The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1871-11-25 00:00:00

TEE COINAGE QUESTION.

In connection with this subject, which has occasioned
correspondence between Mr. Gladstone and some of
the working men at Greenwich, the following letter
has been sent to the papers for publication
Mr. D. Fraser, jun., writing for the working men of
Greenwich, accepts Mr. Loire's explanation of the rules
affecting the coinage of silver, as " good so far as it goes,''
but considers it to he unsatisfactory as failing to provide a
remedy for "on unjust and oppressive state of things,"
consminent upon the levy of a seigniorage of 10 per cent.
on silver coin, and the exclusion of silver from the function
it a standard of value. Will you permit me to offer to
those who nmy share it a brief statement in correction of
the i,pinlon expressed ny Mr. Fraser?
"The provisionof sermon.y invariable in its intrinsic value
and convenient in its forms, its divisions. and Its multiples,
should be the object as it is the prerogative of the Crown.
The currency of this country consists of bank-notes, gold
coin, silver rein, and copper coin.
'The standard of value is gold.
- - -

" If silver were admitted to be a concurrent standard of
value, it must also, like gall. become teal tender,- and
ev,ry debtor would in paying his debt have the alternative of
paying to silver or hi gold. Of course, he would always
select the cheapest medimn. One of two conditions would
tootle:
•

-
"1. or metal might hens for cheaper than the other that '
the dearer metal would be practically excluded from use as
legal tender. This was the case hi France from 1093 till
MO. The law had valued gold at 151 to 1 of silver, but as
gold was worth more than the comparative value aifsigned
to it, it WM speedily transported to other countries. It was
exported as soon as coined, and the silver coin alone dis-
charged the office of legal tender and standard of value. The
geld discoveries after 1850 reversed the relative values, gold
became cheaper than silver, the silver coin was exported, to
the extreme inconvenience of the people, and the French
Government resorted to the coinage of debased silver into all
the smaller pieces, which of course forfeited the character of
standard coin.
" 2. The variations in the values of gold and silver might lie
frequent, and be such as to make at one time gold and at
another silver the cheaper metal. Every debt would he
legally payable in either medium, but the cheapest would in
every case be used, so that no lender of money or seller of
goods could reckon with certainty upon receiving the
equivalent contemplated when he mole his contracts.
" Of thesetwo phases whichthe working of a double standard
might assume, the latter would be the most vexatious, but
either of them may suffice to show that a double standard is
as vicious in theory as it is discredited hey experience. Silver,
then, not hieing a standard of value, or a legal tender
beyond 405., hut representing portions of the pound
sterling or anvereign, which Is the standard of value, is
coined so as to pass for one-tenth more than its intrinsic
value. This difference of onedelith is adjusted si ith a view
to ilerive all the profit that eon he realized from the coinage
without, on the one hand, tempting Illegal coinage, and, on ,
the other, duskier with the function of the gold coin as
the standard of value The State, which makes is per cent.
profit on its silver coinage, carries that profit to the credit
of the community, and takes care that enough, hut no more
than enough, silver Is comet. If any person could, ether by
his own machinery or by sending liar silver h.. the Mint, con-
vert 60s. into GO., thousands would be coined not needed as
currency, and solely to enrich an individual by his exercise
of a prerogative pertaining to the Crown.
"The principle exhibited in the srigniorage levied by the
Crown on silver coined in its sole right may be even more
plainly illustrated in the coinage of copper, which passes fir
more than double its intrinsic worth, and ills higher degree
still by banknotes, of which, whatever the value they repre-
sent, the intrinsic worth Is noticing.
"The prerogative of coining, whether in paper, gold, silver,
or copper, properly belong to the Crown, and should he exer.
cried by the Crown alone for the advantage of the nation;
but the coinage of gold, which as the standard of value at
home is also the medium of exchange with foreign countries,
cannot he made a w.urce of profit. It is, however, an en-
tire misapprehension to suppose (what Mr, David Fraser,
jun., implies that the rich man Is favoured and the poor
man injured by the free coinage of gold, or by the profit of
in per cent, on the coinage of silver, or that "the diffi-
culties of the present position" (what are they' would
be solved by coining a pound of silver into 60 rather
than into 66 shillings. It is precisely the same
class of persons who import Rola and who import
silver, and so far even as regards silver produced
from English mines its value is unaffected by the
Mint regulations, for it is determined by the demand and
supply operating throughout the market of the world. It is
quite true that silver rather than gold la the medium through
which the wages of the labouring clan are paid, but to show
that the labouring chases are injured by the Mint regula-
tions it must be demonatrated that the shilling they now re-
ceive cOMManda a Mailer quantity of the necessaries of life
than would a shilling coined as an integral measure of value.
The shilling now circulating derives its purchasing power, not
from the diver it contains, but from Its being by law a 20th
part of, a pound, the golden standard All prices, wholesale
or retail, whether of Al bullock or a beefsteak of a quarter
of wheat or a Val od bread, are computed upon a gold
valuation. The artisan's shilling is intrinsically the 22nd
part of a pound—his penny but the 450 part of a pound;

but how do those fact. affect his interest if he can always
with 20 shillings or with tiol pence secure the value of
pound? If a silver standard If value were substituted for or
made concurrent with our present gold standard, the great
object to be studied would be So to adjust the new standard
in Its relation to the old one as to leave the prices of corn-
mantles practically unaffected.
4' Money or coin is, after all, but the auxiliary to the real
transa,tions which concern the labouring class—the barter,
viz., of the exercise of their intelligence and industry for
the material products which constitute their salesistence. So
long as the standard td value is maintained in its integrity
and the subsidiary coins or tokens are supplied in sufficient
quantity, industry can have no Callte of complaint against
the Mint, and if the only grievance that can be alleged as
" pressing heavily tipoll the pi," is "the present coinage
law.- the working men of En.-:land must have great came for
thankfulness. " I remain, itc.
Lank of England, Nov. 17. "J. G. IlinntED."