tablish trade of exchange with each other unless each shall in the long run get more than he gives. No permanent trade is possible where the satisfaction or gain is ail on one side. The mutuality of services rendered, is essential to the continuance of mutual exchange or trade. We want more foreign luxuries and comforts than England, because the great mass of our people can afford them better, and we have more natural resources than England, in the shape of easily worked mines, a better climate for the breeding of sheep and the product of wool, almost a monopoly in ordinary times in the production of cotton. and in all farming operations a superiority in natural advantages hardly to be measured, and therefore we have far greater power to create wealth, and in the production of wealth to combine the larger amount of the gratuity of nature with the smaller amount of labor. I can only see one answer to the question, how we shall compete with England in supplying the world with manufactured articles, and that is by adopting the same system of British free trade as soon as our need of revenue, and a cautious, slow and judicious method in making the change, will allow us to do it. Freedom of trade, leads to the free movement of the laborer, and he will surely seek that country where he can secure the most comfort and the best conditions of life in return for his wages and it matters not whether his wages be measured at a high or low rate. Our natural advantages would have induced a larger immigration, and would, I believe, have been more firmly established to-day and upon a larger scale than we have ever dreamed of, had we not impeded the importation of foreign commodities by protective duties, and thus confined ourselves mainly to the home market for our manufactures. We shall again share with England in the commerce of the world, and in the profit of that commerce, when we cease to deprive ourselves of the benefit of our natural advantages over England, by adherence to the principle, or rather the want of principle, involved in laws imposed for the purpose of protection. DEBT AND FINANCES OF CHICAGO. The tenth annual statement of the Comptroller of Chicago, covering the fiscal year ending April 1, 1867, supplies full information relating to the financial affairs of the city and the transactions of the year then closed. The following is a statement of the public debt outstanding at the end of the fiscal year: The floating debt of the city, consisting chiefly of certificates given for temporary loans, payments for schools and sanitary purposes, judgments, water fund, etc. Amounted to.. Bills payable ($4,350), warrants on Treas. (236,114 04), and city orders ($174 34) Making a total floating of.. The amount in the treasury at the close of the fiscal year to the credit of the several funds was $778,990 66. The amount of warrants and city orders outstanding drawn upon the treasury was (as above) $236,288 39. Net balance to credit, $542,702 28. It will be seen from the above exhibit that the bonded debt is gradually increasing; and, the Comptroller continues, "if we keep pace with our rapid increase of population, it must continue to increase upon us for many years to come. The water-works will require during the present year (1867-68) not less than $500,000 to complete the buildings, engines, and improvements that are imperatively demanded. The erection of school buildings, sewerage, river improvements (deepening of the Illinois and Michigan canal), and tunnels, will add, perhaps, $500,000 to $800,000, so that at the end of the present fiscal year the bonded debt of the city will not fall much short of $6,000,000 ; and when all these improvements shall have been completed, for which bonds are authorized to be issued, the bonded debt cannot vary much from $10,000,000, of which about $5,000,000 have been provided for, to be paid by receipts from water, sewerage, sinking fund, and probable State assumption of river improvement bonds. The total city debt at the present time is $5,397,064 50. Of this sum $398,926 12 is for temporary loans, viz.: $222,159 81 for the water works (to be paid from the proceeds of bonds to be issued) and the balance for school purposes (purchase of lots and erecting school buildings) sanitary expenses, judgments, &c." The rate and amount of tax levied, and the purposes for which levied for the service of the year ending April 1, 1867, were as follows: The receipts from general taxes for the year, including $44,735 64 collected on the tax warrants of 1863 and 1865, amounted to the sum of $1,559,502 84; the receipts from special assessment warrants, including miscellaneous receipts from the Board of Public Works and other sources, to $478,540 43; from licenses $153,858 84; from fines in the police courts $81,038 45; from Recorder's court, rents, &c., $15,580 68, and from a judgment $25,492 20. Including $901,863 17 balance from previous year, bills payable $159,226 11, and bonds $6,400, the total means of the city treasury amounted to $4,864,933 44. The principal disbursements were on account of: Public works $385,871 17, certificates $120,575 00; Bridewells and cemetery $55,227 07; evening schools $6,957 08; Fire Department $254,409 41; fuel $31,217 23; health department $61,387 86; interest $100,612 79; judgments $22,151 11; lamp districts $120,922 21; permanent improvements $15,391 13; printing and stationery $17,585 66; police $307,811 44; Receiver's court $28,591 92, redemption $13,861 18; Reform school $73,299 99; river improvements $129,162 37; salaries $47,247 50; schools $412,367 55; sewerage $416,546 48; sewerage, sinking fund, $20,842 50; special assessments $685,903 76; tunnel $19,265 85; water $666,791 89, &c., &c.-total $4,085,942 78, leaving in Treasury $778, 990 66. The following statement gives a summary view of the population, valuation and taxation at the stated periods for the past 30 years: Total pop----Assessed Valuation-- Valua. -Taxation. Am't. p. cap. p.$100. 0 36 Year. 1837. 4,170 $236,842 $236,842 $56 80 1840. 4,479 94,437 1843. 7,580 962,221 479,093 94,437 21 15 1,441,314 190 14 3,065,022 253 56 4,521,656 319 12 0 32 853,704 5,849,170 346 96 18,159 01 1 08 0 31 1848. 1,302,174 6,300,440 314 66 1849.. 1,495,047 6,676,684 246 31 20,023 4,998,266 That Chicago has been gradually growing wealthier, and year by year more able to bear taxation, the above table fully illustrates. In 1850 the valuation was $240 97, and the taxes 84 cents per capita, or 35 cents on each $100. By 1860 the valuation had increased to $349 13, and the taxes 84 cents per capita, or $1 01 on each $100. The first years of the late war materially affected the value of property, but in 1864 a reaction was evidenced which continued upward through the next two years, bringing the per capita valuation from $268 79, as it was in 1862 to $287 75 in 1864, $362 55 in 1865, and $428,87 in 1866. The rate of taxation in 1864, '65 and '66 was $2 on the $100, but owing to the movement in population and property, the tax averaged in 1864 $5 75; in 1865, $7 25; and in 1866, $8 57 per capita. The taxes here spoken of are municipal or city taxes purely. The State taxes for 1866 amounted to $1 28 per capita, and the county taxes (though we have no means at hand to certify our estimate) may be stated at a like rate. These added to the city taxes, will make a total of taxation levied for domestic purposes on the people of Chicago of $11.13 per capita. And as a matter of course the people bear their share of Federal taxation and customs. In the 1st district of Illinois, which covers Cook County, in which Chicago is loca ted, there was collected on account of internal revenue for the year 1865-66, the sum of $6,672,286, from the following sources: The population of the county in that year may be estimated at 220,000 persons, and hence the federal taxes averaged about $33 to each inhabitant. The customs collected in the United States in the same year amounted to $179,000,000 in gold. The population of the United States in that year was not far from 35,000,000. This gives about $5 per capita. All these taxes added, viz.: domestic $11 13, United States internal $33, and United States customs $5-make a total of $49 13 per capita paid by the people of Chicago. Omitting customs, the internal taxes paid are about $44 per capita. COMMERCIAL LA W.-No. 34. FIRE INSURANCE (CONTINUED). (Continued from page 472, vol. 56.) OF THE RISK INCURRED BY THE INSURERS. At the time of the insurance, the property must be in existence, and not on fire, and not at that moment exposed to a dangerous fire in the immediate neighborhood; because the insurance assumes that no unusual risk exists at that time. The risk taken is that of fire. And therefore the insurers are not chargeable if the property be destroyed or injured by the indirect effect of excessive heat; or by any effect which stops short of ignition or combustion. But if there be actual ignition, the insurers are liable for the immediate consequences; as the injury from water used to extinguish the fire. Or injury to or loss of goods caused by their removal from immediate danger of fire, even if it be reasonable, and not if the loss or injury might have been avoided by even so much care as is usually given in times of so much excitement and confusion. In some instances the policies require that the insured should use all possible diligence to preserve their goods; and such a clause would strengthen the claim for injury caused by an endeavor to save them by removal. So the insurers are liable for injury or loss sustained by the blowing up of buildings to arrest the progress of a fire. But we should say, that if goods were damaged by water thrown on to extinguish a supposed fire when there was none in fact, or by the wholly unnecessary and useless destruction of a house distant from the fire, the insurers should not be held. It must now be conceded to modern science, that lightning is not fire; and if property be destroyed by lightning, the insurers are not liable, un less there was also ignition; or unless the policy expressly insures against lightning. An explosion caused by gunpowder is a loss by fire; not so, it is said, is an explosion caused by steam. Scientifically, it might be difficult to draw a wide distinction between these cases; but the difference seems to be sufficient for the law. Whether when the negligence of the insured or his servants is to be considered as the sole or direct cause of the fire or loss, the insurers can be held, has been somewhat considered. And as this is the most common and universal danger, and the very one which induces most persons to insure, there has been some disposition to say that no measure or kind of mere negligence can operate as a defence. And in effect this is almost the law. But if the loss be caused by negligence of the insured himself, of so extreme and gross a character that it is hardly possible to avoid the conclusion of fraud, the defence might be a good one, although there were no direct proof of fraud. That the fire was caused by the insanity of the insured should be no defence. In Beaumont's work on Fire and Life Insurance in England, he gives some instances drawn from the practice of English insurance companies, a part of which, at least, rest upon sound principles, and illustrate what is probably the law, although not yet determined by adjudication. Thus, if implements or apparatus used for fire, as ranges, grates, or the like, are destroyed by fire, this loss gives no claim on the insurers. But if the chimney or other parts of the house in which the apparatus is set are injured by the same fire, for this the insurers are liable. He says, also, that where the loss is caused only by an excess of the heat or fire which was designedly used, they are not liable. But we should have some doubt as to this rule; especially as applied to clothes hung up to dry, and catching fire from the flame, and the like. Nor are we satisfied that, if a haymow takes fire by its own fermentation, it is not a loss within the policy. If quicklime be so heated by water as to set on fire the barrels or other wood near it, it may be said that the lime itself is not burnt, and might not be hurt by being burnt, and, if destroyed by water, is not a loss within the policy; but we do not think this would be reasonable. And if lime be put in a building, and, by being partially wet and heated, set fire to it, and for the purpose of extinguishing this fire, water is so used as to slack the lime and render it valueless, it would be a loss within the policy, unless we say that no loss gives a claim if the thing destroyed contribute to the loss, proximately or remotely. We are aware of no such rule. Thus, if cotton, by fermentation, ignited and set fire to a mill, undoubtedly the loss of the mill would be within the policy, and so would be the loss of other and disconnected cotton. And perhaps we might say that the loss of the very cotton of which the spontaneous combustion caused the fire should be within the policy. There are various exceptions in the policies used in this country; but they have not given rise to much a ljudication, and do not generally need explanation. It may be remarked, that the exception of "military or usurped power," or any similar phrase, would not be extended so as to cover a common mob. But if the word "riot" be used, insurers are not liable for a fire caused by a tumultous assemblage, whatever may have been the original purpose of the meeting. |