Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 21, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 July 1878 — HOME TRUTHS FOR Home Consumption [ARTICLE]

HOME TRUTHS FOR Home Consumption

Facts and Considerations For All the People to Deliberate and Act Upon. Riverside, HL, July 1, 1878. In a recent conversation with a prominent journalist, and a gentleman occupying a position of great influence in the city of Chicago, he made the assertion that our national greenback currency was unconstitutional. I have given it careful research and consideration, and herewith present a few facts and reflections drawn from general information and reference to historic colonial causes of the formation of our Government, the object for, and the ways and means by, which it was established ; its constitutional provisions for development, preservation and perpetuity. The judicial constructions and explanations of the powers of the legislative department, under its provisions, are found in the United States Supreme Court reports and financial authorities, among which are those of Spaulding. Colwell and W. A. Berkie, of Grand-Rapids, Mich. The latter is invaluable as a concise compilation of financial history—especially that of our own country—with valuable statistics, and should be in every public and private library. As this subject is second to no other in its influence on the general welfare and prosperity of all, it demands close investigation and thorough consideration. Our national treasury notes, made full legaltender money for all public and private dues, are not only constitutional, but the most convenient and substantial that, as a nation, we can possibly acquire—based as they are upon all the realty, wealth and industries of the nation. When its merits are familiar to all, it will form one of the strongest bonds of common unity between the various sections of our country, for the preservation of which every citizen will be bound by the most indissoluble ties of selfinterest ;to protect and preserve, one of the most potent influences for promoting the industries of our country, and the general welfare and happiness of the people. Among the many potent colonial grievances of the founders of our Government I find prominent the abolition by the Crown of colonial laws making their bills of credit legal-tender money for the payment of all public and private debts —a right they had exercised from 1690, until abrogated by the Crown in the New England colonies in 1751 and against all others in 1763. Dr. Franklin, by diplomacy, obtained permission in 1773 to make them receivable for taxes and debts due the colonies that issued them. He stated to the British Board of Trade that when paper money was first issued in Pennsylvania, it gave new life to business, promoted the settlement of new lands, greatly increased the inhabitants, and increased the exportation to England more than ten-fold. I understand it to be a high maxim of judicial wisdom that the intent of the act is the life essence of all obligations, and that the letters of a contract are as dependent upon the intent or spirit that gave vitality to those letters as the physical form of man is dependent on the spirit pervading its tissues, to give it life and force in the performance of its functions. In 1690 Massachusetts issued £7,000 in 10shilling notes legal tender to the treasury. They wore ever at par with gold, and faithfully performed all the functions of money. In 1755 the colony of Virginia issued a paper money, based on a specific tax, which never depreciated a farthing below the commodities of gold or silver. After the close of the Revolution, the colony of North Carolina issued a large amount of legal-tender paper money. Its legal-tender clause was, of course, abrogated by the adoption of the United States constitution, but it was receivable for all debts due the State—and some 400,000 or 500,000 of those dollars remained in circulation over twenty years—at par with gold and silver. Thomas Jefferson said, in his letters to Mr. Eppes, vol. 6, of his works: “Treasury bills bottomed on taxes—bearing or not bearing interest—as may be found necessary, thrown into circulation, will take the place of so much gold and silver. Bank paper must be suppressed and the circulation restored to the nation, where it belongs.” Franklin said: “Any other well-founded credit is as much an equivalent as gold and silver. Paper money, well founded, has great advantages over gold and silver.”

Sec. 8 of our national constitution empowers Congress: “To levy and collect texes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States. “To borrow money on the credit of the United States. “To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several States and with the Indian tribes. “To coin money and regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures. . . . “To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any department or officers thereof.” In rhe decision of the legal-tender cases the United States court says that “the acts of Congress known as the Legal-Tender acts are constitutional when applied to contracts made before their passage. They are also valid as applied to contracts made since”—ll Wallace, 682, and 12 Wallace, 457—which has twice been affirmed. —13 Wallace, 604, and 15 Wallace, 195. In confirmation of ■ that decision, Justice Strong said—l 2 Wall., 457—that “the Judiciary should presume, until the contrary is shown, that there has been no transgression by Congress. . . . Such has always been the rule”—4Binuey, 123. “It must be remembered that for weighty reasons it has been assumed as a principle in construing constitutions by the Supreme Court ®f the United States, by this court, and by every other court of reputation in the United States, that an act of the Legislature is not to be declared void unless the violation of the constitution is so manifest as to leave no reasonable doubt. ’

In the case of Fletcher vs. Peck—6 Crouch, 87 —Chief Justice Marshall, who was intimate with the framers of our constitution, said: “It is not on slight implication and vague conjecture that the Legislature is to be pronounced to have transcended its powers and its acts to be considered void—the opposition between the constitution and the law should be such that the Judge feels a strong conviction of their incompatibility with each other.” In Ist Wheaton, 326, he said : “ The constitution unavoidably deals in general language. It did not suit the purpose of the people, in framing this great Charter of our liberties, to provide for minute specifications of its power, or to declare the means by which those powers should be carried into execution.”

In 4th Wheaton, 405, that “a constitution, to contain an accurate detail of all the subdivisions of which its great powers will admit, and of all the means by which it may be carried into execution, would partake of the prolixity of a political code, and would scarcely be embraced, by the human mind. It would probably never be understood by the public. Its nature, therefore, requires that only Its great outlines should be marked ; its import, objects designated, and the minor ingredients which compose these objects be deduced from the nature of those objects themselves.”

In 6th Wheaton, 414—that ‘ * America has chosen to be, in many respects, and to many persons, a nation, and for all these purposes her Government is complete; for all these objects it is supreme; it can, then, in effecting these objects, control all individuals or Governments within the American territory. ... A constitution is framed for ages to come, and is designed to approach immortality as near as mortality can approach it. It is exposed to storms and tempests, and its framers must be unwise statesmen, indeed, if they have not provided it, as far as its nature will permit, with all the means of self-preservation from the perils it is sure to encounter. . . . When the law is not prohibited and is really calculated to effect any of the objects intrusted to the Government, to undertake here to inquire into the degree of its necessity would be to pass the line which circumscribes the judicial department, and to tread on legislative ground. This court disclaims all pretense to such power.” And in 4th Wheaton, 421, he said: “ Let the end be legitimate; let it be within the scope of the constitution, and all the means

which are appropriate, which are plainly adapted to that end, and which are not prohibited, but consistent with the letter and spirit of the constitution, are constitutional.” Section 3,588 of the Legal Tender act, says: “ United States notes shall be lawful money, and a legal tender in payment for all debts public and private, except duties on unports and interest on the public debt.” It passed both houses of Congress, was approved by President Lincoln, with the sanction of his Cabinet , and was baptized in the blood of our soldiers, in our army and navy, furnished them fool, raiment, supplies and munitions, provided for their families, educated their children, and saved the integrity of our nation, crowned our soldiers with laurels of vistory, provided them with ample capital, on their return to peaceful vocations, to prosperously engage in congenial pursuits. It has been unqualifiedly confirmed and twice reaffirmed by the Supreme Court of the United States and by the Supreme Courts of fifteen States, all but one that have passed upon it Adopted by the people, and acceptably and profitably used for fifteen years ; giving unparalleled prosperity to the productive industries of our country, until arch traitors to our prosperity in high positions of trust and honor, who, yielding (some_ through avarice, others in stupidity) to insidious allurements of scheming emissaries of moneyed autocrats, wantonly extirpated a large portion of it, and all the dollars of our daddies—causing bankruptcy, desolation and despair—until vast and rapidly increasing numbers are freely imbibing the ancestral spirit of their forefathers—which has new assumed an intensity that will not yield nor compromise—the just and inalienable rights of the people. The constitutional obligation of Congress is as imperative to provide for their “general welfare,” as it is to “provide for their defense ; as imperative as to “levy and collect taxes,” duties, imposts, and excises, and to pay the debts of the nation, and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers.” The people will resent the abrogation of their right to make their treasury notes legal tender, and receivable for all domestic obligations, both public and private, with the full force of their supreme power at the ballot box, with as much force and tenacity as their fathers did tho abrogation of like colonial laws, with the cartridge box.

They have partaken of the fruits thereof, and know that they are nutritious and good to promote their general welfare, prosperity, ana happiness. At the time of the formation of our constitution there existed but a confederation of various colonies, with representatives, entertaining conflicting views as to what power or privileges should be entertained by the several States, and what delegated to the General Government. It was a Hamiltonian aim to virtually form a kingdom, ‘making the Presidential tenure of office for life; the Jeffersonian, to form a republic, with a limited tenure of office. There were numerous other grave differences, and it was the manifestation of great wisdom by the leading spirits of conciliation that they adopted but few constitutional barriers, and those pertaining only to fundamental principles, leaving to the people in future days the right to adjust and regulate other potent matters as the dictates of experience might suggest, having provided the means for an expression, of their requirements through their legislative representatives, and recreant indeed to their trusts are those representatives and executive chiefs who heed not the expressed will of their •onstituents. The first declaration of principles expressed by the founders of our Government were that the “inalienable rights of the people were life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their powers from the consent of the governed.” The first expressed provisions of our constitution defining the powers of Congress are ‘ * to levy and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States ” (i. e. tbe people who constitute the body politic of the United States). Hence the constitution expressly stipulates that Congress shall provide for the general welfare of the people, as well as for their defense: as well as for “levying and collecting taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, and to make laws necessary and proper therefor.” It expressly provides that the people of individual States shall make nothing but gold and silver legal-tender money, but wisely omitted to bar the General Government of the United States from adopting such measures as the exigencies of the case or the general welfare of the people may require. It is remunerative labor, not gold, silver, or bonds, that promotes the general welfare and happiness of mankind, and enables them, without deprivation or distress, “to pay taxes, duties, 'lmposts and excises: to pay public and private debts: to provide ample sustenance and comfortable homes for families, schools for children, libraries and public halls for entertainment, and churches for all. Exchange of commodities is an essential attribute of civilization, a power that gives life and motion to its physical forces, its industries and commercial relations, so indispensible to the general welfare and happiness of mankind. Money is an attribute of exchange; an equivalent used as a balance wheel to regulate and promote exchange of commodities; a measure of value of commodities; a barometer of confidence among men. When the amount of money in circulation meets the wan's of trade, each has confidence in the ability of ethers to get what they need, but when it is contracted below the demands of business, and financial experts know that it does not exist, then bankers who have issued three demand currency dollars for each one of legal tender they possess—or profess to —lose their confidence in the ability (not integrity) of their customers, and suddenly withdraw their usual discounts, depriving business men of means to pay their debts ; confidence fails; business men fail; banks fail to pay their three demand dollars with one legal tender; corporations fail; industry fails of means to pay ; financial disaster and human deprivation and distress twi,

Money represents ideal values; its standard is regulated by ideal conceptions of the people using it, or the power using it must have the iorce to cause its acceptance. Uncivilized tribes use shells, beads, etc. Heathen nations use metallic coins. As civilization advanced coin was found inadequate to meet the wants of commercial exchange, and, to meet the ideal conceptions of that age, a currency was founded on a coin basis—issuing three or more dollars for one of coin—which has for centuries been the basis of bank circulation—very truly characterized by Sir Robert Peel as “ a relic of feudal daysthey are mute vassals of despotic, feudal lords, who hold their air- castles by the eonfidence they can gain with some, and the power they hold over others of their serfs. They are inadequate to meet the legitimate requirements of freemen in progressive republics, deriving their powers from the consent of the governed, and the developing genius of the age—constitutionaUy “ promoting the progress of science and useful arts.”

We have a population of 45,000,000 people, possessing about $40,000,000,000 of realty and personal wealth, and a legitimate annual industrial production of about $6,000,000,000 with an indebtedness, including national, State, municipal, corporate, and individual, of about $10,000,000,000, bearing an interest of about 6 per cent, per annum, amounting to $600,000,000 annually, with an annual current national expense of about $150,000,000 per annum, besides interest on national bonds, and the current expenses of States, municipalities, corporations, and individuals—all dependent on our circulating medium, the volume of which is inadequate to meet the imperative demands for the payment of interest, maturing obligations, and give remunerative value to our immense and rapidly-increasing pro ductions, and properly facilitate their commercial exchange, and maintain and provide for the proper distribution of sustenance for all the people and facilities for compensative employment, requisites upon which the stability of our Government is largely dependent, and the general welfare of the people imperatively demands. The discovery and application of steam, electricity, chemical combinations and laborsaving machinery have increased the volume and power of production and the facilities of commerce far beyond the feudal capacity of a currency based on a metallic standard to provide for the imperative needs of commerce and the general welfare of the industries of the people, as is clearly demonstrated by the financial condition of all countries in the world adhering to that standard. Under it business and the prosperity of the people will ever be (as they ever have been) subject to violent fluctuations, as the greed of their lords shall dictate or the fear of their vassals may produce. Such ever has been, and ever will be, the case as long as their issue is three or more times greater than the standard, redeemable on call. In all civilized nations money is ever the

product of statute law. All commodities or substances used as money are dependant on the legislation of Congress, Parliament or a decree cf a monarch for legal-tender power, which has ever been granted as an aid of industrial productions and their commercial exchange, or of national defense or aggression. It is the most effective power used by individuals, corporations or nations for the promotion of industrial production, commerce and general prosperity. Upon the power of our na-tional-treasury notes were we dependant dur,tag our late war; to them were we indebted for our country’s prosperity at its close, and to their contraction and attempted abrogation are we indebted for the universal stagnation of business and the consequent deprivation and misery engendered thereby, which has created and is diffusing an intensity of feeling that has never been equaled save when the just rights of the people and the stability of our Government have been, as now, in peril. Vast and increasing numbers of the constituents of our Government are, for want of employment, unabfe to pay their taxes. Individuals, corporations and municipalities are unable to pav their obligations. Yet the administrators of our Government, under the guise and in the name of fairness and honor, despotically endeavor to govern and control the will of our people, that our limited circulating medium should be converted into millions more of interest-bearing bonds, and its place supplied by feudalistic promises, of despotic lords enthroned in national banks, that they may compel their vassals to not *nly pay the interest on those bonds, but such tribute as their greed may dictate within the limits of laws made by their friendly patrons.

Continental money is often referred to as an illustration of the value of national issues; but such advocates fail to state that the Continental Congress—that issued them—possessed no power to make them legal tender or receivable for taxes. As that eminent jurist, Judge Story, says, “They only possessed the power of recommendation.” They could not even get the consent of all the colonies to levy an impost duty of 5 per cent, on importations and prize goods. Yet that money enabled those patriots to successfully prosecute a war with one of the strongest nations of Europe i'ne nest historic illustration of the power of money founded on the credit of a nation is that of the republic of Venice, known as the credits of the Bank of Venice, founded and sustained on tbe realty, wealth and industrial commerce of that republic (similar to pur greenbacks or treasury notes made a full legal tender). It consisted of using the evidences of debt of that republic as money instead of coin, or a promise to pay coin that, in fact, did not exist (as some of our golden statesmen(?) advocate, and feudalistic financiers practice. It was the bulwark of their power in time of war ; the promoter of their commerce and prosperity in time of peace, which was unparalleled by any nation in that age of the world—using a metallic standard—and existed for over 600 years, good in all their channels of commerce at home and abroad, and, because of its convenience and safety, maintained a premium of 20 per cent, over gold and silver for over two centuries, and was increased in volume from time to time as the needs of her industries and commerce required, rendering the Government indissoluble from internal causes and its people renowned as the peer of all nations for their industrial and commercial prosperity, and the cultivation of art, science and intellectual attainments. It continued its advancement until Napoleon crushed it in the gratification of his monarchical ambition. History fails to record one word of complaint from its patrons, one word of detraction from any source. The palatial edifices of Venice, her canals, bridges and commercial harbor exist to-day, monuments of her industries, fostered and stimulated by the wise financial policy of that republic. The mendicants that now infest the streets of Venice, the brigands that infest adjacent mountain retreats, are the legitimate offspring of its abrogation and consequent destruction of those industries, and our tramps are the offspring of the contraction of our circulating curraney. Labor sustains a similar relation to a proper monetary circulation that the respiratory organs of the human system do to the circulation of the blood. Abnormally check the respiratory organs, and disease and disorganization inevitably result ; abnormally curtail the employment of labor, and financial stagnation, distress and commercial disaster must ensue, retarding the advancement of civilization. Money placed in a Government bond is as useless, to industry as a strong man placed in solitary confinement for debt.

It is a moral and physical impossibility to keep the industries and commercial relations of this country in a prosperous and substantial condition, such as will give remunerative employment to the people, by a monetary system based on a pure metallic standard. On such a standard it ever has been, and ever will be, subject to violent periodic fluctuations, because the standard is inadequate to supply the imperative requirements of production, preservation and commercial interchange. The Bank of England, founded on a metallic base, backed by the full power of that kingdom, has been compelled to suspend specie payments eight times since 1783, and only saved many other times by a liberal supply of exchequer bills. It was suspended at one time for near a quarter of a century. England’s noblest statesman, William Pitt, at first opposed its suspension, but on observing its results characterized the event as like finding a mountain of gold. It was a sad event for the great mass of the people that it ever resumed specie payment. England was never more prosperous than during that period; 3,000,000 acres of wild lands were made productive; the exportation of cotton goods alone increased from £7,000,000 in 1801 to £27,000,000 in 1822; the revenues increased from £20,000,000 to £50,000,000 per annum for eighteen years, and the people were able and willing to pay them without deprivation and distress. But to enable the bank to resume specie payments they adopted the despotic practice (imitated by McCulloch and Sherman) of contracting that most essential element of prosperity, the circulating medium, indispensable to the productive ana commercial industries of the people, reducing three-fourths of the land-holders and nine-tentbs of the artisans, mechanics and laborers to a comparative vassalage, and transforming productive lands to hunting grounds, for the gratification of a hereditary titled aristocracy and a banditti of moneyed autocrats, who were prominent instigators, aiders and abettors of our late rebellion, corruptors and hood-winkers of the leaders thereof as well as of our financial agents, who procured, by insidious frauds, many hundreds of milliions of our Government bonds at 80 to 60 cents on the dollar when our Government was in peril promoted by their agencies with means and ways as fertile and poi ent as those of penitent Uncle Daniel or crafty Gould, of Wall street fame. President Lincoln, with intuitive wisdom in his message Dec. 2, ’6l, said, in reference to “the first principles of popular government, the rights of the people” and the relations of capital and labor, that “ Monarchy itself is sometimes hinted at as a possible refuge from the power of the people. In my present position I would scarcely be justified were I to omit raising a warning voice against this approach of returning despotism. . . . There is one point to which I ask brief attention. It is (he effort to place capital on an equal footing with, if not above, labor in the structure of the Government. . . . Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital and deserves much the higher consideration. . . . No men living are more worthy to be trusted than those who toil up from poverty, none less inclined to take or touch aught which they have not honestly earned. Let them beware of surrendering a political power which they already possess, and which, if surrendered, will surely be used to close the door of advancement to such as they, and to fix new disabilities and burdens upon them, till all of liberty shall be lost. . . . “ There are already among us those who, if the the Union be preserved, will live to see it contain 250,000,000. The struggle of to-day is not altogether for to-day; it is for a vast future also. At that session of Congress, March 17, 1862, an act was passed making $60,000,000 of demand treasury notes, previously provided for, full legal-tender true national currency—which has ever been at par with gold and silver. The necessities of the country were then imperative for more men, equipments and supplies, and we had within our own country all the materials required, but the Government was destitute of means to pay for them, its current expenses near $2,000,000 per day, and even brief delay portended disaster and direful consequences. In that emergency Hon. Thaddeus Stevens presented to the House a bill “To provide means to defray the expenses of the Government,” providing for the issue of $900,000,000 more full legal-tender notes, convertible at the pleasure of the holder, which, as he expressed it, “produced a howl among the money changers as

hideous as that sent up by their Jewish cousins when they were kicked out of the temple.’ The bill passed the House, but when it came before the Senate it there met the subtle influence of Belmont and his satellites, Secretary Sherman and prominent bankers of New England, Now York and Philadelphia. Through their corrupt influence it was shorn of its highest attribute —its full legal-tender power—and rendered subservient to their schemes, ever subject to such depreciation as their greed chose from time to time to inflict. A conference committee of both houses was chosen to harmonize their differences. Senator Sherman, of Ohio, was a member of the Senate committee, and Hon. Thaddeus Stevens Chairman of the House committee. At the close of the final conference, that noble old commoner returned to the House with his hat and cane in hie hand —with warm tears of humanity coursing down his venerable cheeks ; meeting Judge Kelley, of Pennsylvania, in the rotunda, he said. “Yes, we had to yield; the Senate was stubborn. We did not yield until we found that the country must be lost or the bauks gratified, and we have sought to save the country in spite of the cupidity of its wealthier citizens.” Prophetic were some of his expressions in the discussion of that bill; he said: “When, a few years hence, the people shall have been brought to ' bankruptcy by iheir unregulated enterprise, I shall have the satisfaction to know’ that I attempted to prevent it.” Sherman’s policy has inflicted severe penalties on energy and enterprise, and paid a high premium on bold, audacious robbery of the people who sustained the integrity of our nation by moneyed autocrat s, who have no sympathy witn or respect for the principles of our Government, or the welfare of the people who protect and support it. It was a maxim with President Lincoln that our Government was formed by, of and for the people. They preserved it from ruin solely with the aid of our national currency. It paid our armies and navy, and for their equipments and supplies. While there was even a shadow of uncertainty of the preservation of our Union our currency and bonds were taken almost exclusively by laborers, mechanics, farmers, and manufacturers; patriots who regarded the principles of self-government of more value than silver or gold, their duty to preserve the Union more sacred than life.

Sherman’s policy enabled the money power to wield its subtle influence to depreciate our national currency and securities preparatory to buying them at an enormous discount. Prior to 1864, the purchasers of our bonds were principally men of small means, patriots, determined to save the country at all hazards. When all reasonable doubts of their value had been removed by the success of our armies in the Southwest, "and Gen. Grant had been given full command of the field, then capitalists laid their plans for gathering the fruits of victory. They had secured and fortified their stronghold, and weakened the people’s power by making their currency only a partial legal tender, which enabled them to cause gold to fluctuate without an honest cause in May, 1864, from 168 to 190, in June from 189 to 251, in July from 222 to 285. The motive was to create a fear of the value of our currency and boi.ds, in the minds of the honest, patriots'who bad taken them in the darker days * of our country’s peril, and thus enable.capitalits to secure them at 35 to 60 cents on the dollar. Then they were sought, for the formation of national banks, and the investment of Rothschilds’ funds.

Our patriots had taken them at par for equipments and supplies for our army and navy; soldiers and sailors had taken tnem at par for perilous services;invalids, widows and orphans had taken them at par for pensionary compensation, fur loss of health, husbands, and fathers—privations, and bereavements that gold or silver, money or bonds, can i:cver recompense. How was it with capitalized bondholders and bankers? The following statements illustrate their agonized emoluments. The official reports of 1,955 national banks, Sept. 1, 1873, show an aggregate capital of $418,100,591. Currency furnished free at the expense of tax-payer553'3,968,279 Their real capital only 134 132,672 Surplus earnings 118,113,848 Net earnings from March to September, 1873 33,122,600 Earnings ou real capital... .51 per cent, per annum. On real capital, and surplus earnings added 26 per cent, per annum.

In 1869 then - reports show a profit on real capital of 55 per cent, per annum; on real capi - tai aud surplus of 31 per cent, per annum. Wo have paid those banks as interest on untaxed bonds held as security for currency furnished at the expense of tax-payers $232,837,556, of which $224 278,271 was paid in gold and SB,559,285 in currency. But their days of prosperity waned as the fatal day of resumption approached. They made frantic efforts to avoid, and be relieved of, their taxes; and their solicitor, Secretary Sherman, asks Congress to authorize them to’ hold untaxed, interest-bear-ing bonds a* reserve funds. It is not the legitimate business of banks to issue a circulating medium. It ever has been and ever will be a source of jeopardy to them and their customers when financial storms arise. Jefferson struck the key-note when he said treasury notes bottomed on taxes will take the place of so much gold and silver. Bank notes must be suppressed, and the circulation restored to the nation, where it belongs. Since 1862 taxpayers have paid untaxed bondholders for interest $1,588,279,452, and to them and Syndicate bankers as commissions, usurious discounts and premiums, over $500,000,000 ; so that they have cost us over $2,000,000.000, exceeding the present amount of our national debt, while the Rothschilds, among the largest holdei s of our bonds, arc reputed tohave invested $100,000,000 in English land the past year. ... To a largo and rapidly increasing number it is as patent as the rising of the sun that every true principle of fairness, honor, justice, equity and humanity demands that we should establish our national finances on the realty, wealth and industries of our nation, and make the volume adequate to our industrial production and commerce in time of peace and our necessities in time of war, without requiring any violent change of base, or pampering to the greed of a relentless and unscrupulous money power to meet emergencies. It will promote the advancement of civilization, render our Government indissoluble from internal causes, enable the people, without deprivation and distress, to pay their taxes, duties, imposts and excises, furnish remunerative employment for all, and constitutionally provide for their common defense and general welfare.

The march of civilization is ever onward and upward ; impeding obstacles may, for a while, obstruct its currents, but its cumulative force is omnipotent and indcstructable, and will, in due time, annihilate all obstacles, and a science of political economy will be inaugurated that will equitably bestow the natural riches of the universe upon all the people thereof, as they qualify themselves to obtain and utilize them.

That sage of inspiration, “Junius,” said that “the ruin or prosperity of a state depends so much on the administration of a Government that, to be acquainted with a Ministry, we need only to observe the condftion of the people.” The financial condition of the people, their industrial corporations and municipalities, speak voluminously in condemnation of the financial administration of our Government; and now is the day, now is the hour, for the people, by, of and’for whom our Government was formed, to sound thb alarm—from the rostrum —from house and hill tops—and ca'l all the hardy machinists, busy operatives, sturdy miners, active train men, yeomanry, and all the unemployed, and organize them for prosperity —for ourselves and posterity—in national-cur-, rency clubs. We should Sound the bugles, through the land, To sturdy men, strong of hand. Beat the drums and rill the bands, Tune the fife and call the rolls, And firmly march to the polls. We should rally around our old flag, and na-tional-currency banners in battalions, to save our c mntry’s industries and our liberties. A pure republican Government that takes the husband from his family, the sustaining son from his aged parents, widowed mother or dependent sister, with its irresistible arm, and compels them to endure all the vicissitudes of war, confiscating their property and lives when necessary for its preservation, will in time of peace protect their lives and property, hold the money power subservient to their industries, and provide them with a national currency founded on their industrial wealth, which will ever be good as gold to them, ample in time of peace, and as unlimited as their blood in time of war, and provide through their postal agents for saving the earnings of its laboring people, invalid i pldiers, widows and orphans. Politicians who fail to promote those interests must take back seats. Very truly, B. F. Shotwell. ♦« 2 = American silver quarters are cut in two by the Mexicans and freely circulated as “bits” (12|c.) on the Rio Grande frontier.