People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 52, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 June 1893 — WATCH THE GREENBACK. [ARTICLE]

WATCH THE GREENBACK.

The Plutocracy Is Paving the Why for an Excuse to Call Them in and Retire Them. Wall street and the administration are determined to demonetize silver, and to quiet the west and south, which demand more money, propose state bank issues in lieu thereof. This would place the country on a gold basis. Gold would be money of settlement— it would lie the tender stipulated in all contracts—and in this coin would nil debts lie liquidated. The state bank notes cannot be made a legal tender by the power of issue, hence would not be the money of account on settlement day. Inability to obtain gold with which to liquidate indebtedness, would force a prqpe/ty settlement—the sheriff's hammer would convey to Shylock his pound of flesh. But, you say, the greenbacks, what of them? They are legal tenders, it is true. But stop. In the early hour, soon after the wild-eat note springs into existence, it will be ' said by the subsidized. press that we are finally landed on terra flrma, the country has an abundance of money, times ai'e good, everybody is prosperous, add' that, well; in a word, we do not need the greenback. Hold. Don’t get excited. ..-The greenback must go. The powers that be have so deeided. But how will they be removed? 1 Easy enough. Listen: . The greenbacks are a debt, non-inter-est bearing, it is true. The’subsidized press will suddenly set up a “consistency" howl. They • will say, substantially: “The government should liquidate its indebtedness as rapidly a» possible. The bonds are not • yet due, but the greenbacks can be retired.” Therepeal of the prohibitory tax on state bank issues means the establishment of hundreds of these banks all over the country, and these institutions wiH issue hundreds of millions of state ben I* currency. This means the demonetization of silver and the retirement of the greenbacks. Gold will then be the ottjjr legal tender. As was the case before the war, about every ten years will come the day of general settlement, when property will change hands. In other words, then will periodical financial revulsions sweep over the land. When the squall comes the mortgagee will double and treble his wealth, and the debtor-—he can go farther west.—Nonconformist.