Franklin Repository

The Union Convention of Franklin county met on the 8th inst. in Chambersburg, and nominated a ticket combining peculiar political and personal strength. Its proceedings were harmonious throughout, and after earnest contests for the more lucrative positions all cordially acquiesced in the decision of the Convention.

It is worthy of note that the Union party has not been content to manifest its devotion to the gallant heroes of the war by mere reception orations and cheap professions of interest in their behalf. Every lucrative position in the gift of the people of Franklin county this fall has been justly awarded to men who have responded to their country's call and braved the perils of the sanguinary field. Col. Fred'k S. Stumbaugh, the Union candidate for Assembly, was one of the first to volunteer in April, 1861, when the call was made for 75,000 three month troops. He raised a company in a few days, and in the organization of the regiment he was commissioned Colonel. His regiment served under Gen. Patterson in his [illeg] campaign on the Potomac; and as soon as it was discharged Col. Stumbaugh re-enlisted in the service and was soon at the head of another regiment--the 77th--and joined the Army of the Cumberland under Gen. Buell. Gen. Negley, who went out in command of the brigade, was soon at the head of a division, and Col. Stumbaugh commanded the Pennsylvania brigade from Louisville until after Shiloh. He was with the advance of Gen. Buell's army and among the first to join Gen. Grant on the night of the first disastrous day on that hotly contested field, and his command actively and gallantly participated in the successful struggle of the succeeding day. His brigade subsequently returned to Louisville with Gen. Buell, and soon after Col. Stumbaugh was nominated by the President as Brigadier General and directed to await orders at Chambersburg. In the meantime subordinate regimental officers were promoted and his Colonelry filled, and his confirmation failed because of the refusal of Congress to sanction the increase of general officers. He was thus retired from the service in 1863, with honor to himself, and resumed the practice of his profession in Chambersburg. He was originally a Democrat and severed his connection with that party in 1854 when it adopted the Kansas-Nebraska infamy, and has since faithfully alike in the field, on the stump and by his efforts and votes, sustained the cause of the right. Captain John Doebler, the nominee for Sheriff, was in the three months service, re-enlisted in 1862, and was commissioned Captain of Company A in the 126th Regiment. He was first engaged at Fredericksburg in the fatal charge upon the heights, and fell while most heroically leading his company, with his right arm terribly shattered by a minnie ball. His arm was saved but entirely and permanently disabled, and his nomination was a fitting tribute to a most gallant soldier. Col. D. Watson Rowe, the candidate for District Attorney, also entered the three months' service, and joining the 126th in 1862 as Captain of the Greencastle company. In the organization of the regiment he was commissioned Major, and was soon promoted to the Lieutenant Colonelry. Colonel Elder fell early in the charge at Fredericksburg, severely wounded in the hip, and Col. Rowe commanded the regiment from there until the term of service expired. He was noted for coolness and [illeg] heroism in battle, as displayed at Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, and he is as accomplished in his profession as he was gallant in the field. Major Hassler also entered the service in 1862 as a substitute for a drafted man, and served with credit as a line officer in the 158th Regiment, commanded by Col. McKibbin. The regiment had but little active service during its term; but he was a faithful soldier, and is a most worthy citizen. Mr. Kuhn, the candidate for Surveyor; Mr. Skinner, the candidate for Commissioner; Capt. Clayton, the candidate for Director of the Poor; Mr. Nevin, the candidate for Auditor and Dr. Maclay, the candidate for Coroner are all gentlemen of blameless character, of superior qualifications for the respective trusts for which they are presented, and will command the confidence and earnest support of the Union men of Franklin county.

The ticket is upon the whole one of peculiar strength and it behooves the Union men to make a most determined effort for its triumphant election. That Franklin county is a thoroughly Union county, and will on a fair poll and a full vote, elect the entire Union ticket by a decisive majority we cannot doubt; but the course of safety is to prepare for an earnest, stubborn contest and leave no honorable measures untried to make its victory as signal as possible. Let the Union men commence their organization by districts and sub-districts without delay, and when the battle surges against them, they will be more than prepared to resist the tireless efforts of their unscrupulous foe. Let each one resolve that the entire Union ticket shall have every available Union vote in the county, and not rest content until it is polled on the second Tuesday of October, and the future supremacy of the Union party in the "Green Spot," will not be a doubtful question.

No name was presented for Senator, and the nomination will, we presume, be conceded to Adams without a contest. Franklin had the nomination in 1859 and Fulton in 1862, and the justice of the claim of Adams is conceded. The other nominee for Assembly is of course conceded to the Union men of Perry, and the formality of a conference will not be necessary.

An official statement of the National debt was made by the Secretary of the Treasury on the 1st inst. The total amount is given at two thousand seven hundred and fifty-seven millions, two hundred and fifty-three thousand, two hundred and seventy-five dollars and eighty-six cents. Over one thousand one hundred millions bear interest in coin at six per cent and a fraction over one thousand two hundred and eighty-nine millions bear interest in lawful money, and nearly three hundred and sixty millions bear no interest. The total amount of annual interest payable in coin is $64,521,837.50; in lawful currency, $74,740,630.78, making a total of annual interest on the debt as now funded of $139,262,468.28. The amount of legal tender circulating notes still out is $685,236,269; but this includes nearly $16,000,000 of five per cent notes and a little over $212,000,000 of compound interest notes which do not circulate freely. They are generally held by individuals and bankers as an investment, and but a small proportion of them are now passing in the ordinary transactions of business. Nearly half a million of the old treasury notes, which are receivable for duties and therefore have nearly the value of gold, are still in circulation, and the fractional currency issued amounts to $25,750,000. The non-interest bearing legal tenders in circulation is $132,687,968, which with the bank issues exhibits the aggregate paper circulation of the country. The increase of the public debt since the 31st of May last is $122,000,000 and the increase of legal tender notes in the same period is $26,075,700. The amount of coin in the treasury is $35,338,000, and the currency in the treasury amounts to $81,462,000.

In this statement we have no information of the amount of requisitions now made and unpaid, and the amount likely to be made for expenses already incurred; but the aggregated must be quite large. The entire amount of loans authorized by Congress is embraced in the estimate, leaving a balance of but little over $116,000,000 in the treasure to liquidate old indebtedness not yet in shape for formal requisition, and to meet current expenses and pay the interest. Our revenues from the tariff will fall materially short of meeting the interest on the public debt, and we apprehend that the internal revenue must fall off very largely during the next year. Our iron factories are nearly all at a stand for want of adequate protection. The English iron is now offered in our market at from ten to fifteen dollars per ton cheaper than it can be manufactured here, and under such ruinous competition our furnaces have been stopped. There is not one half the iron manufactured now in this State that there was one year ago. The direct tax upon it and upon the articles entering into its composition is now heavier than the protection our tariff affords, thus actually discriminating against our own manufacturers. The manufacture of whisky is almost entirely abandoned because of the tax of two dollars per gallon, the limited demand, and the apprehension that the tax will be reduced by the next Congress, and thus inflict a serious loss upon those who have a stock on hand upon which they have paid the present excise duty. The consumption of coal has been very largely diminished by the suspension of iron and other manufactures, and the withdrawal of immense numbers of steamers, gunboats and transports from the active service of the government. The close of the war; the depression of our manufacturing interests, and the abrupt termination of the vast supplies demanded by the army and navy in almost every channel of industry, must very largely reduce incomes; and in the aggregate the internal revenue must be reduced not less than one-third, and perhaps so much as one half. Our public lands have ceased to be a source of revenue, as they are appropriated under our homestead and bounty laws, so that the Nation has but its tariff and internal revenue to rely upon for the payment of the interest on the debt and defraying current expenses. From these sources the aggregate revenue during the present fiscal year will reach about two hundred and fifty millions or three hundred millions at the farthest, at least one-half of which will be required to pay the interest on the existing debt, and the remainder will not be adequate to the necessities of the government, the maintenance of a large army, and the large pensions which justice and humanity alike demand shall be paid, cannot possibly be met by the revenues as they now are and in addition to these, there will doubtless be millions of dollars yet to be paid, arising from the war but not now adjudicated or presented for payment. One of two things, therefore, seems to us as inevitable. We must either add to our existing debt from one hundred to one hundred and fifty millions a year for several years to come, or our system of internal revenue must be so revised as to double its proceeds. It is remotely possible that it might be done by export duties on cotton and tobacco, and still more remotely possible that confiscation of rebel lands may avert the necessity of increased taxation or debt; but looking at matters as they are now we incline to the conviction that we must rely upon increased duties and increased internal revenues to maintain our National credit. We must maintain a large army to give any sort of government to the subjugated States, and from present indications this exhausting tax upon the government will stagger us for years to come, while wounded treason is writhing in the convulsive throes of death. We cannot diminish our interest and pensions and ordinary expenses must be paid, and means must be provided in such a manner as to revive our manufacturing and be least oppressive upon the great industrial classes.

We do not commit the common error of regarding the great financial problem of war as successfully solved. If depression shall follow war, and values diminish below a just standard while debt and taxes increase, it will severely test the integrity of the people. Just now the issue would not be feared by those who regard the National faith as sacredly as they would their own; but the American people must be prepared to maintain their credit in adversity as well as in prosperity. The Democratic party ever allied itself with more or less distinctiveness with the cause of the country's foes in the late war, and now while silenced as to the "failure" of the war, they have never ceased to denounce our national currency, and the banking system, which is entirely dependant upon the maintenance of our credit, and to poison the popular mind by declaring our inability to raise the revenue necessary to sustain the public faith with our creditors. They do not now proclaim repudiation, nor will they do so earnestly as they intend to. If they were to do so they would be condemned by the people; but they will in every future contest for the election of Congressmen appeal to the cupidity of the people by demanding diminished taxation regardless of consequences. In all our reading we do not know of a single Democratic journal in this State that honestly sustains our National credit. Instead of demanding and supporting such measures as are necessary to enable the government to meet its just obligations, they with one accord quibble about our revenue laws and appeal to every popular prejudice to impair the solemnly plighted faith of the Nation. In this work they have but commenced, and unless the people shall be forewarned and forearmed and frown down every attempt whether direct or indirect to impair the National credit, we shall have a bankrupt treasury and be bankrupt in credit before many years shall have passed into history.

Our National debt was an imperative necessity. Treason was inexorable in its work of death, and had to be stayed in its effort to overthrow the Republic at every sacrifice. In the fullness of time its power was broken and the supremacy of the government restored; but three thousand millions of debt remain, and the dregs of treason still breed discord, endanger the peace and safety of the South and require vast additional expenditures, and it may be additional debt to maintain the majesty of the laws. But free government remains to us rescued from its despotic and barbarous foes, and purified in the terrible crucible of civil war; and its blessings are priceless to us and to our children. Of this fair fabric of Freedom, public credit is an integral and most vital part, and if we would preserve our government, for which we have sacrificed so much, the National credit, the public faith, solemnly plighted by the people themselves, must be maintained unspotted and inviolate.