People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 October 1896 — The Laborer Will Profit by It. [ARTICLE]

The Laborer Will Profit by It.

The Irishman said: “If Bryan is I elected we will have 16 to 1. but j if McKinley is elected we’ll have i -nothing to eight’ (ate).” This assertion is true to more ways than one and it only needs the careful perusal of the democratic platform on which Bryan nominated to satisfy the ordinary man that salvation depends on the fulfillment of those principles. Free coinage of silver will put more money into circulation and enable the small businsss man to borrow at low rates of interest to increase his business —the more business, the more manufacturing, the greater the demand for labor and hence the increase in wages; while, on the other hand, going on a gold basis will curtail the currency, increase the rates of interest,'Con fining the production to a few who can at their pleasure shut down or open up, creating an unlimited supply of labor, forcing wages down as at present. Some’ say we have overproduction. Do you suppose we will have it if there is plenty of work? No, sir; that isn’t characteristic of the American workingman, Give him plenty of work and good 'wages and he’ll soon consume your goods. It’s only the very rich who don’t consume in ac cordance with their incomes'. Who is it that encourages or brings about overproduction? Nobody in this mundane sphere more than the trusts, who, not satisfied with a reasonable profit, shut down their mills in order to create a scarcity of the article and get higher prices, forcing the workingman to the position where he can’t consume if he, would, as he is out ol work, out of money and unable to pay the high prices put on the goods. Look at the coal trust, the ice* trust, the sugar trust and others too numerous to mention; the only thing that isn’t a trust is potatoes and I guess they wovld get in, too, if they didn’t have

so many eyes and could see but one way as the other trusts do. Some say the silver mine owner will be the only one to benefit by tbe free coinage of silver. Does anybody suppose he will go and have his silver coined into dollars for the sole purpose of taking them back home to gaze at, the great and glorious American eagle stamped thereon? Not much. He’ll get them out into circulation as fast as possible by letting other people who have collateral use them at low rates of interest to do business with. This will encourage enterprises and a demand for labor, and, as

I said before, the greater the demand for labor the higher the wages. Some cry 50-cent dollars; but why should the silver be worth less- than it is now, and why shouldn’t a piece of it bearing the stamp of the United States mint on it. saying It is a dollar, be good for a dollar the same as it is now? We all know that ' when the United States says a» ■ thing it is so and even “dear old England” will acknowledge this. So why not vote for Bryan and let us have prosperity?

LABORER.

Chicago, Sept. 26.