The Budget of the United States and the Christian-Germanic

Karl Marx / Georg Weerth
The Budget of the United States and
the Christian-Germanic
* Cologne, January 6. What the Prussian Government Costs the Country
No. 189, January 7, 1849
Neue Rheinische Zeitung.

For some days now we have at last had in black and white what the Prussian government costs the country. The *Preußische Staats-Anzeiger* has at last shown us, with the financial estimates for the year 1849, how shamelessly we have been lied to in all previous budgets. This splendid New Year’s gift came as a surprise only to those who have hitherto regarded every word of the government by the grace of God as sacred truth, and the whole humbug of state finance practised upon us since 1820 as proof of the excellence of our police-state budget.

Prussia is a country of roughly 5,000 square miles and somewhat over 16 million inhabitants.

The United States of North America cover an expanse of territory whose surface area now comes fairly close to that of the whole of Europe, and whose population exceeds 21 million.

There is no more fitting introduction to a consideration of the Prussian budget for 1849 than the budget of the North American free states.

A comparison of the two budgets shows how dearly the Prussian bourgeois has to pay for the pleasure of being ruled by a government by the grace of God, of being maltreated by its mercenaries, with or without states of siege, and of being treated *en canaille* by a host of arrogant officials and cabbage-junkers. At the same time, however, it emerges how cheaply a courageous bourgeoisie, conscious of its power and determined to make use of it, can arrange for its government.

The two budgets on their own suffice amply to prove the cowardice, narrow-mindedness and philistinism of the one, as well as the self-confidence, insight and energy of the other.

The total expenditure of the United States during the year 1848 amounted to 42,811,970 dollars. This includes the costs of the Mexican War, a war that was waged at a distance of 2,000 miles from the seat of the central government. One can appreciate what enormous expenditure the transport of the army, and of all the articles it required, necessitated.

The revenue of the Union totalled 35,436,750 dollars, namely 31,757,070 dollars in customs duties, 3,328,642 dollars from the sale of public lands, and 351,037 dollars in miscellaneous and casual receipts. As the ordinary revenue was insufficient because of the war costs, the deficit was covered by loans, which were contracted at above par. Let anyone ask on the money market whether the “Christian-Germanic” government would be capable of raising even 1,000 thalers on such advantageous terms!

In the United States, the financial year begins on 1 July each year. Up to July 1849, expenditure will still be considerable on account of the Mexican War—by comparison with previous years, though not, of course, in comparison with Prussia. From then on, however, President Polk, in his message to Congress, announces the ordinary peace budget for the next financial year, ending on 1 July 1850.

What do the expenses of this mighty state—the North American bourgeois republic—amount to in time of peace?

33,213,152 dollars, including the interest (3,799,102 dollars) on the public debt and the 3,540,000 dollars payable to Mexico on 30 May 1850.

If one deducts these last two sums, which figure in the budget as extraordinary items, the entire government and administration of the United States costs barely 26 million dollars annually.

And how much do the Prussian citizens pay annually to the state in time of peace?

The answer is bitter. The *Preußische Staats-Anzeiger* gives it to us.

It reads: More than 94 million thalers a year!

Thus, while the 21 million inhabitants of the North American republic, in their prosperity, indeed in their wealth, hand over to the state treasury scarcely 26 million dollars—that is, not even 38 million thalers in Prussian currency—the 16 million Prussians, with their relative poverty, must annually throw about 94 million thalers down the gorge of the state exchequer, and yet even this does not satisfy it.

But let us not be unjust!

In return, the North American republic possesses nothing more than a president elected every four years, who, to be sure, works more for the country than a dozen kings and emperors put together. Yet for this he receives only the paltry annual salary of 37,000 thalers

Prussian currency. In this paltry sum of 37,000 thalers, all the grief of a Christian-Prussian soul, with God for king and Junkerdom, may be summed up. No chamberlains, no court jewellers, no sprinkling of the highway to Charlottenburg for court ladies, no game-park apparatus at the expense of the citizen, etc. Oh, it is frightful! But the most frightful thing is that these North Americans do not even appear to grasp this frightfulness, this desolation, this God-forsaken state.

How completely different it is with us. Even if we pay three or four times as much, we can delight in things which they do not have, and cannot have for 37,000 thalers. We delight and invigorate ourselves in the splendour of a court by the grace of God, which—no one knows exactly, but according to rough estimation—costs the people four to five million a year.

While the Americans are such odd fellows that they keep their money as far as possible for their own splendour and their own advantage, we feel ourselves Christian-Germanically obliged to cast our splendour, i.e. our money, away from ourselves, and to let others shine with it. And quite apart from the splendour, what benefactions does not a lavishly endowed court, paid for out of the pockets of the people, offer to a mass of *pauvres* counts, barons, free lords, simple *vons*, etc.? A good many of these people, who are adapted only for consumption, not for production, would, after all, miserably perish if they did not receive public alms in a refined fashion. Were we to go through all the benefactions and advantages one by one, we should not be finished today.

And consider how far behind the Americans, on account of their small budget, lag behind us in other respects!

Among them, for example, Oberpräsident Bötticher would receive no gift of 3,000 thalers from the state treasury. He could be content with his handsome salary, would be the saying. For counts and barons nothing would fall to the rearing of children. The North American republic, in such a case, would say to these gracious gentlemen: *alors il faut s’abstenir d’avoir des enfants!* A “Hüser” would there be cheated of his annual gratuity of 6,000 thalers and would have to content himself with his salary; indeed, the latter would perhaps be reduced to 3,000 thalers. Is a human being, a Prussian human being, a Christian-Germanic general, supposed to live on that? Godless thought! *Apage!*

The Americans, like Herr Hansemann, are entirely devoid of all geniality in money matters.

They would, at most, send Don Carlos a few whippings, but by no means 700,000 thalers, so that he and his grandees and monks might live it up and fight for Metternich’s legitimacy. Only a monarchy by the grace of God, whose access to the pockets of the people must remain open at all times and by right, can do that.

If, to be sure, the American’s taxes to the state are very insignificant, he, on the other hand, has a standing army of only 10,000 men, which can, in times of war, be increased with the greatest rapidity to 2 million vigorous warriors. He does not know, even remotely, the good fortune of having to spend the best part of the taxes on an army of war which, in time of peace, besieges, maltreats, wounds and shoots us dead—all to the glory and honour of the fatherland.

But what is the use? These bourgeois republicans are so stiff-necked that they know nothing of our Christian-Germanic institutions and, indeed, would rather pay low taxes than high ones.

The German bourgeois, on the other hand, is equally obstinate in insisting that rule by the grace of God, with its army of soldiers and officials, its hordes of pensioners, its gratuities, *extraordinaria*, etc., cannot possibly be paid highly enough.

The money-bag republican of North America and the bourgeois in Prussia are related to one another exactly as their budgets: as 37 to 94 million. The one is endowed with self-esteem, the other with grace from God: that is the real difference.