The Liberal journals in America assert that the Democratic party
in the West intend to make repudiation the " first plank in their platform." In less exaggerated language, they intend to propose that every portion of the American debt should be paid off as it falls due in inconvertible paper bearing no interest, but payable to Government in purchase of wild lauds. This would be equivalent to the confiscation of about two-thirds of the debt. As the Union is governed by freeholders, and there is scarcely a free- holder who does not own a few bonds, this little project is not likely to be accepted even by the Democrats, but there is no doubt that at the next election after this one—in 1872 that is-- the one issue will be finance. The taxes are weighing heavily on the West, which begins to perceive that protection is a device to enable Eastern producers to pillage Western consumers. When their eyes are quite open, American protection ends.
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