People's Pilot, Volume 5, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 February 1896 — Next Year. [ARTICLE]

Next Year.

republican platforms in the year just named, were generally unequivocal in endorsement of the proposition to pay the five-twenties in the legal-tender money of the country. In the writer’s own state, in that year, the platform was as as follows: "The public debt made necessary by the Rebellion should be honestly paid; and all bonds issued therefor should be paid in legal tenders, commonly called greenbacks, except where, by their express terms, they provide otherwise.” On this platform senator Oliver P. Morton, of great fame and equal honesty, carried the state by a heavy majority for himself and General Grant Within six months from that time, however he yielded or was conquered—and in yielding lost the ambition of his life. The titanic knees of that great and resolute man. little acquainted with the common use of pregnant hinges, were broken, not, as the people supposed, by paralysis, but by the bludgeon of the money power! t In the recently published book called “A Coin Catechism,” by S. K. Upton, three times assistant secretary of the treasury and financial statistician of the eleventh census, the following remarkable interpretation of the coinage act of April 2, 1792, is given: “The first congress of The United States provided for the coinage of ‘silver dollars, or units, each to be of the . value of a Spanish milled dollar as the same is now current, and to contain 371.25 grains of pure silver,’ hnd fractional pieces of the same fineness and proportional weight, and gold pieces to contain 24.75 grains of pure gold to a dollar,” etc. The last clause of this Is so cunningly false as to be amusing. It is a logical and literary curiosity that it ought to be remanded to the text-books, as the finest existing example of sophism. Why did not the author go on with his quotation from the statute of 1792 and give the clause relative to the coinage of gold? JHe knew that to do so would be iruinous to the yspecial plea which he was making. The first congress of the United States did not provide for any such coinage of gold as that described by Mr. Upton. Mr. Upton either knows it or else he does not know it. The “gold pieces” to which he refers in his carefully covered expression were precisely as given in the text above; namely, an eagle, a double eagle, a half eagle and a quarter eagle, and the coins each and several are defined in the statute as being of the value of so many dollars, or units, and the dollar, or unit, is defined as being 371.25 grains of nure silver. The conformity of gold to silver by the same statute at 15 to 1 made the gold coins to be multiples of 24.75 grains of gold—a proportion which was afterwards twice altered to preserve the conformity. This simply showed the amount of gold which at the time should be. not a dollar, but of the value of a dollar. Senator Sherman says in a published note relative to Upton’s book: “His statements on financial matters may be implicitly relied on.” Of course! Asa matter of fact. Mr. Upton’s whole book is pervaded with the same species of false interpretation shown in the quotation given in this note. Ex uno exemplo disce omnia. And as to false quotations, the Century dictionary, making a pretense of citing the statute (see under the “dollar”), has this: “That law [act of April 2, 1792] provided for the coinage of'dollars, or units, each to be of the; value of a Spanish milled dollar,’as that coin was then current, and to contain 37114 grains pure silver.” etc. This quotation curiously omits the word “silver” before "dollars or units.” and yet in that omitted word lies the whole controversy I It is not good usage in making a quotation to leave out the principle thing. S On the afternoon before the assassination, when Vice-Presi-dent Schuyler Colfax wason theeve of departing fortlie West to examine into the conditions and prospects of the proposed Pacific railway, president Lincoln said to him. measuring his words: “Mr. Coliax I want you to take a message from me to the miners whom you visit. I have very large ideas of the mineral wealtii of our nation * * * Now that the Rebellion is over thrown, and we know pretty nearly the amount of our national debt, the more gold and silver we mine makes the payment of the debt so much the easier. Now lam going to encourage that in every possible way. [Even so, 0 Lincoln!] We shall have hundreds of thousands of disbanded soldiers, and many have feared that their return home in such great numbers might paralyze industry by furnishing suddenly a greater supply of labor than there will be a demand for. lam going to try and attract, them to the hidden wealth of our mountain ranges where there is loom enough for all. Immigration, which even the war has not stopped, will land upon our shores hundreds of thousands more per year from overcrowded Europe. I Intend to point to them the gold and silver that waits forthem in the West. Tell the miners from me that I shall promotetheir interests to the utmost ability, because their prosperity is the prosperity of the nation; and we shall prove in a very few years that we are the treasury of the world.” These are the last glorious words of Lincoln. O thou Immortal! In thy staunch and capacious heart there was a place eves for the miners and the mining interests of our country. Thy last thoughts of public concern in this world were how the war debt was to be paid with the treasure of the mountains! To remember such a man and to compare him with the poor automata who are now truckling and fawning around the Hessian Rothschild in order to support the treasury of the United States kindles in every patriotic soul a fire In which the flames of inspiration are blended with flashes of undying contempt.

Nobody can predict how the next presidential election will result, however much the wise-acres may pretend to do so. Some of the democratic leaders tell us that they do not expect that their party will succeed, while the republicans have no doubt of their success. Upon the surface it does look as if things were running the republican way. But there is many a slip between the cup and the lip. It is not expected, of* course, that the republican convention will declare for free silver. It is probable that both of the old parties will insert a pliable silver plank that can be twisted into any shape. But will that sort of thing suit the western states that are directly dependent upon silver coinage for prosperity? Will it suit the south that is clamoring for more money? It is not probable that the people can be so easily fooled by meaningless platforms as they have been. They have drank the cup of bitterness to the very dregs. Harsh experience has compelled them to open their eyes and behold stubborn facts as they exist. The time is come when the people must act in their own interests and it would seem as if they must recognize the necessity for so doing. If they do who can tell what the next election will bring fortlj? The people’s party and the silver party, it is announced, will combine, and even if we admit that this combination will not elect a president, it may mix matters to an extent, so as to make the result, judged from this moment, very misty. It looks to us as if the people never went into a more uncertain presidential campaign than the next one will be. It will be utterly impossible to retain thousands upon thousands in the party ranks. They will leave their partisan association in the hope of doing something to change conditions so that the farm, factory and workshop give them at least a living. Where will they go? It is that question which will give the next campaign its element of uncertainty.— Farmers Voice. “Do you know that it is very seldom that I take in a*s gold piece now days?” asked a well know Grand avenue clothier. • ‘During the past month not a gold coin has passed into my store. Before that time I received one occasionally but I have noticed that gold coin seeing to be getting scarce. How do I account for that? I think the banks are holdiog it back. Especially since the bond issue has been spoken of. I believe the banks have held back all they could get. Years ago customers of mine were partly paid off in gold and then I used to get considerable of it, but now silver and greenbacks do all the buying. Some think that people have hoarded gold, but I do not believe it. ’’—Milwaukee Sentinel Republican.