each other ; " "In trade, one
nation can gain only what another nation has lost ; ''
"A nation's wealth is increased only. as money is
brought in and held fast;" "Better to give two
dollars which remain in the country for a com-
modity, than only one dollar which goes out of the
country." These false doctrines led to the most
harassing restrictions on all commercial intercourse.
Different trades were organized as rival guilds, each
guarding carefully its own secrets, and eager to
secure special privileges. Tolls were collected at
every city's gates on all goods brought in. Each
nation sought to build up its own industry by break-
ing down that of others. Strange and absurd laws
were enacted, defining what things the people should
and what they should not consume, and resisting or
distorting all the natural laws of trade.
Happily, other and better views have now, in
great measure, supplanted the old false doctrines,
and the absurd regulations have for the most part
disappeared from the statute-books. One theory,
however, which originated in the mediaeval ideas
198 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
of feudal isolation, still lingers with tenacious hold
on many minds, and with power to sway the policy
of states, our own free Republic especially, against
the principles of sound economy. It is that which
is known as the theory of protection, carried out in
the enactment of protective tariflfs. The limits of
this work do not admit of an extended discussion
of this theory. We cannot, however, do less than
to attempt a concise statement of the question as it
now agitates the public mind, in the light of those
first principles of our science which we have been
studying.
The Theory of Protection distinctly stated is,
that, in order to promote home industry, the im-
portation of certain articles, from countries where
they can be produced cheaper than at home, should
be prohibited or restricted by heavy duties.
In direct opposition to this, —
The Theory of Free Trade affirms that a na-
tion's wealth and prosperity are best promoted by
maintaining the utmost freedom for the exchange
of all commodities among its own people, and -with
the people of other countries.
The mere statement of the principles suggests two
conflicting economic sj^stems. In practical legisla-
tion two corresponding policies have been in conflict
through all the history of our nation. There seems
no place for compromise : truth and wisdom must lie
on one side or the other.
In the discussion of each department of our sci-
ence, freedom appears as the natural law of industry
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 199
and trade. But on the face of it the theory of pro-
tection involves an interference with freedom ; an
interference which affects all of the four depart-
ments,— production, consumption, distribution, and
exchange, though applied most directly to the last-
named. Is it not plain, then, that the presumption
is against the theory that the burden of proof is
laid over upon its advocates? What are the argu-
ments urged to sustain it ? We can notice only the
three most important and plausible. It is said, —
1 . Protection is necessary to secure that variety of
industry and that balance of different industries
■which are essential to a people's prosperity. This
is the broad proposition which underlies and in-
cludes all arguments for the system. In form the
argument is logical. It gives for a major premise
the affirmation that a varied and balanced industry
is essential to a people's prosperity. The minor
premise is that protection is a necessary means to
varied and balanced industry. If the premises are
admitted, the conclusion is sound : a protective pol-
icy must favor a people's prosperity.
The truth of the major premise cannot be ques-
tioned. On the other hand, it is worthy to be pre-
sented in full force, resolved into several particulars,
as a kind of summar}^ of economic principles.
a. Every country has a great variety of resources,
and the development of all its resources conduces to
its greatest wealth.
b. Among the population of every country there
is a corresponding diversity of native talent, and
200 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
labor is most effective when every one has scope for
doing that for which he is best fitted.
C. The actual wants of men are equally diverse,
and the highest happiness of a people depends on
the degree in which these varied wants are provided
for.
d. A diversity of occupations makes a home-mar-
ket for all sorts of products, saving cost of trans-
portation, favoring division of labor, and binding all
classes together by ties of mutual helpfulness and
common interests.
e. Varied industry favors the social and moral ad-
vancement of a people, quickening and broadening
minds, enlarging hearts, and impelling to noblest
action in the lines of rectitude and benevolence.
These statements will be readily accepted by all
candid minds. As bearing on the question under
consideration, they need but a single qualification.
It does not follow that a people must hasten by all
means to develop every source of wealth existing
among them, or maintain at all hazards every pos-
sible form of industry. The people of Barbadoes
have ample facilities for raising table-vegetables,
^ but they have greater advantages for raising sugar.
Hence it may be good policy for them to produce
mainly sugar, and get the other provisions from
other countries, where the cost of raising them is
greater, perhaps, than it would be on their own soil.
Man}^ such cases do exist, but they are exceptions
which prove the rule.
The real issue is joined on the second or minor
premise, — protection is necessary to secure diversi-
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 201
fled industry. This proposition is met by a flat
denial, and the positive affirmation that there is a
better and surer way of reaching that result. Where
no interference or obstruction is allowed, there comes
a spontaneous development which is safe and con-
stant, because it is in accordance with nature's law.
This thought may be unfolded in a few distinct, yet
connected, propositions.
a. There is a natural growth of human industry,
the laws of which are as fixed and certain as those
which pertain to the growth of a tree.
6. Free competition is the healthy stimulus to that
growth.
c. Under the natural law of development, industry
will be applied to the several native resources of a
country as fast as the increase of labor and capital
will warrant.
d. Men's instinct for accumulation, following di-
verse individual capacities, tastes, and predilections,
is the safest guide to determine the order in which
labor and capital shall be applied to those various
resources. Under it, whatever promises a profit will
be undertaken as soon as it can be without sacrifi-
cing a greater profit elsew^here.
e. The attempt to force labor and capital into
certain employments before their time deranges the
order of nature, and produces re-actions which hinder
the desired result.
/. At any stage of this development, if exchange
is free, foreign products are purchased w^ith the fruits
of a people's most effective labor, that is, with those
articles which they can then produce to the best
202 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
advantage ; which they can best afford to part with,
because they are obtained at the least cost. By all
such advantageous trade, capital, the prime element
of varied industry, is increased, and labor is sus-
tained.
g. When, by this natural progress, a people come
to take up a new industr}'^ for which they have nat-
ural advantages and God-given capacity, no foreign
competition can crush it; for, even in its infancy, it
is charged with the nation's hfe and strength.
h. An industry which is not indigenous, which
has no natural advantages, or which is prematurely
set up and fostered by artificial means, can have
only a sickly, uncertain life, and is supported at a
wasteful expenditure of a nation's resources.
The strong reason urged on the other side to prove
that protection is necessary is thus presented : —
** Foreign competition crushes out the home pro-
duction of all but the rudest and coarsest articles
of manufacture, and prevents the estabhshment of
a varied industry, unless the government interfere,
as the personification of the nation and its co-ordi-
nating power, to restore the equilibrium by discour-
aging imports."
If the question is raised, how foreign competition
is able to do this, the answer must be that the for-
eign COUntr}^ has either superior natural resources,
or more abundant capital, or laborers in greater
numbers, and better skilled for the work to be done,
or possibly all these advantages combined. If this
be so, it may be asked again, how can government
interference, discouraging imports, counterbalance
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 20S
these advantages ? It is quite evident that protec-
tion cannot add to the natural resources of a coun-
try. It can never give to France the coal-fields of
England, nor bring to the prairies of Illinois the
water-powers of New England, nor secure to Ger-
many the cotton-raising facilities of our Southern
States. Obviously a protective tariff cannot create
capital. Capital springs and grows only by industry
and frugality. It is the fruit of saving. And cer-
tainly legislation has no power to create men, or
endow them with skill. Population increases both
by births and by immigration, according to the
abundance of the necessaries of life which are fur-
nished ; and a people grow in skill as they grow in
intelligence, and bring their faculties into active
exercise.
All that protection can do is to concentrate capi-
tal and labor on one employment, and for this it
lays a special burden on all others for the benefit
of the favored occupation. The advocates of this
policy keep out of sight the fact that it can do noth-
ing more than to change the direction of capital and
labor, and that the duty is a tax laid upon the many
for the benefit of a few. When articles of foreign
production are imported, they are to be paid for by
the products of home-labor and capital; and the
question of economy is. Which is the cheapest?
Which will bring the largest returns for a certain
amount of labor, — to make these articles ourselves,
or to make something else with which to bu}' them?
Left free from government interference, home labor
and capital will lay hold of whatever natural re-
204 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
sources a country possesses, and, with reference to
both home wants and foreign wants, produce the
thino-s most feasible and desirable at the cheapest
possible rates. The surplus of these products w^ill
pay for the foreign goods. Capital will be increased
by both the productive industry and the trade ; and,
as a people grow strong in capital and in men, it is
not possible for foreign competition to restrict their
industry, or to prevent their taking up all the variety
of industry which their needs require, and the facili-
ties of their country favor. Competition, free and
fair, is ever the strongest and healthiest stimulus
of both productive industry and wide-spread active
trade.
2. It is strongly urged that protection is a neces-
sary means of maintaining national independence.
This is a specious argument, because the phrase
"national independence'' has a patriotic ring, to
which the popular ear and the popular heart are
peculiarly sensitive. But, as it stands in the propo-
sition before us, it simply covers a subtle sophistry.
For individuals and for nations there are two
kinds of independence. One may withdraw from
his fellow-men to a cave in the wilderness, and thus
keep himself alive, and possibly find interest and
enjoyment in a hermit-life. He may glory in his
independence. But is there any thing noble in such
isolation? Is it the way for a man to make the
most of himself? The independence of genuine
manhood is of another sort. It is individuality of
capacities, acquisitions, and character, which is able
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 205
to stand on its own basis in full and free relations
with fellow-men. It is, in tlie midst of society, a
distinct personality, giving and receiving, support-
ing and supported, blessing and blessed, through
the varied intercourse which nature prompts, and by
which the completest development of the man and
of the race is advanced. So of nations, there is an
independence of isolation, such as China and Japan
until recently maintained. But that independence
which is the strength and glory of a nation is of
another kind. It is an individuality of national
resources and character which stands up in the full
brotherhood of nations, and in the consciousness of
its own strength enters into all offices of mutual
dependence through which nations grow, and civili-
zation makes progress.
The policy of protection fosters the narrower kind
of independence. It is a restrictive policy. Carried
out to its logical conclusion, it leads to isolation.
The sophistry referred to consists in the conceal-
ment of this fact, w^hile the term " national inde-
pendence " is put forth in its broader, nobler sense.
In an economic i)oint of view, the real independ-
ence of a nation is commercial independence. That
means, not that it does not need or will not have the
productions of other nations, but that it is able to
command them. The basis of such independence
is the home-production of wealth. The way to
increase wealth is to use to the best possible advan-
tage the gifts of nature, and then, in the world's
great mart, sell where things can be sold on the
best terms, and buy where things can be bought on
206 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
the best terms. The nation is strongest and most
complete in her independence, which can open most
freel}^ every avenue for the wealth of the world to
flow in upon her, because, as the fruit of her own
vital energies, freely exerted, she has wealth in
abundance to give a fair equivalent.
A nation comes to this full maturity b}^ a steady
natural growth, just as a child comes to full man-
hood. In both cases freedom is the law of growth.
Fair competition helps a nation's growth both in
general wealth and in particular industries, just as
the wrestling of a boy with one older and stronger
than himself helps to develop in him particular
muscles, and the pluck and vigor of a whole man-
hood. When at times worsted and thrown, the
boy may rise and say, ''You beat me now, but I
don*t give up the contest. Let me get my growth,
and I'll show you what I can do." The effort by
protection to hasten a nation's independence is like
binding an infant's limbs in splints, that he may
sooner stand alone. The artificial appliance may
develop prematurely a single function, but it is at a
wasteful expense of general vigor, and is quite sure
to induce chronic weakness and deformity.
3. The advantages of a home market for agri-
cultural products are often urged in favor of the
protective system. It is certainly an advantage to
a farmer to find, in a manufacturing village near, a
market for his produce. But, if this market is made
and sustained for him by a protective tariff, he must
pay for tools, for salt, for dry-goods, for many of
INTEKNATIONAL TRADE. 207
the manufactured articles he needs, from twenty to
fifty per cent more than they would cost under the
rule of free trade. This adds to the cost of pro-
ducing his crops, and offsets what he may save in
the expense of transportation to the distant com-
mercial city.
But here, as in the first case, we take issue directly
on the main point. The assumption that protection
creates the home-market is a fallacy. These centres
of varied industry grow up naturally and healthily
with the increase of population and wealth. Me-
chanical genius, the investigating turn of mind, the
energy of will-power, managing capacity, — these
qualities come not of protective tariffs. They are
the gifts of God to men. Left to themselves, and
stimulated by competition, they spontaneously lay
hold on all gifts of God in nature, and, using all
available capital, set up the workshops of industrj',
wherever best opportunities are presented.
Furthermore, the term " home market," in this
discussion, has force only as it implies the produc-
tion at home of all manufactures wanted, and the
consumption at home of all agricultural produce
raised, — a condition of things attainable, if at all,
only after the lapse of centuries. Meantime a
people must buy the things they cannot produce,
by selling the surplus of that which they can pro-
duce. For a long time to come this countr}^ will
have a large surplus of breadstuffs, cotton, petro-
leum, silver and gold, to dispose of. We can sell to
others onl}^ as we give others a fair chance to sell
to us. Domestic commerce and foreign commerce
208 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
are necessarily^ interlocked. The prices of agricul-
tural products in our home markets are determined
by the prices in markets abroad. Where trade is
freest, the prices will, on the average, be the best.
Hence free trade is the essential condition of a
sound and healthy home market. Of all classes,
those devoted to agriculture bear the heaviest share
of the burden laid by the protective tariff, while
they reap no direct benefit from it.
There are positive objections to the system of
protection, which may be conciselj' stated as fol-
lows : —
1. Protection introduces and fosters antagonism
between the different industries of a country. The
idea of giving protection to every branch of indus-
try is absurd. The theory implies special encour-
agement to certain manufactures b}^ taxing all other
interests in their behalf. The duty which protects the
woollen-manufacture increases the cost of the wool-
grower's clothing, while the competition of cheap
wools from abroad keeps down the price of his
product. A tariff on the foreign wools will enhance
the cost of material to the manufacturer. So two
parties whose interests are really one are set against
each other.
2. The unnatural stimulus given by protective
legislation leads to over-production, and consequent
stagnation and failure. The first effect of a high
dut}^ is to raise prices, and increase the profits of
the protected industry. This causes a rush into that
branch of production, till it is quickly overdone, and
a disastrous re-action comes.
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 209
8. Prot^tion diminishes the legitimate revenues
of the state, at the same time that it lays a heavy
tax on the people. Just so far as the tariff is pro-
tective in its operation, it reduces the imposts from
which the government gets its income ; yet, just so
far as prices of the protected article in the market
are enhanced by the tariff, all consumers pay a
special tax for the benefit of the favored producer.
4. In its application, the policy of protection must
be unstable, disturbing the course of industry by
frequent changes. This follows inevitably from the
conflict of interests just referred to. When the
duty on iron is high, all who use iron as the mate-
rial of their industry clamor against it. So new
candidates for the special favor press their suit for
a change of the tariff in their interest. With every
session of Congress movements are made for some
change of the tariff. A protective tariff can never
be made fair and equal to all ; for its fundamental
principle is an unjust favoritism, against which those
not favored instinctively protest and contend.
5. Protection tends to demoralize our national
legislation. The lobby of the Capitol is thronged
with representatives of certain manufactures, seek-
ing to obtain or to perpetuate special protection.
Money is freely used, and bargains are made to
combine the friends of separate measures, when
votes are given. Proposed acts come thus to be
judged of not by their real merits, but by their
relation to personal interests.
6. Protection tends to corrupt the public morals
and the public service. It offers strong temptations
210 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
to the violation of law by smuggling. The resist-
ance of men's' consciences to this temptation is
slight, because the tariff-law rests on no ground of
absolute right. The nice sense of honor and right
is deadened ; and the making of false invoices, the
swearing of false oaths, and direct bribery at the
custom-house, are regarded as venial sins. Officials
of the government come into, collusion and partner-
ship with these crimes, and betray the sacred public
trusts with which they are charged.
Until within the last half-century, the protective
policy has ruled the industry and trade of the world,
with only here and there an exception, like Holland
in her best days. Free trade has had scarcely a
chance to try its experiment. Its principles are,
however, illustrated and sustained in the hundred
years' history of our nation's independent life. The
States of our republic, in their extent of territory,
their diversity of resources, the varied races and
endowments of their people, and their distinctive
interests, constitute a world by themselves. For-
tunately our Constitution forever forbids the pro-
tective policy to restrict their trade with each other.
Here is a broad arena for the experiment of free
trade. For nearly forty years the writer has watched
the course of that experiment in the unfolding
growth of a young Western State. Her chief in-
dustry was at the first, and must long continue to
be, agriculture. But as population poured into the
prairies and groves, and agriculture yielded a sur-
plus of home capital, and a basis of credit was laid
IKTERNATIONAL TRADE. 211
for the introduction of Eastern capital, every kind
of industry suited to her climate and conditions has
been successfully established. Her mines have been
worked, her water-powers have been utilized, villages
and cities have sprung up suddenly, and the diverse
genius and taste of her sons have found ample scope
and stimulus for profitable exercise. According to
the theory of protection, the competition of New-
England manufactures, brought in freely by the
best facilities for cheap and rapid transportation,
should have " crushed out the home production of
all but the rudest and coarsest articles of manufac-
ture." But the facts are all against the theory.
Woollen-factories, cotton-factories, shoe-factories,
iron- works, machine-shops, paper-mills, establish-
ments for making agricultural implements, all have
been set up and carried on with a success that
promises to be abiding and expanding. This result
of a brief but fair experiment of the principle of
free trade confirms every phase- of that doctrine,
and shows that what is philosophically sound and
true is also practically safe and wise.
The Golden Rule of Christ is full of wisdom and
righteousness in its application to the intercourse of
nations. We cherish the fond hope that the day
is not distant when the nations will conform their
policies to the rule, and " do each to others as they
would have others do to them." Then the theory
of protection, with its false ideas of antagonism and
selfish isolation, will have no place ; but, instead,
the brotherhood of nations as well as of individual
212 POLITICAL ECONOMY.
men will be recognized, and the broad philanthropy
which Christianity inculcates, and aims to make uni-
versal, will have free scope to work out the world's
emancipation from all wrong and evil. In such a
state the first principles of sound Political Economy
will find their consummate application.
EXERCISES.
1. Illustrate the effects of steam applied to navigation
on the commerce of the world.
2. What benefits have accrued therefrom ?
3. What effect had the opening of the Erie Canal on the
condition of the early settlers of Western New York, as
respects the wheat they raised ? as respects the goods they
needed ?
4. Did that improvement help, or hinder, the increase
of their wealth ? Did it hasten, or delay, the introduction of
manufactures in the region ?
5. If it is expedient to restrict the importation of goods
from abroad, why should so much expense be laid out in
removing obstructions to free communication ?
6. How is the department of production affected by the
policy of protection ?
7. How does it affect consumption ?
8. How does it affect distribution ?
9. How does it affect exchange ?
10. Explain the difference between a revenue tariff and
a protective tariff.
11. Show how a tariff of forty per cent on iron will tax
the farmers.
12. Will such a tariff yield much revenue to the govern-
ment ? Who gets the benefit of the tax ?
13. How and when is it expected that the farmers will
get an indirect benefit from the tariff ?
14. If a farmer can buy a suit made in England for ten
bushels of wheat, is there any justice in compelling him to
pay fifteen bushels for a suit of American manufacture ?
INTERNATIONAL TRADE. 213
15. If the tariff excludes a great part of English manu-
factures, can we expect the English to buy freely our corn
and pork ? If we expect to sell to a foreign country, must
we not also buy of them ?
16. If capital is accumulated by agricultural industry, and
labor grows abundant, is any artificial means needed to turn
it to the setting-up of manufactures ?
17. While capital and labor applied to farming are yield-
ing satisfactory returns, is it expedient to turn them to
some other employment not so profitable ?
18. Is Robinson Crusoe's independence a thing to be
desired ?
19. Does Chinese isolation, as it was, meet your ideal of
national prosperity ?
20. Explain how a high tariff tends to over-production in
the industries protected.
21. Why might not a tariff be adjusted to favor all
branches of industry alike ?
22. Can you tell any thing about corruption in the custom-
house in New York ?
23. How would a low rate of duties, uniform on all im-
ported goods, relieve that corruption ?
24. Has any protective tariff in our country been allowed
to continue long without changes ?
25. Can you tell how the iron interest in our country has
been affected by such frequent changes of the tariff ?,
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