The Board of Brokers is in decided panic. Stocks are going down. Cause, the anticipation of trouble growing out of Lincoln’s election. The government loan, just taken at a premium, is a strong indication the other way, especially as Southern bankers bid for it; but a few timid capitalists here are unquestionably converting their securities, and Kearny tells me the deposits in the Trust Company are unusually heavy. There is heavy money-pressure at the South. But that is one of the ordinary fluctuations of trade, due to causes outside of politics, and has not yet reacted on us here.
Walter Cutting was very atrabilious—his prophesyings were full of woe. Joseph Lawrence of the United States Trust Company says that they have been refusing Southern stocks as collaterals for several days. He and other leading financiers say that, though secession would produce a general fall in values here of twenty-five per cent, at least, it is better for us to test the question at once and submit to that fall, if so it must be, than continue exposed to these panics and fluctuations, which must occur at short intervals while the question remains open.
People begin to look grave and talk anxiously about our prospects. Will this have any serious effect on the vote of New York and Pennsylvania? Panic and pressure in New York and Philadelphia will not have made themselves felt throughout the country in time to influence the elections. Had they occurred earlier, they might have determined the result, for comparatively few Republicans love niggers enough to sacrifice investments for their sweet sake.
SOURCE: Allan Nevins and Milton Halset Thomas, Editors, Diary of George Templeton Strong, Vol. 3, pp. 52-4
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