Yankee Resources.
--In a late number of the London Times is a comment upon a circular put forth by a New York merchant, wherein it is stated that the Yankees will be able to raise £40,000,000 sterling per annum, by means of taxation, to carry on their Government.--The Times concedes that the Yankees are a great and rich people — fully equal to the task of raising the sum in question, provided only the taxes indicated be laid and paid. It says however, that the objects of taxation enumerated by the circular embrace everything taxed in England, heretofore the most heavily burthened country in the world. It will be a strange sight, it intimates, for the world when the United States, which heretofore have boasted of their low taxes, and cheap Government, shall be found, after an existence of only eighty years, establishing a system as complicated and as all embracing as that of England itself, after an existence of eight centuries. Still it will not deny that the taxes may meet the wants of Government, provided only the people will consent to pay them.--There, it thinks, will be the rub.There can be no doubt whatever upon this point. The Yankee nation never will consent to bear any such burthen. It will repudiate every debt, and overthrow any Government before it will thus be trammeled. It is enough to know this fact, and the keen-sighted writers of the Times know it well enough. Nor do they shone know it. The merchants and bankers of Great Britain, and the capitalists of all Europe know it. Not one dollar can they be induced to touch in the shape of a Yankee
loan. The Yankee know that this financier who wrote the circular know it. He therefore throws an anchor ahead. He tells the English moneyed public that the Yankee Government expects and prefers to get its loan taken by its own people, and the Times admits that it has been thus far successful, alluding to the late operation of the New York, Boston and Philadelphia banks.
The Times, in admitting the wealth of the Yankee nation, and its ability to pay provided it be willing, admits too much. It could not raise £40,000,000 sterling ($200,000,000) per annum, if everything in all Yankee land were taxed as highly as the most highly taxed articles in the English schedule. If the Yankee nation had the ability to pay, it would not, and if it had the will, it could not. A contemporary justly remarks that they are the poorest race upon the face of the earth.--What have they to tax? Brick and mortar? The value of that depends upon the condition of business, and the increase of population. What have the Yankees within themselves to give rise to a large business, and to sustain it? The Southern trade has heretofore been their entire dependence. They have built their cities upon it. It has covered the sea with their vessels. It has dotted over their land with manufactories. Take it away from them, as it will be taken away, and their houses go to decay for want of tenants, their ships not at the wharves for want of cargoes, and their manufactories lie idle for want of a market.--Their whole property — everything that they have of a taxable nature — railroad stocks bank stocks, real estate, everything tumbles in an instant. Their banks lately made an exhibit of specie to the amount of nearly forty millions, while their liabilities seemed very fair; but the greater part of this specie was on deposit, and, within a few months, one-fourth of it has been removed by the depositors. For this fact we are indebted to the Whig. It there be no mistake, the banks of New York are unmistakably and undeniably bankrupt already.
There can be no doubt that the London Times knew this state of things perfectly well. It did not, however, feel called upon to state the inability of the Yankees to raise the money. It answered its purpose fully to show that the Yankee nation would not submit to the required taxation.
