Disquisition by Scripps, E.W., Big debts, September 1, 1909

              Ohio University Libraries, E.W. Scripps Papers, MSS 117, Series 4, http://media.library.ohiou.edu/scripps
September 1, 1909. (Ie..
BIG DEBTS. -_._.-.' .. -._ ........ __ ._.,_._""_ .. _-
The national v.. overnments of the world are owinp~ about thirty ) .. -
billions of dollars in gold.
Mined gold in all forms, coined and othenvise 1
earth to the amo'U..'I'lt of about eleven billions of dollars;
I believe amounts to about seven billions of ~ollara.
exists on the
coined gold
Practically
three times as much e:old is owed by governments as exists; and practi­cally
it would require about four times as much gold coin as exists to
pay the national debts.
l11ere are about a billion and a half people 011 the :fa ce of
the globe; the per capita of tbe national debts then is about $20.
Beyond these so called national debts there is an innmnsrable
swann of other public and quasi-public debts.
'rh.s United States government owes about a billion dollars, or
lJetween $15 and $16 per capita. But all the states have their indi-vidual
debts; nearly ever] county in ever:¥ state has a debt; cities,
tm\Tlls) villages, hamlets have public debts; school districts 0'1'16 money.
lunor temporary districts, parts of states, counties and oi ties 1 without
regard to ordinarJ governmental limits, owe debts t There are debts on
account o~ irrigation, on account of drainage" on account of flood pro­tection
and on account of city street inrprovementtl e
All these debts exist by reason of the action of vater majori­ties
and are obligations not voluntarily accepted by all individual B.
Interest money and the return of the principal in;these cases is procured
by mea.ns of taxation assessments' beil'lf~ mads and forced upon the people
by public officers---these moneys are not paid voluntarily, each indi vid­ual
bearing his share.
In other nations there exists TLk'1.ny forms of the public debt 289