The Ricket Bank Suspensions.
--The Government of Great Britain, in one of its most trying emergencies, authorized the suspension of the Bank of England, which, by its extraordinary and unexampled credit, though in a state of suspension, enabled that Government to carry on its operations through a most expensive war; and the combined capital and credit of all the banks in the Confederate States is about equal to the Bank of England, and will enable our young Confederacy to carry on the war without sending its bonds abroad, begging foreign capitalists to take them, or hawking its Treasury notes in small quantities over the country for sale, as the Lincoln Government is now compelled to do, to sustain itself.A general suspension of specie payment is at all times to be regretted, and we who remember the days of 1837 and its inconveniences, hoped never to witness another; but that was brought about by causes and circumstances totally dissimilar from the present, and as different will be its results and effects. That was a commercial crisis, produced by over-trading and a wild speculating mania — not confined to any particular section, but embracing every quarter of the globe; when immense sums were invested in wild lands and projected railroads, which, though they might ultimately have proved valuable, were, in their uncultivated and unfinished condition, unproductive and useless, and did not realize the interest on the debts contracted for their purchase, and of course had to be sacrificed to pay the principal; thus involving the ruin of the whole country — locking up all the capital, and prostrating every vestige of credit, public and private. The present crisis is of a different character — political, not monetary — and though necessarily affecting the commercial and monied interests of the country, as all wars do, it came upon the South in a time of comparative pecuniary prosperity — having a large capital within the Confederacy, and all our banks with first-rate credit. We have another advantage, possessed by no other country at war, in having within our boundaries everything we actually need; and, in consequence of the blockade, having no trade with other countries, our credit will not be depreciated by asking other countries to credit us, or take the issues of our Confederacy or our banks. Credit is capital, and as we have abundance of it, it is only necessary to make the best possible use of it among ourselves — not abusing it — by extending a generous confidence to our Governments, Confederate and State, as well as to all our institutions, and to individuals entitled to it; and all will work harmoniously and well, till we have freed ourselves from a domination never again to be exercised over us for all time to come.
