CYCLES OF DEPRESSION.

Evening Star, Issue 7248, 27 June 1887, Page 4

CYCLES OF DEPRESSION.

TO THE UDITOIt. Our country, tight or wrong; but still cur country. gm —Mr Goschen delivered a speech sorre time since at Liverpool, and attributed t!io tmivereal depression which seems to be existirg all over the world to the fall in the value of silver. 'When delivering his Financial Statement,' he found himself with a surplus of L 1,000,000. The editor of the 'Banking Record' thus comm*nte on ihe facts:—"Depression of trade has beeu one of the concorriAants of commerce fr m its earliest days. We «ra only conclude that the world--commercial and financial—must reconcile itself to their, when they occur, a"» best it can. Not even the most barren consolation can be derived from theories which do not account for facts. These, sir, are words of wisdom, and well may <we, at the present tim?, consider their import. At certain epochs of colonial settlement the medium of commercial exchange was varie'. In the early days of New South AVales rum was the only medium, and ueveral of thoso waluable sections in George street, Sydney, •changed ownership by this means. Amongst .those islands in the South Seas concerning which all the diplomacy of two powerful .nations is necessary to prevent war, the writer .once a sailor's jack-knife for two -golden sovereigns (a ship had been wrecked 4here) Visit those islands now, and the Natives know the value of gold as well as •ourselves. We are becoming more thinking •animals, and asking for a fairer share of this woild's wealth. . , How is this to be attained is the question of ihe hour. Freetraders and I ©resume, are each anxious to do " the greatest food to the greatest number." Amongst others sir, advocate the former as the better mean? «t doing so. The medium of exchange is gold, which is more sensitive than a delicate plant. /Without labor it is of ao use. Both mtost go hand ia hand together. I Btart a boot factory; my friend a farm. Protection will enable me to Bet rich perhaps, but at the expense of ray Friend, who has ao market for his profluqe.

Tiadesiiien for a time will \>m haps get plenty of work, but what about my friends the lumpers, swaggers, and laborers '! How is tlieir labjr to b.• protected, and why should they pay more for their boots to enable me to get rich ? Granted that Protction may bring its competition : when the capitalist finds his profits decreasing, he will insist upon longer hours of labor, to make up tho dflleicnoy. Ameuca is citel as the working man's paradise, but the purchasing power of the dollar iR less there thin its cquivaliit is in New Zealand. Owners of coal have limited the out-put in order to raise tho pi ices and make themselves rich at the expense of the many. The toilers there work ten and twelve hours daily. Any system of social government which permits the concentiation of wealth in the hands of a few, to wit, the Goulds, Astors, and Vanderbilts, is a vicious one, and it behoves all well-wishers of New Zealand, the laboring classes particularly, with whom the writer has toiled and worked, not to bo led away by any plausible arguments in favour of an ultra-Protectionist policy.—l am, etc., Lump jr. Dunedin, June 20.