The Sun.
London, England, 1855-12-21 00:00:00

It is impossible much longer to bind industry and

its complicated divisions of labour down to barter
—nay, what is worse, to a monopoly of bartar for
gold. Free trade will not tolerate this bondage.
The paper system, which the instiacts and neces-
sities of the people have continually enlarged, can-
not longer be permitted to rest on the narrow basis
of gold, rendered unstable both by the law and by
the increased rapidity of communication with
foreign States. A foreign loan or speculation, a
short harvest, a telegraphic despatch, anything, in
short, may, by causing a sudden exportation of
gold, derange our whole commercial system. I
scarcely need recall to your mind how
frequent and fatal such panics have been,
how fertile of insolvency, misery end crimes,
and that in the depth of our ruin and the
triumph of our prosperity the amount of our wealth
was exactly the same, but disorganised by the failure
of our monetary system. It will be well for the
Times seriously to consider whether it wili be be-
coming its rank and character to be the first to err,
the last to learn, in a matter so deeply involving
the interests of civilisation and humanity.
It is a vulgar error, that the value of legal tender
money depends on the obligation of the issuer to
redeem it in gold, or to redeem it at all, or to give
any security whatever.
The value of wheat depends on the fact that it
ministers to the great human necessity of satisfying
hunger. The value of legal tender depends on its
legal power of ministering to the equal human
necessity of satisfying debt, and in both cases those
values will vary exactly in proportion to their abun-
denbe and-scarcity Tehitively- to the wont; of -Midi-
kind. To satisfy debt is the solifunction of money
and the sole element of its value. Money ought
not to be merchandise which can be melted and
robbed of its vital function as the canceller of debt.
Instead of " the promise to pay," which appears so
simple and definite to the times, it is payment
which is more simple and definite still. The only
problem to solve is to maintain it in such quanti-
ties as shall be in harmony with the just require-
ments of industry.
What are the conditions we seek? The first and
most sacred right we have to protect is that of the
labourer to full employment. I have shown that
increased money of necessity increases employment
and sustains prices. A sufficient issue of legal ten-
der money will give full employment to labour,
producing the greatest amount of national wealth,
and the money that produces the wealth will al-
ways be able to effect its distribution, securing the
greatest amount of national happiness.
Iu 1853, with abundance of legal tender money,
labour was fully employed in every branch through-
out the kingdom ; all the classes you have enume-
rated were happy, prosperous, and contented. Every
man was his own Chancellor of the Exchequer.
The air was everywhere resonant with the music
of gipsey parties of the labouring classes, there was
joy and contentment throughout the land, and the
workhouses were empty. The Bank of England,
under the compulsion of the law, reduced its issues,
and at the present moment the workhouses and
gaols are altogether insufficient to contain the
paupers and criminals ; our wealth and means o
wealth being identically the same, the derange-
ment of our monetary system alone disorganises
every interest.

The Times has fulfilled many a mission of
humanity and justice ; I still hope it will look
more deeply than it has hitherto done into this
all-important question, and that it will enter its
powerful prot,ist against the happiness of the
people being longer made the sport of an obsolete
theory.—l am, Sir, your obedient servant,
T. C. SALT.

" Come, expound your riddle, Mr. Salt. What is the
rtn,tter with the bank note ?" See the Times, Dec. 13.
Sir, —I will answer your question, and solve the rid-
dle. In return, I claim of you the solution of a greater
riddle than mine.
What would have been the matter with the bank-note
if the gold in California and Australia bad not been dis-
covered ! What would have been the matter with the
country under the effects of a law compelling the pay-
ment of all debts, public and private, in gold absolutely
unequal to their discharge 1' What would have been the
condition of the editor of the Tinter, even now agonised
by the delay of a single vessel bringing a supply of gold,
if none of them had arrived at all l
To these questions I want a clear, fair, and specific
answer, and not merely wit and literary banter.
Sir Robert Peel's bill is universally acknowledged to
have been a gigantic error, from which accident has only
imperfectly rescued us. Shall we correct or cling to the
error and its consequennes, and depend on future chances?
I say the discovery of gold has only partially saved us ;
even now we are suffering from intolerable usury, and
from the contraction of our monetary system. Under
this double effect our workhouses and gaols, which were
empty, are overflowing. Is not that fact enough 1
But what is the matter with the ban K-note I—that is
the question. Why, it is gone ! That is the matter,
and a pretty considerable matter too, seeing our debts
are not gone with it.
It is wild of you, Sir, talking of my taking a Han-
som cab, going to the bank of England, and getting five
sovereigns. I hate not got the note ; hence my grief,
A vast quantity of gold money has left the country •
the Bank of England has reduced its issues of notes from
25,000,0001. to 19,000,000/.
Every bank in England-800 banks—has secured a
portion of the 19,000,0001. to increase their reserves ;
the Government is exacting 100,000,000/ instead of
60,000,000/. of taxation, and you coolly tell me to take
a Hansom and present my 5/. note at the Bank. I tell
you
vlh havey i
it notde s
tgrootytehleln—otfoer;
ai t i
g os
odi withdrawnyreas on, - f destroyed.orso o t
becaase we have no gold money,—ergo we shall have no
paper money ; and you ask what is the matter with
the cote l Why it is dead--not sick, but dead. That
is the matter.
Now, I pray you, solve me the riddle how, with this
remnant of stagnant money, wages and debts are to be
paid'' Sol-re me that riddle and you shall be immor-
talised.
I will not 'a aete your titre nor the time of your rea-
ders by disputing whether the price of gold is fixed ; the
Bank of England, i
d, we know, is obliged to supply it at a
fixed prise, which is a sufficient fact for all but the most
refined understandings..
Sir, iu the coniiri, session this subject must be dis-
custeCi, and the Tinies cannot afford to be behind all its
contemporaries, and almost alone to support errors no
glaring as those of onr monetary system. I know that
editorial etiquette forbids the confession of error, but