The workingman's advocate. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1864-1877, 1870-04-30

" tne matoHai quantity VI jug HE.SJ'
ney has legal authority to crush the value
Of labor and properly, but property and Ia
Dor have not particle Of legal authority
over money.
When q national government has estab-
lished money Is . standard Of value, 90 fAr
rs the jurisdiction of the laws extend. the
money Is clothed with an omnipressnt power
such as no other earthly thing possesses.
This omnipresent power Of money is used
a hundred times more in the entire absence
of its material substance than it is when and
where the material substance is present
Manufacturing companies, in this country.
mostly send their goods to commission mer.
chants in the city. These goods are credited
to the manufacturers, who draw upon the
merchants at such dates and times, and for
such amounts as are agreed upon between
the parties. These goods are sold on four,
SIX, eight and and ten months credit to job
bers in the city, who cell them again 10 mer-
chants in the county, upon perhaps equally
long credits. All these sales are founded
upon money, and yet all these agreements
are made without any use Of the material
substance of the money. The material Is
not necessary in making these sales. In
running accounts ut stores, the goods are
extended, summed up, and the amount is
balance against the debtor Of 50 much mo-
ney: but not the labor Of the debtor nor any
product of labor has legal authority to pay
this balance. There IL a certain amount of
money due, which the creditor can force the
debtor to pay, no matter how much the lat
ter NAV have to sacrifice, Of his labor or
products in market in order to exchange
them for money. Yet in mourning the in
debtedness, not penny Of the material sub
stance of money may have been used. Iii
simply the legal authority and power Of
money which are used in making all these
obligations and agreements but in order to
pay these debts money must DO had in its
material form.
1t is obvious that all agreements for the
sale of property and labor are founded upon
money, and th4t no price could be fixed up
on any property or labor without first hav-
ing a standard of value. When this stand.
ard is established, it is not matter of choice
but of necessity that the people use it in all
business transactions If individuals barter
one kind of property for another, they fix
price for each kind Of property, and they
must use the power Of money in order to cs-
innate the value, 30 that even in barter,
where not dollar of the materiul substance
of money is present, its power is used and
the balance may be adjusted by the addition
of more property on one side or the substi-
tuition of less on the other but if balance
be left unsettled, the creditor can compel the
debtor to pay it in money.
Again, the banks in the city Of New York
publish weekly statements of the amount I'M
der discount, the amount Of specie on hand,
of money on deposit, and of bant-notes in
circulation. These weekly statements are
given under oath of the officers Of the banks,
and the people suppose there is actually SO
much money deposited in the banks belong
ing to depositors. Now, are these deposits
all money? II they are, the power of mo-
6SyH7s not in its material substance, for all
the specie and all the bank notes held by
the banks would not, in ordinary times, pay
even one-half Of these deposits as reported
Then in what does the other half consist 1?
1t consists in a mere balance of accounts !;
and if these balances are money, it follows
that the power Of money is not in its mate
rial substance. But this power has the
ability to call for the material substance to
satisfy its requirements. Let the banks in
the city Of New York curtail their discounts
so that they shall not exceed the actual
amount of their specie and the bank notes
which they have received from the Comp
troller, aud it would paralyze the business OF
the nation, and make far more ruinous
crisis than that of 1887, or the one of 1857.
The property and labor of the country would
sink into insigniicance before the over
whelming power of money. The Insurers
would get almost any price they chose
to charge for the use Of money, and thus
monopolize the great wealth Of the nation
without even lifting their hands in any pro-
ductive labor. Under our present monetary
laws the people would be compelled to sub
NIT to these extortions for the money has
the legal power, but property and labor
have no legal authority over the money.
The holder Of a mortgage for 81, 900 on
property worth $50, 900, if the mortgagor
could not pay the money, might buy in the
property worth $4,000 for even 500,
and enter up Judgment against bis debtor
for $500. A debtor placed in these cir
sumstances would doubtless try bis best to
borrow the 81, 900, even if be had to pay
one or two per cent. day, in order to pre-
vent this great sacrifice of bis property, and
in the hope that there would be more ease in
the money market. This endowment Of
money With an immaterial, omnipresent
power, which can be, and is, used to any
extent without the presence Of the material
substance, and this immaterial power having
the legal right to call for money in its mate
rial form to fulfil its requirements and salts
| fy its demands, when the government has
neg lected to provide the necessary material
substance, is gross outrage upon the rights
of the people.
A certain amount of money is required
to fulfil the business engagements of the ma
ton. If one-fourth of that amount be with
held from circulation, one fourth Of the con-
tracts must remain unpaid. A high price
charged for the remaining three-fourths, will
not enable them to supply the place of the
absent one-fourth, which is indispensable to
the prosperity of business. No country can
be prosperous, while capitalists can cause
a scarcity of money. Their legal right to
withdraw their money from cir ,ulation can
not be denied but the exercise of this right
should not operate to the injury Of others.
Some public means must be devised where
by the requisite amount Of money for the
people may always be supplied, at the legal
rate Of interest. No government should
make currency of material of which it
cannot supply quantity adequate to the
wants of the people, for it cannot be neces-