People's Pilot, Volume 6, Number 41, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 April 1897 — FIAT MONEY. [ARTICLE]

FIAT MONEY.

Republican promises are not being realized and will prove a boomerang. The police seem to be an organization for the protection of criminals that have a pull. One man fighting for his home is worth four men fighting for their boarding houses. No leader who has betrayed the people can be efficient again. It is not in the nature of things. With direct legislation the people would now proceed to take charge of the Pacific railroads. There is work for all to do, but not enough money to effect an exchange of the products of labor. The regular annual meeting of the National Reform Press association convened at Memphis Feb. 22. We may rest assured that the Morgan syndicate is not going to monkey with the Union Pacific railroad merely for its health. If we are to have any bonds at all let them be non-interest bearing, for the sting of the bond is in its power to draw interest. The Morgan syndicate will get the Union Pacific railroad and continue to rob the people. But the end will be reached some day. If we had the imperative mandate in this country Grover would have been yanked out of the white house more than a year ago. It is said that Wanamaker spent SIOO,OOO in his effort to be elected United States senator. That office comes pretty high nowadays. The way to bring good times is for the government to issue money and pay it out for public improvements. This would put »every idle man to work. From every great city comes the cry of poverty and distress. Starvation stares thousands in the face, but still the mill of single gold standard contraction grinds on. When will the people learn? An increase in the volume of currency does not amount to repudiation, but if it did that would be more honorable for a nation than to pursue a policy that is starving thousands of people to death. \ There is a great deal of sport made of the farmer by his plutocratic cousins, yet if the farmer would stop raising only such things as he used himself and sell nothing there would go up from these cousins a most doleful cry. ' _ ’ —-'■■fctUW Gold is not worth 100 cents because it can be worn or eaten, but because it can be exchanged for such things as contribute to life and comfort. That is all that any money can do and all it is required to do. Gold money is preferred by the miserly because it is safer and more convenient to hoard—withdraw from circulation. The most complete form of currency would be a receivable paper money issued by the government.

The Material on Which Money Is Stamp* ed Is Not the Essential Thing. The constant cry that fiat money is not good money Is already refuted by the use of gold and silver as money. These metals, with fifty years of supply on hand would have very little value if they were not used as money in any part of the world. Law, or custom having the force of law, makes gold and silver money when stamped by the government for the purpose of designation. We contend that if a law were passed making paper or any material designated by the stamp of the government a full legal tender for all debts, public and private, it would be as good money for all pur- . poses for which money is used as either gold or silver. We might cite many instances and make a long and elaborate argument in favor of our contention, but it would be ridiculed by all who do not understand the science of money. This question is of paramount importance and is certainly worth the experiment, which would cost the government nothing, except engraving and printing the paper. If Congress should pass a law authorizing the secretary of the treasury to issue a small amount of strictly fiat paper without any promise of redemption, and make such paper money receivable for taxes and all government dues and a legal tender in the paymentof all debts, it would be easy to determine whether the people would take it at par as money. If they should do so and it should be sought for in the same manner that gold coin is now sought for by persons who desired to use it to pay debts and government dues, it would demonstrate that the material upon which money is stamped for designation is not the essential thing. It would verify Aristotle’s definition of money when he declared that "money is a creation of law.” The verification of this definition would be of the utmost value to civilization, and this government can well afford to sake the experiment.