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PUBLIC DEBT OF THE UNITED STATES.

Statement of the Character and Amount of Bonds and Other Forms of Indebtedness, July 1, yearly, from 1861 to 1876 inclusive (omitting the years 1871-2-3-4).

COMPILED FROM THE ANNUAL STATEMENTS OF THE SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY.

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Loan of 1847
Loan of 1848
Texas indemnity.
Texas debt
Loan of 1858 June 14, 1858
Loan of 1860 June 22, 1860
Loan of Feb., 1861 Feb. 8, 1861
Oregon war loan. Mar. 2, 1861.
Loan of July, 1861 July 17, 1861
Bonds (for 7.30s). Aug. 5, 1861
Five-twenty bds. Feb. 25, 1862
Loan of 1863 Mar. 3, 1863.
Ten-forty bonds. Mar. 3, 1864.
Five-twenty bds. Mar. 3, 1864
Five-twenty bds. June 30, 1864
Five-twenty bds. Mar. 3, 1865
Five-twenty bds. Mar. 3, 1865.
Five-twenty bds. Mar. 3, 1865
Five-twenty bds. Mar. 3, 1865
5 per cents of 1881
Jan. 14,70
Jan. 20,'71 S

Tot. funded debt!

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Postal currency. July 17, 1862.

Frac. currency.. Mar. 3, 1863

Tot. U. S. notes

and frac. cur...

Gold certificates. Mar. 3, 1864

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454854 458166 427963 400299 388768 388238 395984 417971 404285 10,713 19,207 17,678 30,489 34,547

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N. B.-None of the Trust Funds" are included in the above statement, such as the Navy Pension Fund, the Indian Annuity Funds, the Smithsonian Fund, etc., which are provided for by annual appropriations.

The following statement of the outstanding principal of the public debt on the 1st of January each year, from 1791 to 1876 inclusive, is taken from the annual report of the Secretary of the Treasury (B. H. Bristow) for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1875, the amount for June 30, 1876, being added from the official monthly debt statement:

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1868. 1869. 1870.

2,611,687,851 19 1874.

2,588,452,213 94 1875.

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2,480,672,427 81 1876, June 30..*2,180,325,037 00

The total debt, including all outstanding obligations of the government, reached its maximum in 1866, when it aggregated $2,773,236,173. But the total interestbearing portion of the debt aggregated at the same time only $2,339,954,150.

The reduction in the total annual interest since the aggregate of interest-bearing and non-interest-bearing debt reached its maximum has been as follows, viz.:

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* In the amount here stated as the outstanding principal of the public debt are included the certificates of deposit outstanding on the 30th of June, issued under act of June 8, 1872, amounting to $31,730,000 in 1873, $58,760,000 in 1874, and $58,415,000 in 1875, for which a like amount in United States notes was on special deposit in the treasury for their redemption, and added to the cash balance in the treasury. These certificates, as a matter of accounts, are treated as a part of the public debt, but being offset by notes held on deposit for their redemption, should properly be deducted from the principal of the public debt in making comparison with former years.

FOREIGN INDEBTEDNESS OF THE UNITED STATES.

IN

N 1874 Dr. Edward Young, Chief of the National Bureau of Statistics, made an estimate of the amount of American national, state and corporate bonds held in Europe at the close of 1873, and arrived at the conclusion that the amount then was, in round figures, twelve hundred million dollars. By a memorandum sent to the writer of this in August of this year (1876), Dr. Young estimated the amount of the foreign indebtedness of the United States at $1,350,000,000.

Dr. Young's method of arriving at the estimate of $1,200,000,000 of foreign indebtedness at the close of 1873 is somewhat elaborate, and open to some criticism, though it is perhaps as logical a method as any that can be devised for approximating to the actual amount, the most pertinent objection to his conclusions being that he has perhaps estimated the average prices at which American securities have sold in Europe higher than was actually obtained for them.* It is a tolerably well-estab

* BALANCE OF TRADE.-It is necessary, in the outset, to consider the elements that enter into this computation. In the first place, we must ascertain the adverse balance of trade upon the actual specie values of imports and exports. As in the fiscal year 1862 the value of exports exceeded that of the imports, the period embraced in this investigation begins on the 1st July, 1862.

(Here follows a table of the total imports and exports of merchandise and specie from July 1, 1862, to December 31, 1873, which has been incorporated in a table of the same items on page 159, for the longer period from June 30, 1843, to June 30, 1876. The period selected by Dr. Young shows an excess of merchandise imports over merchandise exports, exclusive of specie, amounting to $1,040,535,721. This adverse balance was reduced by the export of $681,946,067 of

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