Subjects
The US National Debt, 1787–1900
Editor: Robert E Wright
978 1 85196 816 9: 234x156mm: £395.00/$670.00
Almost 8 trillion dollars: this is the size of the US national debt in the early twenty-first century. In this ambitious, four-volume edition Robert E Wright, a leading advocate of the finance-led growth hypothesis, assembles a broad selection of rare primary resource materials in the form of essays, reports, books and compendia informing on US public finances in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. He investigates the debates put forward, from which comparisons with today’s debt can be drawn. Some of today’s historians already argue that financial development and government securities markets played a leading role in the economic growth of the US, Britain, Holland and Japan. Wright equally maintains that these factors were crucial to the progress of the modern nation state and democracy.
With writings from the close of the eighteenth, through to the latter years of the nineteenth century, the contents list reflects the importance of studying national debt in detail, with international comparisons and over a long term. Like all institutions, this debt changed over time. Its impact on the economy, politics and governance evolved too, so pains have been taken to balance the selections chronologically.
The pamphlets by McConnell, Aitken, and Bordley will help to improve scholars’ understanding of the functioning of the debt markets for a crucial period before comprehensive data became available. The Livingston and Findley entries present various political interpretations of Alexander Hamilton’s funding system. The Gallatin, Wolcott and Anon. 1843 pamphlets, in contrast, present the official government version of the debt. Cohen’s compendium is important because it presents the view of an outsider, an early investment analyst, in a comparative context.
Other selections are apologia, pro-debt propaganda, attempts at objective analysis, or policy prescriptions. All such perspectives are important because they help scholars to ‘triangulate’ between disparate or divergent views of this controversial but critical issue.
Many long-neglected subjects, including the development of secondary markets for sovereign debt issues, are revisited here: The US National Debt brings together rare documents illustrating aspects of US financial history that have recently been overlooked. With a general introduction, endnotes, headnotes and a consolidated index, this edition will enable scholars to navigate through these sources with ease.
Contents
Volume 1
The First National Debt
A Plan for the Payment of the National Debt by Means of a National Bank (1785)
Matthew McConnell, An Essay on the Domestic Debts of the United States (1787)
Robert Aitken, A View of the Principles, Operation, and Probable Effects of the Funding System of Pennsylvania (1788)
John Beale Bordley, National Credit and Character (1790)
Robert R Livingston, Considerations on the Nature of a Funded Debt (1790)
William Findley, A Review of the Revenue System … Wherein the Principles and Tendencies of the Funding System … Are Examined (1794)
Jeremiah Allen, The Memorial and Petition of the Subscribers, For Themselves and Others (1796)
Anon., A Correct Table Shewing the Net Amount of Funded 6 Percent Stock of the United States (1798)
Albert Gallatin, Views of the Public Debt, Receipts, & Expenditures of the United States (1801)
Volume 2
The First National Debt, 1787–1832 (continued)
Oliver Wolcott, Remarks on the Present State of Currency, Credit, Commerce, and National Industry (1820)
Bernard Cohen, Compendium of Finance (1822)
Volume 3
The First National Debt, 1787–1832 (continued)
Bernard Cohen (continued), Compendium of Finance (1822)
The Antebellum Debt
Anon., Harrison’s National Debt: Assumption of the State Debts (1840)
Anon., The National Debt As It Was, and As It Is: Facts from the Public Records of the Treasury (1843)
Thomas Cary, The Americans Defended by an American: Being a Letter to One of His Countrymen in Europe in Answer to Inquiries Concerning the Late Imputations of Dishonour Upon the United States (1844)
Volume 4
The Civil War Debt
A B Johnson, The Advanced Value of Gold, Suspended Specie Payments, Legal-Tender Notes, Taxation and National Debt, Investigated Impartially (1862)
A W Stetson, Is our Prosperity a Delusion? Our National Debt and Currency (1864)
Samuel Wilkeson and Jay Cooke, How Our National Debt May Be a National Blessing: The Debt is Public Wealth, Political Union, Protection of Industry, Secure Basis of National Currency, The Orphans’ and Widows’ Savings Fund (1865)
David Ames Wells, Our Financial Credit Abroad (1867)
Charles Bowles, Cosmopolitan Views of American Finance (1870)
William Richardson, Practical Information Concerning the Public Debt of the United States with the National Banking Laws: For Banks, Bankers, Brokers, Bank Directors, and Investors (1872)
J C Zachos, Our Financial Revolution: An Address to the Merchants and Professional Men of the Country, Without Respect to Parties (1878)
John Sherman, Refunding the National Debt (1880)
Fernando Wood, Refunding the Public Debt. Financial Policy of the Secretary of the Treasury. Can a three-and-a-half per cent. Bond be Negotiated at Par? (1880)
Margaret Sullivan Burke, The Truth About Our Finances (1892)
A J Warner, Our Debt Abroad: How It Has Grown, and How It Is Affected by the Appreciation of Gold (1895)
Reviews
'A valuable four-volume collection...highly recommended'
– F Petrella, CHOICE