Ulysses S. Grant was a visionary in many ways, including in his goal of paying off the national debt — and keeping to a gold standard.
Indeed, if America had heeded his warnings and adhered to a gold standard, many of the economic crises that have ensued since his presidency could have been avoided. At the very least, we ought to take to heart his urgings to diminish rather than thoughtlessly and foolishly increase the national debt. On this Presidents' Day, we should rediscover his advice.
As of Monday morning, the U.S. national debt is almost $38.7 trillion. That is absolutely obscene. Politicians' unconstitutional, unnecessary, and irresponsible spending over many decades has greatly weakened the U.S. dollar's buying power and our own credit on the world stage. Because of the sheer size of our national debt, we can no longer possibly pay it in gold, as Grant advised. But we can urge our politicians to enact massive financial reform instead of just funding more and more and more programs we cannot afford.
The Founding Fathers were totally opposed to such a welfare system as we have, and if there's one thing we've learned in the last few months, it's that our welfare system is exceedingly vulnerable to fraud (SNAP, daycares, hospice care, etc.). Of course, if we examine the constitutionality of the overwhelmingly majority of government agencies and functions — including those dealing with healthcare, climate regulation, education, and overreaching domestic surveillance — they are in fact unconstitutional. At this point, unfortunately, we're trying to minimize the unconstitutionality and excessive spending, because our politicians and bureaucrats will never surrender them altogether.
So what did Grant say? Despite the abovementioned caveats, his advice is still worth pondering and obeying today. The following is from his Inaugural Address of 1869, an admirable speech that touches on his goals for securing the rights of Native American Indians and black Americans, for rebuilding the nation after the Civil War, and for international relations. Below is one passage taken from his comments on the national debt:
A great debt has been contracted in securing to us and our posterity the Union. The payment of this, principal and interest, as well as the return to a specie basis as soon as it can be accomplished without material detriment to the debtor class or to the country at large, must be provided for. To protect the national honor, every dollar of Government indebtedness should be paid in gold, unless otherwise expressly stipulated in the contract. Let it be understood that no repudiator of one farthing of our public debt will be trusted in public place, and it will go far toward strengthening a credit which ought to be the best in the world, and will ultimately enable us to replace the debt with bonds bearing less interest than we now pay.
If we prized the national honor now, we would prioritize paying off every dollar of government indebtedness, and we would not trust anyone who did not feel that responsibility with public office.
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Similarly, we should feel as strongly as Grant did that we must cut useless luxuries from public funding:
When we compare the paying capacity of the country now, with the ten States in poverty from the effects of war, but soon to emerge, I trust, into greater prosperity than ever before, with its paying capacity twenty-five years ago, and calculate what it probably will be twenty-five years hence, who can doubt the feasibility of paying every dollar then with more ease than we now pay for useless luxuries?
Putting off reform only brings disaster closer.
