People's Pilot, Volume 3, Number 3, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 July 1893 — Our Plea. [ARTICLE]

Our Plea.

Until people learn what money is, how it is made, its absolute necessity in civilized life, and the power wielded by him that controls it, there is little hope of prosperity among them. Money is not a natural product, nor is it a v mechanical device. It is only a creation of law. Let us illustrate this point. Some may think gold and silver are money, getting that idea from the fact that that is the principal use made of those metals. But such is not the fact, for while gold of certain weight and fineness is money in Great B/itain, it is not money inUhin#. While silver is money ia it is not money in Eng-

land. The law and the law only of those countries make gold money in the one and silver in the other. In France, gold, silver and paper with the government stamp, form the money. Then money is made or created by law, and is the soverign act of the whole people, acting in their governmental capacity. A government is a soverign. It may make its money of anything, it is under no necessity or obligation to consult anyone in regard to the matter of which it is made and when made. It is only money within the territorial jurisdiction of that government. The moment a dollar or an eagle crosses the boundary line of the United States, they are no longer money. We are stating just what and nothing more, every reputable writer on finance has said from Aristotle

to the present day. Even so acceptable an authority to our Republican friends as John Sherman said that the government could put eight grains of gold in a coin and stifmp it a dollar, and it would be a dollar. The constitution has placed the entire control of the money of the Nation in the hands of congress. This has been affirmed and reaffirmed by the Supreme court. The constitution having given to congress absolute control over money, the material of which it is made, its legal characteristics, and the amount, the People’s Party maintain that it should be exercised for the benefit of the whole people, and not as at present, for a class. It is estimated that there are about fifteeen hundred millions of people on the earth. There are about sixty-five millions in the United States, or about Jime twenty third part of the earth’s inhabitants. The most liberal estimate that we have seen of the amount of gold and silver among all nations is that there is about seven billions, divided about equally between the two metals. We are less than one twentieth of the globe’s inhabitants, but suppose that owing to our superior advantages, that we are able to bring and keep among us one seventh of the world's supply of the preoious metals, it would give us only about fifteen dollars per capita; whereas, we ought to have fifty, which is the People’s Party’s demand. Fifteen from fifty, leaves thirty five to be supplied. Now who shall furnish this additional thirty five dollars per capita, if furnished at all. The Republicans say, receive state, county, municipal and railroad bonds, and let the banks issue it upon them. To this, the People’s Party objects, Ist, because it is a class privilege; 2nd, because it would make the money too cosfly: 3rd, it places the contract of the money supply in the hands of bankers, who can and will make a panic as now. The Democrats would furnish the additional thirty five dollars per capita by removing the tax from the state bank issues, and then to resume business. All the ob- , jections urged against the Re-

publican plan are of equal force against the Democratic plan, with two additional objections of a very serious character: Ist, they could not be made a legal tender, and nothing should be allow r ed to circulate as money or currency that is not a legal tender. 2nd, they would not have government backing, hence their liability to depreciate and unfitness for general circulation. Observe the superiority of our plan for supplying the deficiency over that of both -the old parties. We would have the government exercise its sovereign right in this matter, issue its own notes, made a full legal tender the coined credit of the whole people, and put into circulation by paying it out to meet the current expenses of the government. This is a constitutional way, an economical way, and one free from the objection of class legislation and class

privilege. Such money has the sanction of more than eighty years of experience, in all which time no pi an has lost a dollar by using it as money, nor has it ever depreciated, save where it had been made unable to perform the full monetary function by reason of legal enactment. The People’s Party advocates the government greenback dollar, brave and loyal in war, and honest and industrious in peace, a democratic dollar. (To be continued.)