is announced from the pulpit; it is demonstrated by the sensitiveness of the public funds at the least prospect of disturbance, and their firmness the instant it is made manifest that the Executive is far superior in wisdom and power to the factious ex-officials of all former
In its issue of November 29, 1851, the “Economist” declares editorially:
“The President is now recognized as the guardian of order on every Stock Exchange of Europe.”
Accordingly, the Aristocracy of Finance condemned the parliamentary strife of the party of Order with the Executive as a “disturbance of order,” and hailed every victory of the President over its reputed representatives as a “victory of order.”
Under “aristocracy of finance” must not, however, be understood merely the large bond negotiators and speculators in government securities, of whom it may be readily understood that their interests and the interests of the Government coincide.
The whole modern money trade, the whole banking industry, is most intimately interwoven with the public credit. Part of their business capital requires to be invested in interest-bearing government securities that are promptly convertible into money; their deposits, i. e., the capital placed at their disposal and by them distributed among merchants and industrial establishments, flow partly out of the dividends on government securities.
The whole money market, together with the priests of this market, is part and parcel of this “aristocracy of finance” at every epoch when the stability of the government is to them synonymous with “Moses and his prophets.”
This is so even before things have reached the present stage when every deluge threatens to carry away the old governments themselves.