New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-09-16


600, 600. The total circulation Of bank notes
of all kinds for the month of July was
$22s,186,795 The total Of coin and Bank
of England notes held in reserve by the banks
issuing this 1928, 166,795 is probably $500,
OOO, 900, the specie in the Bank OF England
and Scotch and Irish banks of issue being
$174, O3s, $50, and the English private and
joint stock banks making no reports. 1t thus
appears that the banks of the United King
dom hold in coin more than eighty per cent
of their issues outstanding with the public.
1t is also to be noted that the banks of the
United Kingdom have never, since the re-
sumption of cash payments in 1921, been
forced to suspend payment nor has the Bank
of England ceased for single day during 81
years to give gold for its notes.
The total of the metallic money of France is
now seldom, if ever, estimated at less than
81 200, OOO,O 900, exclusive of the reserve of
the Bank of France. Of this coin large pOr-
ton is constantly boarded by the population.
When French peasant has saved sum of
money he is quite as likely to hoard it as to
invest it in an interest bearing security. 1t has
been estimated by competent authorities that
One-half of the coin of France lies constantly
race. The note circulation of the Bank of
France, by the return for the week ended Aug.
10, 1878, was $475,69O,O0O, which is the
total amount of the paper money of
France, no other bank having the privi-
lege of issuing notes. The coin and bullion
held by the Bank on the same day was
1922, $685. 900. The LIST of January, 1878, has
been appointed for the resumption OF payments
in cOn and in the interval the Bank is to be
repaid $95, 900, 900 of its loan Cat one per
cent? to the Government, that loan being in
reality made by the holders of the Banks
notes, which on the 9TH of May, 1870, just
before the war excitement, amounted to only
96,O0O,00O. The specie at that date was
1888, 531 900, being considerably more than
eighty per cent of the circulation. The repay
ments by the Government and the withdrawal
of its small notes by the Bank are having the
effect to restore the proportion formerly sub
sisting between the specie and note circu-
latiOn.
The vices of our old system of bank-note
currency were that the coin reserves were en-
trely inadequate to maintain cOnvertibility, and
that the unlimited issue of notes as low as
one dollar expelled gold from circulation. Our
currency in 1860 consisted of 5000, 100000
of bank notes and about 5000, 100000 of coin,
of which $s4,OOO,OOO was held by the banks
as reserve. We do not think it necessary that
banks should have the power of issuing notes,
and we certainly are not in favor of enlarging
their privileges in this respect while they
and the Government are relieved from
the payment of their notes in cOin
We are not in favor of the conversion
of greenbacks into bank notes at the rate Of
800 in bank notes for $50 in legal tenders,
as provided by the Act of Jan. IA, 1875. The
commercial interests of the country in time Of
peace and the stability of its finances in time
Of war demand that the quantity of legal
tender notes in circulation and supported, not
by coin like the notes of the Banks of En-
gland and of France, but solely by the brute
force of the Legal Tender act, be reduced, and
payment of their bills in gold coin be resumed
by the Treasury and the banks. The people
of the United States will expose themselves to
the just contempt of the world by engaging in
squabbIe with the banks over the profits OF
rag money.