Letter to Empress Charlotte, 1866

Scope and content:

Written from Mexico. Copy of a letter to Empress Charlotte (Carlotta) regarding colonization and internal improvements.

Language:

English.

Other descriptive data:

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"To her Majesty The Empress.

It has not escaped Her Majesty's observation, how the Empire is gaining ground and acquiring strength: That it is gaining the confidence of the people of stability, no better evidence can be afforded that the potent fact, that capital is leaving its hiding places, and seeking investments in various enterprises throughout the Empire.

The times therefore seem propitious for inaugurating those great measure of policy the adoption of which would impart new vigour to this nascent life.

The revenues of the Empire may be increased and its prosperity promoted by revision of the whole excise system; and one of the first steps towards this is a census which will tell the number of the people, and the value of the property.

Another step, requiring years for its accomplishment, but nevertheless redounding the glory of our Emperor; the good of His people, and the welfare of His Empire, is a landsurvey: - for the two fold purpose of [cadastre], and of separating the lands of the crown from those of the subjects.

Another pillar in the edifice which I am so anxious to see raised up here by His Majesty, to our honour and His glory, is a judicious system of internal improvements, self supporting, and sustained by the wealth which itself [creates]

As an illustration, let us take the case of an imaginary farmer in Cuernavaca: - It costs him annually in freight alone to send his crop to market in the City, say $10,000 - If there were a Railway, his freight bill would be perhaps $1000 instead of $10,000; and his hacienda would probably be trebled in value. Now if the owner of such a hacienda, was required to invest, in the shares of the Company, a certain portion of in increased value given to his property by the road - and the law were applied to all lands within a certain distance of the road, its construction would be secured without further tax upon the public treasury. The people would find in a little while, that this so called tax, instead of being a burden, was really a benefaction; for the stock-holders thus created by the paternal care of His Majesty, would stand upon a different footing from any other stock holder; for they would draw treble dividends: - first, from the earning of the road; and next upon the principle that a "penny saved is a penny gained," in paying at the rate of $1,000 instead of $10,000 annually for transportation of produce to market: - and last, in the increase of value which their lands derive from the existence of the road. Certain states in my native "sunny south" adopted this system: it worked like a charm and produced magic effects.

Another pillar to the superstructure which His Majesty is so nobly striving to raise, is a revision of the revenue laws, in homage of free trade: and the establishment of the warehousing system.

These measures, with colonization, will make us great; and the undersigned having some little knowledge of a practical sort, connected with them, hold, it together with the homage due from the most loyal of subjects, at the service of Their Majesties

M.F. Maury

Subjects:

Mexico—History
Correspondence

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