Ostensibly exploring the practice of law before the internet. Heck, before good highways for that matter.
Saturday, January 25, 2025
Monday, January 25, 1875. The Pinkertons raid the James home.
Tuesday, January 14, 2025
Thursday, January 15, 1875. Restoring the gold standard.
The Specie Payment Resumption Act of January 14, 1875 restored the gold standard through the redemption of previously unbacked United States Notes.
It also attacked inflationary policies that arose during the Civil War.
President Grant address Congress regarding it, stating:
To the Senate of the United States:
Senate bill No. 1044, "to provide for the resumption of specie payments," is before me, and this day receives my signature of approval.
I venture upon this unusual method of conveying the notice of approval to the "House in which the measure originated" because of its great importance to the country at large and in order to suggest further legislation which seems to me essential to make this law effective.
It is a subject of congratulation that a measure has become law which fixes a date when specie resumption shall commence and implies an obligation on the part of Congress, if in its power, to give such legislation as may prove necessary to redeem this promise.
To this end I respectfully call your attention to a few suggestions:
First. The necessity of an increased revenue to carry out the obligation of adding to the sinking fund annually 1 per cent of the public debt, amounting now to about $34,000,000 per annum, and to carry out the promises of this measure to redeem, under certain contingencies, eighty millions of the present legal-tenders, and, without contingency, the fractional currency now in circulation.
How to increase the surplus revenue is for Congress to devise, but I will venture to suggest that the duty on tea and coffee might be restored without permanently enhancing the cost to the consumers, and that the 10 per cent horizontal reduction of the tariff on articles specified in the law of June 6, 1872, be repealed. The supply of tea and coffee already on hand in the United States would in all probability be advanced in price by adopting this measure. But it is known that the adoption of free entry to those articles of necessity did not cheapen them, but merely added to the profits of the countries producing them, or of the middlemen in those countries, who have the exclusive trade in them.
Second. The first section of the bill now under consideration provides that the fractional currency shall be redeemed in silver coin as rapidly as practicable. There is no provision preventing the fluctuation in the value of the paper currency. With gold at a premium of anything over 10 per cent above the currency in use, it is probable, almost certain, that silver would be bought up for exportation as fast as it was put out, or until change would become so scarce as to make the premium on it equal to the premium on gold, or sufficiently high to make it no longer profitable to buy for export, thereby causing a direct loss to the community at large and great embarrassment to trade.
As the present law commands final resumption on the 1st day of January, 1879, and as the gold receipts by the Treasury are larger than the gold payments and the currency receipts are smaller than the currency payments, thereby making monthly sales of gold necessary to meet current currency expenses, it occurs to me that these difficulties might be remedied by authorizing the Secretary of the Treasury to redeem legal-tender notes, whenever presented in sums of not less than $100 and multiples thereof, at a premium for gold of 10 per cent, less interest at the rate of 2 1/2 per cent per annum from the 1st day of January, 1875, to the date of putting this law into operation, and diminishing this premium at the same rate until final resumption, changing the rate of premium demanded from time to time as the interest amounts to one-quarter of 1 per cent. I suggest this rate of interest because it would bring currency at par with gold at the date fixed by law for final resumption. I suggest 10 per cent as the demand premium at the beginning because I believe this rate would insure the retention of silver in the country for change.
The provisions of the third section of the act will prevent combinations being made to exhaust the Treasury of coin.
With such a law it is presumable that no gold would be called for not required for legitimate business purposes. When large amounts of coin should be drawn from the Treasury, correspondingly large amounts of currency would be withdrawn from circulation, thus causing a sufficient stringency in currency to stop the outward flow of coin.
The advantages of a currency of a fixed known value would also be reached. In my opinion, by the enactment of such a law business and industries would revive and the beginning of prosperity on a firm basis would be reached.
Other means of increasing revenue than those suggested should probably be devised, and also other legislation.
In fact, to carry out the first section of the act another mint becomes a necessity. With the present facilities for coinage, it would take a period probably beyond that fixed by law for final specie resumption to coin the silver necessary to transact the business of the country.
There are now smelting furnaces, for extracting the silver and gold from the ores brought from the mountain territories, in Chicago, St. Louis, and Omaha--three in the former city--and as much of the change required will be wanted in the Mississippi Valley States, and as the metals to be coined come from west of those States, and, as I understand, the charges for transportation of bullion from either of the cities named to the mint in Philadelphia or to New York City amount to $4 for each $1,000 worth, with an equal expense for transportation back, it would seem a fair argument in favor of adopting one or more of those cities as the place or places for the establishment of new coining facilities.
I have ventured upon this subject with great diffidence, because it is so unusual to approve a measure--as I most heartily do this, even if no further legislation is attainable at this time--and to announce the fact by message. But I do so because I feel that it is a subject of such vital importance to the whole country that it should receive the attention of and be discussed by Congress and the people through the press, and in every way, to the end that the best and most satisfactory course may be reached of executing what I deem most beneficial legislation on a most vital question to the interests and prosperity of the nation.
Physician and Lutheran minister Albert Schweitzer, in Kaysersberg in Alsace
Last edition:
Saturday, January 9, 1875. Officers' Quarters Fire at D. A. Russell.
Sunday, August 25, 2024
Tuesday, August 25, 1874. The Coushatta Massacre.
Friday, July 5, 2024
Sunday, July 5, 1874. The Battle of Liberty Place.
The Democratic-Conservative White League, a terrorist organization made up of Confederate veterans, attacked the racially integrated Republican Metropolitan Police and the state militia in New Orleans. The police were defeated and the White League held the city for three days before Federal troops intervened.
Saturday, July 4, 1874. The Bates Battle.
Friday, June 23, 2023
Christian Nationalism, National Conservatism and Southern Populism. Eh?
TexasLouisiana whewThat's where we come fromTexasYeah LouisianaAlways on the runWell I'm just starting outI ain't never doneHey there neighborGet on in this houseLike sugarcane and cactusWe're both from the southTexasLouisianaThat's where we come fromTexasYeah LouisianaWe're both old and youngI'm the farmers daughterI'm a poor man's sonLove Stevie rayLittle Walter tooTurn it up BuddyI wanna jam with youTexasLouisiana tooThat's where we come fromTexasWhew Louisiana tooTogether having funTeacher used to tell meTwo heads is better than one
Blog Mirror: Christian nationalism and how it’s hurting Wyoming
1. National Independence. We wish to see a world of independent nations. Each nation capable of self-government should chart its own course in accordance with its own particular constitutional, linguistic, and religious inheritance. Each has a right to maintain its own borders and conduct policies that will benefit its own people. We endorse a policy of rearmament by independent self-governing nations and of defensive alliances whose purpose is to deter imperialist aggression.
2. Rejection of Imperialism and Globalism. We support a system of free cooperation and competition among nation-states, working together through trade treaties, defensive alliances, and other common projects that respect the independence of their members. But we oppose transferring the authority of elected governments to transnational or supranational bodies—a trend that pretends to high moral legitimacy even as it weakens representative government, sows public alienation and distrust, and strengthens the influence of autocratic regimes. Accordingly, we reject imperialism in its various contemporary forms: We condemn the imperialism of China, Russia, and other authoritarian powers. But we also oppose the liberal imperialism of the last generation, which sought to gain power, influence, and wealth by dominating other nations and trying to remake them in its own image.
3. National Government. The independent nation-state is instituted to establish a more perfect union among the diverse communities, parties, and regions of a given nation, to provide for their common defense and justice among them, and to secure the general welfare and the blessings of liberty for this time and for future generations. We believe in a strong but limited state, subject to constitutional restraints and a division of powers. We recommend a drastic reduction in the scope of the administrative state and the policy-making judiciary that displace legislatures representing the full range of a nation’s interests and values. We recommend the federalist principle, which prescribes a delegation of power to the respective states or subdivisions of the nation so as to allow greater variation, experimentation, and freedom. However, in those states or subdivisions in which law and justice have been manifestly corrupted, or in which lawlessness, immorality, and dissolution reign, national government must intervene energetically to restore order.4. God and Public Religion. No nation can long endure without humility and gratitude before God and fear of his judgment that are found in authentic religious tradition. For millennia, the Bible has been our surest guide, nourishing a fitting orientation toward God, to the political traditions of the nation, to public morals, to the defense of the weak, and to the recognition of things rightly regarded as sacred. The Bible should be read as the first among the sources of a shared Western civilization in schools and universities, and as the rightful inheritance of believers and non-believers alike. Where a Christian majority exists, public life should be rooted in Christianity and its moral vision, which should be honored by the state and other institutions both public and private. At the same time, Jews and other religious minorities are to be protected in the observance of their own traditions, in the free governance of their communal institutions, and in all matters pertaining to the rearing and education of their children. Adult individuals should be protected from religious or ideological coercion in their private lives and in their homes.
5. The Rule of Law. We believe in the rule of law. By this we mean that citizens and foreigners alike, and both the government and the people, must accept and abide by the laws of the nation. In America, this means accepting and living in accordance with the Constitution of 1787, the amendments to it, duly enacted statutory law, and the great common law inheritance. All agree that the repair and improvement of national legal traditions and institutions is at times necessary. But necessary change must take place through the law. This is how we preserve our national traditions and our nation itself. Rioting, looting, and other unacceptable public disorder should be swiftly put to an end.
6. Free Enterprise. We believe that an economy based on private property and free enterprise is best suited to promoting the prosperity of the nation and accords with traditions of individual liberty that are central to the Anglo-American political tradition. We reject the socialist principle, which supposes that the economic activity of the nation can be conducted in accordance with a rational plan dictated by the state. But the free market cannot be absolute. Economic policy must serve the general welfare of the nation. Today, globalized markets allow hostile foreign powers to despoil America and other countries of their manufacturing capacity, weakening them economically and dividing them internally. At the same time, trans-national corporations showing little loyalty to any nation damage public life by censoring political speech, flooding the country with dangerous and addictive substances and pornography, and promoting obsessive, destructive personal habits. A prudent national economic policy should promote free enterprise, but it must also mitigate threats to the national interest, aggressively pursue economic independence from hostile powers, nurture industries crucial for national defense, and restore and upgrade manufacturing capabilities critical to the public welfare. Crony capitalism, the selective promotion of corporate profit-taking by organs of state power, should be energetically exposed and opposed.
7. Public Research. At a time when China is rapidly overtaking America and the Western nations in fields crucial for security and defense, a Cold War-type program modeled on DARPA, the “moon-shot,” and SDI is needed to focus large-scale public resources on scientific and technological research with military applications, on restoring and upgrading national manufacturing capacity, and on education in the physical sciences and engineering. On the other hand, we recognize that most universities are at this point partisan and globalist in orientation and vehemently opposed to nationalist and conservative ideas. Such institutions do not deserve taxpayer support unless they rededicate themselves to the national interest. Education policy should serve manifest national needs.
8. Family and Children. We believe the traditional family is the source of society’s virtues and deserves greater support from public policy. The traditional family, built around a lifelong bond between a man and a woman, and on a lifelong bond between parents and children, is the foundation of all other achievements of our civilization. The disintegration of the family, including a marked decline in marriage and childbirth, gravely threatens the wellbeing and sustainability of democratic nations. Among the causes are an unconstrained individualism that regards children as a burden, while encouraging ever more radical forms of sexual license and experimentation as an alternative to the responsibilities of family and congregational life. Economic and cultural conditions that foster stable family and congregational life and child-raising are priorities of the highest order.
9. Immigration. Immigration has made immense contributions to the strength and prosperity of Western nations. But today’s penchant for uncontrolled and unassimilated immigration has become a source of weakness and instability, not strength and dynamism, threatening internal dissension and ultimately dissolution of the political community. We note that Western nations have benefited from both liberal and restrictive immigration policies at various times. We call for much more restrictive policies until these countries summon the wit to establish more balanced, productive, and assimilationist policies. Restrictive policies may sometimes include a moratorium on immigration.
10. Race. We believe that all men are created in the image of God and that public policy should reflect that fact. No person’s worth or loyalties can be judged by the shape of his features, the color of his skin, or the results of a lab test. The history of racialist ideology and oppression and its ongoing consequences require us to emphasize this truth. We condemn the use of state and private institutions to discriminate and divide us against one another on the basis of race. The cultural sympathies encouraged by a decent nationalism offer a sound basis for conciliation and unity among diverse communities. The nationalism we espouse respects, and indeed combines, the unique needs of particular minority communities and the common good of the nation as a whole.
City Park Church, formerly First Presbyterian Church, Casper Wyoming
This is City Park Church, and was formerly, as noted below in the original entry, the First Presbyterian Church.This Presbyterian Church is located one block away from St. Mark's Episcopal Church and St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church, all of which are separated from each other by City Park.The corner stone of the church gives the dates 1913 1926. I'm not sure why there are two dates, but the church must have been completed in 1926.This century old church became the home of the former First Baptist Church congregation on February 28, 2020, and as noted in a thread we'll link in below, had been experiencing a lot of changes prior to that.The original entry here was one of the very first on this blog and dated at least back as far as January 25, 2011. While the architecture hasn't changed at all, with the recent change our original entry became misleading to an extent.
As Montesquieu pointed out long ago, democracy is the most demanding regime, given its demands for civic virtue. The cultivation of virtue requires the thick presence of virtue-forming and virtue-supporting institutions, but these are precisely the institutions and practices that liberalism aims to hollow and eviscerate in the name of individual liberty.
[W]hat is bemoaned by the right is due not to the left but to the consequences of its own deepest commitments, especially to liberal economics. And it seeks to show that what is bemoaned by the left is due not to the right but to the consequences of its own deepest commitments, especially to the dissolution of social norms, particularly those regarding sexual behavior and identity. The “wedding” between global corporations and this sexual agenda is one of the most revealing yet widely ignored manifestations of this deeper synergy.
Its warning would be simple, recalling its oldest lessons: at the end of the path of liberation lies enslavement. Such liberation from all obstacles is finally illusory, for two simple reasons: human appetite is insatiable and the world is limited. For both of these reasons, we cannot be truly free in the modern sense. We can never attain satiation, and will be eternally driven by our desires rather than satisfied by their attainment. And in our pursuit of the satisfaction of our limitless desires, we will very quickly exhaust the planet.
Christians are indistinguishable from other men either by nationality, language or customs. They do not inhabit separate cities of their own, or speak a strange dialect, or follow some outlandish way of life. Their teaching is not based upon reveries inspired by the curiosity of men. Unlike some other people, they champion no purely human doctrine. With regard to dress, food and manner of life in general, they follow the customs of whatever city they happen to be living in, whether it is Greek or foreign.And yet there is something extraordinary about their lives. They live in their own countries as though they were only passing through. They play their full role as citizens, but labor under all the disabilities of aliens. Any country can be their homeland, but for them their homeland, wherever it may be, is a foreign country. Like others, they marry and have children, but they do not expose them. They share their meals, but not their wives.They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven. Obedient to the laws, they yet live on a level that transcends the law. Christians love all men, but all men persecute them. Condemned because they are not understood, they are put to death, but raised to life again. They live in poverty, but enrich many; they are totally destitute, but possess an abundance of everything. They suffer dishonor, but that is their glory. They are defamed, but vindicated. A blessing is their answer to abuse, deference their response to insult. For the good they do they receive the punishment of malefactors, but even then they, rejoice, as though receiving the gift of life. They are attacked by the Jews as aliens, they are persecuted by the Greeks, yet no one can explain the reason for this hatred.To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world. As the visible body contains the invisible soul, so Christians are seen living in the world, but their religious life remains unseen. The body hates the soul and wars against it, not because of any injury the soul has done it, but because of the restriction the soul places on its pleasures. Similarly, the world hates the Christians, not because they have done it any wrong, but because they are opposed to its enjoyments.Christians love those who hate them just as the soul loves the body and all its members despite the body's hatred. It is by the soul, enclosed within the body, that the body is held together, and similarly, it is by the Christians, detained in the world as in a prison, that the world is held together. The soul, though immortal, has a mortal dwelling place; and Christians also live for a time amidst perishable things, while awaiting the freedom from change and decay that will be theirs in heaven. As the soul benefits from the deprivation of food and drink, so Christians flourish under persecution. Such is the Christian’s lofty and divinely appointed function, from which he is not permitted to excuse himself.
6. Free Enterprise. We believe that an economy based on private property and free enterprise is best suited to promoting the prosperity of the nation and accords with traditions of individual liberty that are central to the Anglo-American political tradition. We reject the socialist principle, which supposes that the economic activity of the nation can be conducted in accordance with a rational plan dictated by the state. But the free market cannot be absolute. Economic policy must serve the general welfare of the nation. Today, globalized markets allow hostile foreign powers to despoil America and other countries of their manufacturing capacity, weakening them economically and dividing them internally. At the same time, trans-national corporations showing little loyalty to any nation damage public life by censoring political speech, flooding the country with dangerous and addictive substances and pornography, and promoting obsessive, destructive personal habits. A prudent national economic policy should promote free enterprise, but it must also mitigate threats to the national interest, aggressively pursue economic independence from hostile powers, nurture industries crucial for national defense, and restore and upgrade manufacturing capabilities critical to the public welfare. Crony capitalism, the selective promotion of corporate profit-taking by organs of state power, should be energetically exposed and opposed.
[W]hat is bemoaned by the right is due not to the left but to the consequences of its own deepest commitments, especially to liberal economics. And it seeks to show that what is bemoaned by the left is due not to the right but to the consequences of its own deepest commitments, especially to the dissolution of social norms, particularly those regarding sexual behavior and identity. The “wedding” between global corporations and this sexual agenda is one of the most revealing yet widely ignored manifestations of this deeper synergy.
Elections provide the appearance of self-governance but mainly function to satiate any residual civic impulse before we return to our lives as employees and consumers.