People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 November 1895 — A BELIEVER IN GOLD. [ARTICLE]

A BELIEVER IN GOLD.

JUDGE ALDREDGE ADDRESSES BANKERS' ASSOCIATION. The Position of the Gold Hen Clearly Defined—Control of Coinage the Memanre of Stability—Government Moat Not Loee It. Atlanta, Ga., Oct 17. —The second day’s session of the American Bankers’ Association was called to order yesterday by President Odell. Chairman E. W. Pullen read an extensive report from the executive council in reference to a number of proposed changes in the wording of the constitution. The question of annual dues was referred back to the council to be reported on today, and the minor amendments suggested were adopted. Judge George N. Aldredge, of Dallas, Tex., delivered an address on the currency, which was received with enthusiastic applause, and was pronounced the hit of the convention.

“The proposition that this government should coin silver for the world in unlimited amount at double its market value, is so repugnant to the common sense of mankind,” said Mr. Aldredge, “that it ought to be unnecessary to discuss it, and would be, but for the fact that a portion of our people have been mislead by appeals to their prejudice and by the specious reasoning of sophists.” He declared that the leading nations of the earth, after testing silver for hundreds of years, voluntarily adopted the single gold standard, and that no nation today lias the silver standard from choice. The gold standard advocates believe in gold as a standard with the largest possible safe use of silver among the people. The 16 to 1 men believe in the so-called double standard and we are driven by this law to the use of silver alone. All gold standard countries use large amounts of silver and no silver standard country uses any gold whatever.

As the practical question is the use of the metals, it follows that we are the bimetallists and 16 to 1 people are the monometallists. Hence the battle that is to be fought to a finish next year, is whether we will remain under a gold standard, with actual bimetallism in use among the people, gold and silver circulating freely without discrimination against either, or shall we have a so-called double standard at the mints and nowhere else, with silver monometallism in actual use. The battle, he said, is between substance and shadow, between those who want bimetallism in fact and those who want it in name only. We are the friends of silver money, who would bring to its aid the power of the Government to keep it good and they are its enemies, who, by unlimited coinage, would take from it the guaranty of parity by the government, and thereby degrade it to its market value. Our government has been and is now coining silver at 16 to 1, and can do this because under the law it can restrict the amount coined, and being vested with this control, it undertakes to make every dollar good money. The moment the government loses control of coinage, confidence is gone, and a silver dollar then rests on its merits, and is worth 50 cents.

In refutation of the claim that gold has appreciated and depreciated prices, he pointed out that no two articles have declined at the same time or in the same degree, nor has any article mentioned uniformly depressed, and, therefore, but one controlling cause can be assigned for these results. Continuing he said: “Interest has declined since 1872 in my part of the country from 3 per cent per month to 6 and 8 per cent per annum. There is no denying the fact that the gold bugs did that. The south and west have saved more on the decline of interest than they have lost on the decline in wheat and cotton. Interest is always low under an honest standard, among an honest people, where money is plentiful. It is lower in London than in any other spot on the globe, because her standard is stable and her commercial integrity has been the care of her statesmen and her people for ages past.” Mr. Aldredge charged that it is repudiation of debt and not coinage that the 16 to 1 man is after, and said in conclusion: “Allow me to say that our country is in no danger of repudiation. This 16 to 1 clamor is but one of the manifestations of hard times brought on by the late panic. The country is rapidly advancing. Our factories are taxed to the utmost with orders and wages of their employes have been everywhere voluntarily raised. Prices recently depressed by the panic are improving. The American people are honest and patriotic. Upon this rock we build our faith, and all ages and agencies of truth are ours for the superstructure.”