Terre Haute Weekly Gazette, Terre Haute, Vigo County, 24 January 1878 — Page 4

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THURSDAY, JANUARY 24, IS78.

VOQRHEES.

I Continued From First Page.] I

when the ult'mate and extreme necessity ci the hoar demanded a money stronger than-them both, based on the confidence *fthe people that their government would live and not die yet when they fell, they fell together. Neither the one, nor the other, nor both united were sufieient to make even a respectable struggle for national existance, -and they abandoned the field on the first roar of the hostile canon, but silver did notifiee any sooner nor get under cover any quicker thifln gold. It may then, I tWnk, be'safely assumed in the light of 'all experiince that the real reason for demonetizing silver is not to be found in its failure to be the peer under all circumstances. in a£l ages, and in all nations cf the other pneciou* metal which has now become so strangelv, so suddenly, and so surreptitiously exalted in the eyes of the iffioney power sis the sole standard of values.

Pursuing our inquiry, therefore, on this poirtt we come next upon one of the principal reasons now assigned for abandoning silver coin as money. It is true that the-sincerity of this reason is open to the suspicion which always taints an argument brought forward as an after thought to justify an act which evaded all discussion at the time of its passage* but nevertheless it shall be fairly considered 'even at this late day. It is now urged with great vehemence by the advocates of the gold standard alone, that because here and there a European monarchy wfth'the hardest worked and poorest paid .peasantry on the face of the earth has 'banished silver, "we are called upon by •our business relations to do the same. It is urged that we are to follow and not: lead in the affairs of the world. According to this argument we are to trail in Tthe footsteps of governments whose principles we denounce, and whose laboring people «ve fleeing in constant streams from their shores to our own, in order'to escape oppression and starvation.

Sir,'no one disputes the fact that all civilized governments have certain com-munities-of interest, but to my mind the American republic is less dependent tor its strength and prosperity on the con duct and politicsof other nations than any Other government now in existence Nature, in her most lavish mood has conspired to make the American people, in fadt as well a* "in name, independent people. Our place on the map of the globe is an isolated one. Mighty oceans stretch out between us and all the first class powersof the world What foreign neighbor* we have on our immediate borders ane*eak and unimportant. We are notoahy-substaotially alone as a political power on the North American conti nent, and -separated by long distances from all the-great nations of the earth, but we possess within'Oureelves, in unfailing abundance, every 'article and every element of national -wealth and glory Our vast £»main will feed uncounted millions, mountains of iron and of all other usefutf ores respond tovery call of! fcient3ic progress, nvhile ttfee intelligent industry ofwnan, if not paraiyzsd by bad government, will forever sapply all his wants, comforts and luxuries On such a theater oar greatest resource is self reliance, and we have but litfle need of examples or alliance'furnished by less fortunate nations.

Admitting, however, the argument, for the sake ofaneeting it, that our financial policy ionrcgard to a specie bas«s ought to be harmony witix the reSt of the world, let us examine into the actuul facts as 'they now exist In the various •money-systems with every people with whom vre have -even the slightest commercial iirtercourse. Has silver in the

I general tncle and budoess of nations i., fallen into -such 'discredit, that we are

corqpeiled uto cast it aside* in order to keep pace with a wide spread financial revolution..-? Is it held ia such dishonor as a medium of traffic throughout the world.that-we-can no laager uphoki it with credit to ourselves-? On the contrary aicare&il.estiinate-ehows that silver is an enormous and overwhelming favorite. iQf thc.«itire trading and cpmmercial populations of.the whole earth 696,2 50,000 more ^people .have si Iver alone as 1 their standard of values, ar.d transact all their business«upon it as a specie basis, than these who have gold alone forsimi•f lar purposes. .From the same sources of information we learn that 744,200,000 more people use silver alone than .use gold and silverihoth as their metallic-cur-5 rency. Ia this last statement I include the populationthe .United States as using the double standard, for we shall 1 return to it at once, as .far ssileast as a ijspecij basis can ..now exist. The great *,tact, therefore, i« tfaat in-the mighty bulk tflf intelligent mar&ind, more than four tifnes as many peejtle have chosen stiver I iAS have chosen g-olcL, and more than five ttimcti as many have chosen silver as hare chosen gold and til-ver together. 'IIhe following table giving (the finanr.iai systems and the populations of the varied governments of the world will be found .in the main correct:

N&tio&««iniler£oid4ionc. Imputation. Great JUribun -31,000,000 Ust- utla ..... 4,000,000 Australia....... ... 2,0 0,0W Foitu.al. 4,250.000 Turkey in Europe and Asia..S,500,000

Ptsrsj a J,000 000 Brsxit 1VO?*,000

Aracntinu Kepubiio liSOO.OOO Kavpt

.... «.00».000

(Geraan Kmpire 41.000,000 ifiaiplre •Sweden JUtenmark... Norway i-Ohdi ^Jaitan.-

3totai

JNatiftua under ei'.ver alone ,.itmssia Austria '•Central Amcrica

iao,ooti

.. l,8lO 000 .. VSO.kO .. 2.I0O.0S.0 ..33.030 0(H)

JEcumtor. juifa .:" ,v.'.v'.'.':v... 3,0,00 vw liexfco V. e,.oo,ocn Pg 4.500,00! UnHwls'ute of «Jotaml»ia,...2,T0,0u0

.Holland lioilmw l,j00,000

To'.id

.. .83V,7«y»0 Papulation ... 6 100.0W ... :,80O,t»O!» .... 86,1' ,i0 ... 1.50V 00 55 800 OOP

iliv'.H uutiT-r jc»ti.*olKilv.-r. 15o.f-hsn» It Iiv'a .......

^llDrlud "ty®0®

United States.. Total :....W,«oo)fl» It will be seen from this sfMemeht that silver coin, as money, not only meets the desires of four-fifths of the human race, but that those who use it as a sttandard occupy more than three-quarters of the inhabited parts of the globe. Germany is perhaps prematurely placed in the list of nations using g«ld alone. It is true she has attempted to adopt »he gold standard, but there are still two hundred millions of silver currency in the hands of

her

people, and they are reluctant to give it up and see it driven away from latherland. Whether the empire will be entirely successful in depriving its subjects of this favorite money yet remains to be proven. In view of all the foregoing tarts, however in view of the history and condition of the world on this question, the enemies of the silver dollar in the United States who, having first destroyed it, seek now to justify themselves by slandering the reputation of its metal in distant lands, must stand before their injured countrymen covered with shame and confusion. They are utterly overwhelmed and beatfrom their position by

the general testimony of the civilized races of men, and we are left at this point to follow them next to their final and in fact real reason for their assault upon silver money.

Sir, I touch now upon an issue as old as human society and as universal as the loaning of money at interest and the investment of capital for income. Two classes have existed in every age of his tory on the question of money. All such as plow, sow, and reap who 6pin, weave, and make merchandise for 6ale who manage and work the caverns of coal and iron, and the blast furnaces and forges who construct railroads, build ships, and found cities all such a6 are in any way pushing on the cause of progress and material development, and who desire to keep their capital, whatev er it may be, and especially that greatest of all capital, the bone and muscle of the laborer, actively employed, constitute the class. These who have stepped aside from the active, moving column of affairs and withdrawn themselves and all they own from the trade and business of the world, intending thenceforward to fasten their idle wealth on the produc tions of labor as a consumer, and not as an assistance, constitute the other. Of these two classes those who compose the first desire money to be plentiful and cheap, for they are working to obtain it wiile those who compose the latter desire money to be scarce and dear, because they already have it in abundance to loan and to invest at high rates of in terest and profit. And it was in the real and actual interest of this last powerful class that silver was demonetized in February, 1873. not because it was less valuable as money than gold, nor because such a change was demanded by the policies of foreign nations, but simply because retired capital desired to diminish the amount cf money of every kind circulated in the hands of the people.

Silver was selected as the victim for sacrifice on that cccasion because it was thought on account of certain circumstances yet to be noticed, that it could be more successfully assailed than other kinds of money then in existence. The managers of the great money centers in this country and in Europe saw with avaricious alarm the bright streams of silver begin ntng to increase in volume and value a6 they flowed from the mouths of our mines, and now we hear from their angry throats, and from an apparently sLit 1 angrier newspaper press which they control, a cry without ceasing against silver inflation, arising from an overproduction of the metal. They have heretofore filled the world with their hostile clamor mainly against a paper currency, not im mediately convertible into coin of in tilnsic value, but it now .appears that there can be, in their own amiable Ian guages, an insane inflation of a currency which Jaas this very intrinsic value itself. We have heard much talk to prove that gold and silver are the only real money that they have an absolute value as such everywhere and all times but we now discover that even these precious metals may become more abundant than agreeable to those who want the purchasing power of money increased by leweniag the quantity in circulation un til iifcy dollars will buy a farm worth a thousand under the foreclosure of mortgage. Is it true, however, that for the genuine interests of the American people, for their advancement in trade ana development, and for the prosperity of our commerce throughout the world, too much silver ha* been produced in the United States or anywhere else? Has «ilver, as now claimed, ever-threatened to pour into the chaiinelsof business such do^ds and torrents as would unsettle and sweep away all the landmarks of safety We will examine this question. 1 he history of the production of the precious metal is one of great and in terest Although they have been arbiUrtly determined upon as the money mankind, yet it has never been possible for the highest hatnan intelligence to foretell their supply or to s&y with certainty that their production will £ail altogether. The quantity of a circulating medium sufficient to meet the legitimate demands of trade can be estimated, but who has ever been able to look into the mines and declare how far their veins of ore extend or how soon they wiil cease to yield? Who has tver been able to point out where new mines may be opened into the hidden riches of the earth to take the places Af those that are worn out. sterile and barren? The result has been that while the precious metals have been declared the standard of values, theq%ave themselves always been an unknown quantity, and the irregularity, uncertain ty, and insufficiency of their production htas caused frequent and crushing disasters in ail countries and in every period of history, and have often comoelled the strongest governments of ancient and modern times to entirely abondon them. .h-

It is aot my purpose, however, to dwell

.180,450,000100 this point further than to meet the arPopuiation. fgument based upon a* alleged overpro- ... 87,000,oaojduction cf silver in recent years. From ... 80,0a) coo ja report made not long since by a comnr.ittee in the British parliament it ap.425,Xu'oco pears, as nearly as can be estimated, that

the entire production of silver throughout the world during the last twenty-five years has reached about $1,400,000. The u:crease in its production during that period at Obe from about $40,0^0,000, in 1S52, to $80,000,000. in 1S75, and the an nual amount produced at tbis time may bo placed a*- $70,000,030. Of these imou nts South Amcrica, Mexico, aud the United States produced all excepting about $10,000,000 year, arising from the silver resources of all other countries.

5^7*7^

43,000,0(0 has all taken place in the last eighteen years, substantially in the latt ten. The following estimate, made by the commissi ner for mininpftatutics, shows the annu.t! production of silver and its in-, crease in the United States: 1850 »]00,00« 186)

THE Ra'M WEEKLY GAZETTE.

£.

Estimating the production of 1876 and 1877 the same as 1875, and we find that the entire amount of silver yielded by the mines of the United States since they began to pay for working them, has reached but a trifle over the comparatively 6iflall sum of $250,000,000. This is less than one-half the amount of our present volume of currency yet when those who are interested in making and keeping a scarcity of money in circulation noticed an increase ot ortly $12,000,000 from 1870 to 1872, they took the alarm which resulted in the act of 1S73 proscribing and outlawing it in the companionship of gold as m^uey. It will not do to say thar h.- demand for silver had failed, for a ..kit from what our own people needed at home, the demand from abroad was 60 great that in the very act of demonetizing it here provision was made for the coinage of a dollar that we found "necessary for our fon.ign trade. It was a dollar of the weight of 420 grains troy, and the secretary of the treasury, in his recent report, says: "This provision was made at a time when 6uch a dollar was worth in the market 102.12 in gold, and was d-esigned for the use of trade in China, where silver was the only standard."

The great demand for this coin, espec ia'ly in our trade with China, is shown by "reports made by the two leadidg foreign banks of China, the Oriental bank and the Hong Kong and Shanghai banking corporation, dated respectively January 31 and 30, 1877, and furnished by the United States consulate at Hong Ksng to the secretary of the treasury." I find these reports quoted by the director of the mint, and I extract from them the following statements: "The United States trade dollar has been well received in China, and is eagerly welcomed in tho*e parts of the country where the true value of the coin is known. It is a legal tender at tbe ports of Foo-choottnd Canton, in China, and also at Saigon arid Singapore and, although not legally current in this colony, it is eagerly sought af'.er by the Chinese, and in the bazaars ic is seldom to b^ purchased. In proof of the estimation in which the trade dollar is held in the south of China, we need only state that the bulk of the direct exchange business between Hong Kong and San Francisco, which is very considerable, is dune in this coin, the natives preferring it to the Mexican dollar. Late advices from San Francisco repjrt that so great is the de mand for trade dollars lor shipment to China that the California mint is unequal to the task of turning out the coin last enough to. satisfy requirements.

My opinion is that ultimately

it will be current all over China. It is the best coin that ever has been imported, and, being produced at the fountain head of silver, can be laid down more cheaply than any other dollar. China requires tnany mil lions of dollars annually, and while the clean Mexican dollar will be imported for the north of China the t-ade. dollar will be imported for the south. I would roughly estimate that San Francisco Steamers will bring from tour to six sacks of trade dollars (from four to six hundred thousand) each fortnightly trip all the year round."

The secretary 6f the treasury also inorms us tbat since the trade dollar was authorized it has been coined to the large amount of $30,710,400, mair.ly to meet this and other foreign demands for silver money. It is true, however, that he further 6tate9 that the export demand for the trade dollar has now almost if not quite ceased. It is not strange that this should be so, when this government has done all in its power to dishonor it at home first limiting it as a legal tender to the insignificant sum of $5, and hastening soon afterward to strip it of even this 6mall badge of respectability. Distant people naturally suspicions of our institution, would necessarily reject a coin or which we ourselves have placed such a stigma of disgrace, however great, as we have seen, may be -their demand for silver money. In fact, no artifice, no cunning device feas been spared to bring the silver dollarin t»«contemptand to drive it out of existence, although the American peo pie and the peqple of all lands and of every form -of civilization plead for its restoration to fayor and tc* i|n &tnple circulation -.Jl,

If there are eaime, however, who still think that these assaults on silver were inspired by any other motive than the fear of too mudk money, allow aie to recall an incident in financial history full of teaching on this point. When the revelation of gold took place in California, and on the-otlier side of the world ia Australia about the same time, an impulse was giyea. to the progress of mankind gieater than .his been produced by any other one «v.ent-since Columbus discovered America. It qnickened every energy of labor, aroused all the great industries everywhere into new and startling activity, revived the drooping sails ot commerce in every sea, and sent the loaded caravans of railroad transportation flying in every direction over the face o'f the earth. Th» whole rorld rejoiced with one exception. The creditor "class in every clime beneath the sun looked on in sullen distrust and dread. And in 1856, when the production of gold had reached its highest point, and when it was supposed that it would continue to incre'ase, this class broke forth in the different countries of Europe in favor of demonetizing gold, because the supply was making money too plentiful. De Quincey, Chevalier and other writers made earnest and elaborate arguments to show that the in crease in the flow of gold was so great that soon it would be within the easv reach of all classes, and then its power to purchase labor and property in large quantities for very small sums would be lorever gone. Germany and Austria and some other European governments heeded these arguments, and in 1857 actually dt monetized g^ld in order to maintain the scarci of money. The reason why this question did not serious

ly agitate the financial circles of th* Unitso Stites is to be found in the fact that at that time we had no great creditor class in this country wc had no stu pendouj national debt held

in our OA-n country the ueveiopemeut ofiu an invcwtinent for fixed incomes tliis great agency of national prosperity no such state, municipal

filled all the stock markets with interestbearing bonds, and which are now a draining tax on all the labor and production of the country. Had our situation been then a» it is now we would have seen the holders of government securities, and nil other bonds wherein the payment of money from the many to the few was nominated, as badly afiright.'d in this country at what was called an over production of gold as the holders of similar securities and binds were in Euroupe. The laws which govern the human heart in iis love of gain are in the same every where. The creditor class is not so much concerned wiiat coin or other material shall constitute money a« it is that there shall be no redundancy alter its demands are paid.

9

jggl O.O'O lSsa'T .. 4 500.000 is*,::: 8,4osooo 804 1869 (avi-rag-J) 1$7U 16,000,000 £7 23-00,000 IH72 MOSO.t-OO 1873.....'.' 85,750,«00 1874 8 ,000,f?0 187 5 8S.00 ',000

The rep*rt of the monetary commission subm 1 ted to this body in March last by the .distinguished senator from Nevada (Mr Jones) comments on this fact as follows: "In all the European discussions, after 1848 and prior to the German demonetization of silver and its consequences, the point made was not that either metal had depreciated relatively -to the other, but that by .reason of extraordinary supplier of gold from California and Australia, supplemented, about 1865, by new supplies of silver from Nevada, both metals had depreciated relatively to labor and commodities, and that those having fixed incomes were being injured by a rise in prices. So long as a double standard existed, anew supply of either metal was only an addition to and only affected the value of the general mass of money and not the relative value of the metals. "The'fall'in gold,' which Chevalier lamented in 1867, was its fall in relation to property. He pointed out how the double standard had prevented any change from occuring in its relation to silver and how it would continue to do so until the silver of double standard countries as exhausted. In order, therefore, to protect the interests of the income classes, it was claimed to be necessary to demonetize one of the metals, and gold being the metal which then promised the most abundant yield was selected fjr the purpose "It was the depreciation in the value of the precious metals and of troney sup posed to have already resulted from the new supplies of gold, which made him the conspicuous advocate of the demand that one of the metals should be demonetized in order to 'redress the situation.

It appears, therefore, thit gold, even gold, the very god of a fierce idolatry in oar midst at this time, has been cursed and ostracised on that account by the usurers and money changers as well as its more modest companious, silver a'nd paper. And if now both the precious metals threatened to increase beyond the wishes and interests of this class they would be earnestly inquiring and scheming into some ^lan by which they could demonetize gold and silver alike, and substitute diamonds or some scarcer and more difficult commodity to obtain as the basis of specie payments and the money in which all debts due to them should be paid.

There remains, however, one other argument in connection wi*.h the alleged overproduction and inflation of silver which requires atuntion. In the name of good faith it h.s been urged here in this *xdy and elsewhere that, although i-ilver specified as plainly as gold in all our financial legislation, yet it was

During that very year, the year of the contract which is to be enforced in all its demands against the flesh and 3abor, the generous ailver mines of the lnited States yield $16,000,000. Was not this sum sufficient to put the authors of that enactment, the bondholders ot Europe and America, on their guard against making a solemn stipulation to receive silver money in payment of theii bonds unless they intended at that time tc do so? During the year of' 1871 and 1S72 m?nv hundred millions of bond W :re issued under the act of July 14 1870, and received in exchange fivetwenties. They were all payable by the express term* of the law either in silver or gold, at the option of the government and the production of silver, when they were thus voluntariallv received, amour tetl, accarding to our mining statistic, ii 1871 to $23,000,000 and in 1872 Jo $28,750,00a. It is no doubt true tbat the pioduct of these two latter years excited the fear of a silver inflation which has since deepened i.ito the absurd panic now prevailing, but how canst with any fairness be pretended that th£ bondholder is released from receiving silver according to his agreement, on the ground that we were not producing that metal when the laws governing the, contract were enacted

And, it it was no: coined in amounts large as it ha- been siiiCe, yet it was well known th?.t the 'law made it* coinage f.ee and unlimited, ana no one has a right to complain of the enforcement of the law of which he had full knowledge

corporation debts as have since crued. The argument is unSouud in law 1 of capital and labor as it i* i? tl l1 aMflill ItaMtalAtlBaJ kl. A. A. A I

PiO-

daced in such meager quantities at the time our national debt was created that the purchasers of our bonds could not have, reasonably supposed they were ever to receive it in payment of the same, notwithstanding the law expressly said they should. In other words, it is an argument to release the bondhlder from the absolute, definitely written words of the law on the ground that he could not foresee that the goverment woula ever have silver enough to fulfill the law. This is the highest, boldest note of repudiation ever heard in this country an open admission of the law and an open, square deniand for its violation. .No tact or surrounding circumstances at the time the contract was made can for a moment justify such a flagrant abroga tion of its most explicit terms, but even if outside conditions, not expressed in its face, could be set up now to defeat it, 1 assert that the conditions alleged by the advocates of this, argument never existed at all. I assert that when the law tor the payment of the public debt was construed by the famous act of March 1869, to mean payment in gold and silver both, the production of our silver mines for that year was $11,625,000, and had annually averaged that amount since *864 I tis contended that the purchasers of our bonds overlooked, when they were first issued the feeble supplv of silver Did an annual average produc tion «f nearly $12,000^000, for the space of five vears, preceding the act March, 1869, likewise escape their at tenticn, when they were framing that act in their own interest and to suit them selves? But again, by the funding act of July 14, tSjo, authorizing the issue of new coip bond* to be subsituted for ori ginal 4.20 bonds, making thereby the new contract of that date, it was agreed that the bonds issued by virtue of that acl should he payable in silrer as well gold.

and at tbe time his rights and liabihties^ac- eo much* conflict between other forme 1

and unsustained by the facts. In fact, the entire movement demonetizing silver is to be explained solelv and alone on the principle of contraction and this brings me, in this connnection, to consider mote fully that destructive principle, and especially to examine the policy and the effects of the law of January 14, 1875, for the resumption of specie payment by an enforced contraction of the non-ir.terest-bearing legal t.-nder currency of the count.y. The law of February, 1873, taking away pilver money from the people, and the law of January, 1875, fixing the day, now les* than a year in advance, when the greenback shall also perish, are twin monsters cf evil, born of the same parentage and linked together for the destruction of all monev tave gold. In their discussion, therefore, they are entitled to a joint recognition-

Sir, in the entire catalogue of crimes against human society not one' can be found so awful in all its .consequences, both immediate and remote, as a government commits when it deliberately destroys the money of its own citizens. Wherever in all" the regions of time such measures have been accomplished, the horrors of history have taken place. No shrinkage in th* amount of money, no contraction of the currency in the hands the people was ever enforced bv law to any considerable extent, except amidst broken lives, ruined hopes, despair, lost honer, and all the vices springing from the lowett depths of poverty and human misery. The worst ingredients of war, pestilence, and famine all flow from the act of a government violently tearing from the hands of laboring masses the money they so much need. Murder, thelt, robbery, prostitution, forgery, embezzlement, and fraud of every hue and mien curse the land that is deprived of a full and sufficient circulating medium on which to give employment to its toiling men and women. The social statistics of mankind will 6how that wherever the supply of money has been scant and labor poorly paid, or le't entirely idle, there the gallows-tree has boine most frequently its horrid burden there the jails and the penitentiaries and all the haunts of infamy have been most crowded. The well clothed and well-fed pharisee may ostentatiously thank God that he is better than such a6 these, but he is not. When the strong hand of the government is engaged in abolishing money and thus interposing between the laboring man and the laboring woman and their last chance for bread by honest work, thtir sins for self-preservation are less odius to their merciful Father than the prayers of the usurers who have driven them to ruin.

It is said in highly intelligent quarters that at this hour there are three millions of our own people unemployed, who have no other dependence for food and shelter than the labor of their hands, and one-half of whom are now tramping from place to place for crumbs of charity. Pitiable and dangerous spectacle! It never happened before in this land of bountious nature, nor would it now but for the fact that in these latter davs a class has arisen in our mids, which is benefitted by the scarcity of money, ani the consequent dc struction of all those great industries which afford employment to labor. Ncr does this frightful spectacle appeal alone to our sympathy with human misery deep and indescribable as that must be The loss to the country in actual wealth aris:ng from the absolute idleness of three million persons is very great. It has been estimated that at one dollar per day as wages it would amount to enough in two years to liquidate our public debt. The United States monetary commission make the following valuable observations in their recent report: "The worst effect, however, economi cally considered, of falling prices is not upon existing property, nor upon debtors, evil as it ij, but upon laborers, whom it deprives of employment and consigns to poverty, and upon society, which it deprives ot that vast sum of wealth which resides potentially in the vigorous arpis of the idle workman. A shrinking volume of money transfers existing property unjustly, and causes a concentration and diminution of wealth. It also impairs the value of existing property by eiimina ing from it that important element of value conferred upon it by the skill, energy, and care of the debtors from whom it is wrested. But it does not destroy any existing property, while it doss absolutely annihilate all '.he values producible by the labor which it condemns to idleness

The estimate is not an extravagant one that there are now iu the' United States threa million persons willing to work bat who are idle because they cannot obtain emplo/ment. The vast povertystricken army is increasing and will continue to increase as falling prices 9hall continue to separate monej capital, the fund oat of which wages are paid, from labor, and to discourage its investment in other forms of property.

Labor, co-operating with the forces of nature, is the source of ail wealth, and to reach the highest degree of effectiveness it must be classified through the aid of capital and supported by capital during the process of production and be measured and paid in money, each unit of which ia a sight draft on all other forms property, bearing a value in proportion to the number of such drafts. In order that any countrv may reach thi maxi mum of material prosperity, certain conditions are indispensable. All its labor, assisted by the most approved machinery and appliances, must be emploved, and the fruits of industry mutft be justly distributed. These conditions are only poa •iible when capital is ibsolutelv protected against v'o'.-.i and frte from illegitimate 1-givatrve iuterference, and when tne laborer is protected in t-tis natural right to dispose of his labor in such manner as he may prefer. They are utterly impossible when the rnonev stock is shrinking and -the money value of property and services is leclining. Howsoever great the natural esources of.i country mav be, however jenui it* etinriu-. iVr'ih* is soil, ingen- •*. -1 eipri nd industrious its in i'a vti-r,ts.or fVf it- institutions, if the volume of money is shrinking and prices a: f«Jhng, its merchants will be over whelmed with bankruptcy, its industries will be paralyzed, and destitution and distress will prevail.

The instinct ofself-interestisthe mainpring of industrial and commercial activity. It is the animating motive alike of the capitalist and the laborer. Witnjut it no labor would be pet formed, nor would capital have an existence. If monev capital is withdrawn from productive enterprises, it is from the apprehension ot loss and from the same instinct of thri! ehrjuah which it was acquired. It natural that the money capitalist should exact from labor all he can in exchange for his labor. What is known as the conflict between capital and labor, is not

money and labor. Indeed, tb« Jbi flict between monev and other formt of capital is as distinctly marked and-sprite

severe as the conflict between

as

money

labor, and in that conflcit other forms of capital suffer fully a* much as labor, the only difference being that they eve

better

able to endure losses. Other forms of capital must be constantly converted into money in order to pay wages and to meet other demands incident to

industrial

enterprises. When the stock of money is shrinking and prices are falling, this conversion can only be made at rates continually growing more unfavorable, while at the same time the products of the labor for whose wages the sacrifices have been made are also undergoing a shrinkage of money value. Thus loss and sacrifice are encountered at every turn, and the owners of other capital than money shrink from the friction of exchange, withdraw from productive enterprises, and onlv exchange as much of their property for money as will meet the necessary expenditures of living, which are reduced to the most economical level, as it is principal and not^income that in being consumed. Little more labor will be employed under these circumrtruce* than is sufficent to support the owners of capital on this parsimonious basis, and as a

conseqnence

the labor market will be overstocked, and the competition between laborers vi ill reduce wages to a starvation level. But during this period, when property is being sacrificed to meet current necesities, and laborers are being remitted to idleneess and destitution, money fatten* on the general disaster."

When, therefore, on the 15th of January, 1875, this government having already destroyed silver money, determiped to destroy within the next four years its outstanding legal tender paper currency until there should be no more of it left than could be redeemed in gold coin alone on the 1st day of January, 1879, it became responsible for all the appalling consequences that have followed. An attempt to force the resumption of specie payments with gold and tilver both as our metallic basis would be a cruel failure at this time but the proposition to contract, reduce, cancel, and burn our present amount of cirrency until it harmonises with the meager margin of gold which we can command has stricken the arm of labor with paralysis, dried up the fountains of business prosperity, and placcd hollow-eyed want in more than a million hitherto happy homes. The demonetization of silver was purposely accomplished before the policy of specie resumption was declared, in order to make money as scarce as possible in reaching by forced contraction the single standard of gold. We could reach the double standard easier than the single one, but the purpose of the money power was the diminution of money in circulation, and it better accomplished that object by first outlawing silver and then seeking the specie basis composed of but one metal. It cannot be denied that gieat progress has been made in this work of destroying moneys, and all values, except the value of money, which is made greater by being made scarcer and harder to obtain.

At the date of the act of January, 1875, our volume of currency was already reduced in proportion to population fur below European nations, where labor commands barely subsistence wages. We had nearly one-half less per capita than Germany, England, or France. Financial distress was even then upon us. Business wrecks were afloat on every hand. We had the warnings of the nine preceding yeais duiing which the money of the country had been diminished nearly $400,000,000 by contraction, and during which time the liabilities for commercial failures and bankruptcies had ariten from an average of about $11,000,000 per annum to nearly three hundred millions. A panic had just swept over the country with just sufficient havoc and ruin to extort the admission from General Grant in his message of December, 1873, that our volume of currency was too small for our business, even at its dullest stages. We had less than $375,000,000, not counting fractional currency, and vet against the supplications dtf every business and iudnstry a still further reduction was dictated, and has been effected to the extent of nearly one hundred million. If, however, the law for the enforced resumption of specie payments is to stand unrepealed on^ our statute books, then there still remains a work of destruc ion to be done in this country far more xpensive, dangerous, and full of wretchedness than we have yet witnessed. That law declares that— "On and after the 1st day of January.

A. D. 1879, the secretary of the treasure shall redeem in coin the United States legal tender notes then outstanding on their presentation for redemption at the office of the Assistant treasurer of the United States in the city of New York, in snm of not less than $50."

The term coin nere Used ttiMrti only gold now, and the law, in order to enable the secretary of the treasury to Carry out this plan for retiring the greenback money from circulation, authorizes hitn to sell interest bearing bonds to obtain gold and to use such surplus revenues aa he mav haye on hand.

The government has undertaken two things: first, the shrinkage of the amount of currency, and, second, the possession of gold in such quantity that the one can be converted into the other. The smaller, therefore, the quantity of gold that can be obtained, the greater must be the reduction of paper money in order to rest dollar for dollar on such a narrow metallic basis. It becomes important in this view to know what has been done under the law of January, 1875, *n accumulating gsld as a basis for specie payments a year hence. Many efforts have been made to ascertain the exact amount of actual gold which this government now owns, none of which has been entirely successful, for the reason that the sum is so small, but it is perfectly safe to state, after deducting the amount due as interest on bonds that there are not this day fifty mili*ons of god in the United States treasury and in all the national banks beides. If resumption is to take place on that basis, the gigantic task of this poor pittance will to stand good for the redemption of $350,007.308,.50 of legal tender notes, commonly called greenbacks, and $291,874,236 of national hank note circulation, making in all the sum of $641,881,544.50. It is very plain, even to those who believe that $1 in gold is sufficient for the circulation and resumption of $3 in paper, tbat our present condition of$t in gold to about fourteen tn paper must be rad caily rcvoKit'vu'zsd against the day fixed for specie resumption. What probability is there of any large increase of gold in the vaults of the •i

IContiaoedoa Fifth Pags.