Democratic Sentinel, Volume 1, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 February 1878 — STEP BY STEP. [ARTICLE]

STEP BY STEP.

The Louisiana rotnrning board is in a tight place. Fraud is ab< it to receive its rewasd.

Matthews’ Silver resolutions f. »«s«hl the Senate and House by overwl elm majorities. Voorhees has waked them up.

The law providing for the issue of fifteen hundred million dollars of 5 20 bonds, passed February 25.1862. made them redeemable in greenbacks. John Sherman, now radical Secretary of the Treasury, then Senator from Ohio, gave his views of the contract in the following letter: United States Senate Chamber, 1 Washington, March 30, 1868. , Deab Sib—l wan glad to receive your letter. My personal interests are the same as yours, but, like you, I do not Intend to be influenced by them. My con truetlon of the law is th*' result of careful examination, and I f» el quire sure an impartial court would confirm it if the case should be tried before a court. I send you my views that we propose to repudiate or violate a promise when we offer to redeem the ’’principal” in legal tenders is erroneous. I think the bondholdi r violates his promise when be refuses to take the same kind of money he paid for the bonds. If the case is to be tested by the law I am right; if it is to be tested by Jay-Cooke's advertisements, lam wrong. I hate rej u diation or anything like it, but we ought not be deterred from what is right for fear of undeserved epithets. If under the law as it stands the holders of five-twenties can only be paid in gold, the bondholder can demand only the kind of money he paid, then he is a repudiator and extortioner to demand money mote valuable than h<» gave. Truly yors, John Shf.rman. The letter is certainly sufll ie> t y explicit for all to understand. Foreign and domestic bondholders paid for these bonds legal tenders worth at the time only 50 to 60 cents on the dollar, but soon began >o clamor that the face of the bond be paid in C'. in. In March. 1869, in compliance with the demand of the bondholders, :he contract and good faith with the people was broken; and by this tlrst and single act of concession the p< ople were robbed of not less than $500,000,000. Thit was step number one. Step number two was taken in the enactment of the law of July 14,1870, purporting to be for the refunding >f tlie national debt. It was simply an exchange of new bonds, with the eontrret of 18;,9, for the old ones. Thh was done with a view to the “maintenance of the national faith and hoi - or” with the money brokers, and to prevent the possibility of dispute on the part of the people. The demonetization of silver, on the 12th day of February, 1873,-and the consequent increase in value of bonds in the hands of the holders, was sep number three. In 1874 Will street and foreign capitalists made another demand, and step number four is revealed in the act which repealed the legal tender qualities of silver. The fiifth step was made on the 14th cay of January, 1875, in the passage of the Resumption Law, and adoption of a system for contraction of the currency. Summed up:— Step No. I.—Breaking honor and good faith with the people, in making payable in coin, what could legally, under the contract, bo paid in currency. Step No. 2.—ln behalf of foreign and domestic capitalists, ami against the people, in 1870 completing the the fraud of 1869. Step No. 3.—The demonetization oi silver in 1873, increasing the debt and making more valuable the bonds in * the hands of the holders. St»p No. 4.—The repeal, in 1874, of all legal tender qualities of silverrendering it optional with a creditor to receive it or not in payment of debt. Step No, s.—Having broken fafth with the people, increased the vt lue of bonds, depreciated the silver coin, the last step was taken in the contraction of the currency, and the designation of an early dale for resumption. These steps have been piemeditatedly taken. The wealthy have been enriched at the expense of the toiling masses. The radical party has controlled the legislation for many years past. Let the mighty people, for their own protection, bold it responsible for the financial evils which now so sorely distress the country.