Make France Great Again

"Damn it! How could I forget this!"

After reading the newspaper, Jerome Bonaparte patted his forehead gently with his hand and muttered something in a low voice.

A few years ago, he had been thinking about the economic crisis in the United States of America.

In order to trigger the economic crisis in the United States of America faster, he mined and speculated in real estate in the United States of America, and even teamed up with Britain to short California gold in the international market.

Who would have thought that the strength of the United States of America would be far more durable than he imagined. Within the time period expected by Jérôme Bonaparte (according to expectations, the United States of America should detonate an economic crisis from the end of 1855 to the beginning of 1856), the United States of America would not No crisis occurred.

Feeling a little disappointed, Jerome Bonaparte also began to pay less attention to America. In addition, Jerome Bonaparte had many other government affairs at that time.

Over time, he gradually forgot about the economic crisis in the United States of America.

It was not until today, when the secretary's office sent him a newspaper, that he was reminded of the economic crisis in the United States of America.

However, what he didn't expect was that the economic crisis in the United States of America would still follow the trajectory of history.

He didn't know whether it was the revision of history or the reason for the United States of America itself.

"Let me think about it, what is the reason for the economic crisis in the United States of America?" Jerome Bonaparte muttered to himself, "I remember it seems to be because of the railway fever, right?"

In order to verify his conjecture, Jerome Bonaparte got up from the sofa and came to the desk. He opened the bottom drawer of the desk and took out the notebook in the drawer to read.

"Economic crisis...economic crisis!" Jérôme Bonaparte muttered quietly, turning his hands backwards.

Soon, Jerome Bonaparte turned to the page he wanted.

"That's right! That's it!" Looking at the contents of the notebook, Jérôme Bonaparte's mouth showed a smile, and then he sighed to himself: "My memory is really good!"

According to the contents recorded in the notebook, a massive economic crisis will begin in the Americas this fall and then spread to the entire world.

(Actually, only Europe, America, and South America are affected by the economic crisis. Less industrial areas are basically affected by this economic crisis, and there is no major impact.)

The reason for the economic crisis is the uncontrolled development of the railway industry in the United States of America.

Under the rough railway planning of the United States, the railways of the United States of America expanded to 33,000 kilometers in just 10 years, exceeding the combined length of the Kingdom of Britain and the French Empire (Britain built 8,000 kilometers, France built 12,000 kilometers)

Under this abnormal development, the railroad bubble in the United States of America is getting bigger and bigger.

If the United States of America built its railways on its own, it would not have much impact on the world economy, and the damage it would cause would not affect the entire world.

However, the United States of America did not rely on its own strength to build such a long railway. The rails, sleepers, and steel plates they used to build the railway were not from the United States of America, but from the Kingdom of Britain.

Not only did the steel companies of the United States of America fail to reap dividends from railway construction, but they were steadily defeated by the British's continuous offensive of cheap steel.

Many steel companies are on the verge of bankruptcy under the pressure of cheap British steel.

For a sovereign country, it is unimaginable that its own companies cannot defeat foreign companies locally, but are suppressed by foreign companies to the brink of bankruptcy.

The reason why American steel companies face such difficulties is the low-tariff policy they implemented. Under the low-tariff policy, the British Kingdom relied on its own mature steelmaking and metallurgical technology to carry out the steelmaking technology just developed in the United States of America. Crush.

Even if the two sides are at the same technical level, the steel companies in the United Kingdom can rely on their own excellent workers to make their costs much lower than those in the United States.

With such a first-mover advantage, if late-comer countries want to achieve progress, they can only raise tariffs. After the excellent products of first-mover countries enter their own markets, they will no longer have an advantage.

Domestic companies can take advantage of this gap period to develop.

After the enterprise develops to a certain scale, tariffs can be appropriately reduced to put pressure on domestic enterprises, so that they can make further progress.

However, such an approach only exists in a sovereign country with relatively concentrated power.

Not at all appropriate for getting the United States of America right now.

The power of the current federal government of the United States of America is much smaller than that of the United States of America before the Civil War, not to mention that of the United States of America after World War II.

At this time, the United States of America was not so much a federal country as a country with only slightly more concentrated power than the Confederacy.

Speaking of which, I have to mention the history of the United States of America.

The federal government of the United States of America was originally established because the thirteen state governments, under pressure from Britain, united and "voluntarily" transferred their powers to the federal government.

In other words, the essence of the founding of the United States of America was that the thirteen local princes could not defeat the "Emperor" from Europe, so they had to stick together for warmth.

It is not like France, relying on a corner of the Paris Basin to conquer other princes throughout France and become the local boss of the entire France.

Therefore, in the Constitution of the United States of America, each state has the right to secede from the United States of America.

At this period, the power of the state government was equivalent to that of a small country.

Except for the power of diplomacy, coinage, and the military, the state governments of each state basically have all other rights in their hands.

(State governments just do not have the right to establish field armies. National Guards and private armies are still very common in the United States of America. Moreover, the regular army of the United States of America during this period only numbered tens of thousands.)

The current federal government is not so much a central government as it is a political consultation platform for state governments.

The reason why raising tariffs cannot be implemented by the federal government is because the southern states and northern states have differences on the tariff issue.

For industrial owners in the north, raising tariffs can effectively protect the interests of their factories, and they still agree with it.

However, for the slave owners in the South, raising tariffs was absolutely unacceptable.

Once the United States of America raises tariffs, the Kingdom of Britain will also raise tariffs on the United States of America.

In this case, the cotton in the hands of slave owners would face economic losses due to the British Kingdom raising tariffs.

You must know that the only country in the world that can eat the cotton share of the United States of America is the Kingdom of Britain.

The northern industrial owners' behavior of raising tariffs is simply killing them.

Not to mention, the profits generated by industrial capital are much greater than those generated by agricultural capital.

In the long run, southern slaveholders will only be defeated by northern industrialists.

When the interests of southern slave owners and northern industrial owners were diametrically opposed, all the federal government could do was to reconcile the issues between the two parties as much as possible and propose terms acceptable to both parties.

However, it was not so easy to get the southern slave owners to compromise. When the federal government tried to use subsidized agriculture to offset the losses caused by the higher tariffs to the southern slave owners, so that the southern slave owners agreed to the higher tariffs.

Those congressmen representing the southern slave owners pointed to the high-end goods from Britain and France and asked the congressmen representing the northern industry in turn whether they could produce the same products as those of Britain and France in a short period of time.

Representatives of northern industrial owners, whose industry and textile industry had just entered its infancy, could only shake their heads and angrily accused representatives of southern slave owners of forcing themselves to do something difficult.

Immediately afterwards, during the voting, the representatives of the southern slave owners would use their veto votes to veto the proposal.

To southern slaveholders, the life and death of northern industrialists was of no concern to them.

Despite repeated vetoes, the proposal to raise tariffs never passed.

The United States of America had no choice but to build 33,000 kilometers of railways with the "help" of the British Kingdom's "goodwill".

The capital of the British Kingdom gradually took complete control of the steel field of the United States of America. After establishing a foothold in the steel field, British capital extended its tentacles to the banking field.

Most of the thousands of banks in the United States of America have capital from the British Kingdom.

The current United States of America can be said to be half controlled by British capital.

The present Kingdom of Britain can be said to be the only creditor nation of the United States of America.

Of course, this kind of control cannot make the United States of America a puppet of the Kingdom of Britain. At best, it can prevent the relationship between the Kingdom of Britain and the United States of America from completely breaking up.

However, the capital of the British Kingdom probably did not expect that the United States of America would also produce a steel bubble like the original United States of America, and this bubble would be even larger than the original British Kingdom.

"A crisis will occur in the autumn of 1857, and more than 5,000 companies will close down..." Jérôme Bonaparte read what he had written word for word.

In the past life, the information that I specifically looked up in order to argue with others did not expect that it would become a priceless treasure in this life. "The American banks, railways, and commercial companies that provided funds from the United Kingdom went bankrupt one after another, and the securities held by British investors Sharp depreciation..."

After Jerome Bonaparte finished reading them all, he hid the notebook in the drawer again, and he walked out of the study to stand on Basilio's platform and ordered Basilio to call the Finance Minister Adolf Fuld.

Basilio followed Jérôme Bonaparte's orders and went to the Treasury to find Adolf Fuld.

After more than an hour passed, Adolf Fuld was taken to Jerome Bonaparte's study by Basilio?

"Your Majesty, what are your orders?" Adolf Fuld asked Jerome Bonaparte respectfully.

"Fulde, come here!" Jérôme Bonaparte took care of Adolf Fuld and sat on the sofa, and then handed a newspaper to Adolf Fuld.

Adolf Fuld looked at Jerome Bonaparte doubtfully. He didn't understand what the emperor asked him to do.

"Mr. Fuld, you read the newspaper first! I have a question for you later!"