New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1875-07-31
TILE RRINULE DOLLfR.

q. e. ossonat a. the infaIlible remedy for that
universal maady-waut of money. 1t was
thought by Adam Smith and other old gran
MES that when q man, by his extravaganza
and want of calculation, had involved himself
in debt or, by buying some article with Dor
rowed money when the price was high, became
bankrupt when the price fell. money would.
~ it were. naturally grow scarce with
him. If WIS also maintained that when n
large body of people had acted in tho same
way, the scarcity of money would be general
and that simultaneously the labOrcrs who IN
various ways, direct and indirect, had found
employment at the hands of those who
were thus involving their estates, would
experience much suffering. But Mr.. Carey,
Mr.. Kelley, and their followers now
tell us that under proper finan-
cial system folly in business management
will answer just IA well Is prudence
Is nm iron manufacturer distlcssed' Lend
him money at 3.65. Are thousands OF iron
manufacturers and laborcrs badly OFT Start
paper mill and turn out 3.65 enough to buy
ND the whole Public Debt. Are forty million
people in debt Let them bring their ten
cent scrip and have it stamped legal tender
"for ten dollars" and if the cannibal creditor
refuses TO take it let him rot in Jail SO will
everything he prosperous. and common sense
and hard work never more lie required in our
g-mOney Utopia.
We particularly ask attention TO Mr.. William
Brindle's definition of dollar The trouble
with the 1865 school of financicrs il that they
think their views are original. The Amer
lean system of credit or something OF that
kind, they call their project IN contradistinc-
ton to the "British credit SYSTEM In this
hatterng opinion they are mistaken. Sixty
years ago, during the period when the Bank
of England was restricted from paying its
notes, the Brindlo dollar pound stcr-
ling it was in those days was adj
vocated as earnestly and dciiantiy as
it is now. The honest currency men OF
that age persisted in asking the imitation
lists for their definition of the pound. The III
flationists came forward boldly, as Mr.. Brin-
die does this morning, with their replies
One man said that ga pound might be de-
"fincd to be q sense of value in reference to
"currcncy as compared with commodities
This, certainly, was not very satisfactory. being
rather difficult to represent definitely to the
mind. Another said: "Thero is a standard
"and there is unit which is the measure Of
"value and that unit il the interest of e33
"6s. Sd. at per cent, that being f1, and
"being paid in Bank note as money of ac-
count" This comes near to the 800 dollar,
that being the interest of $4,000 assignat
for twenty -four hours, and being paid at
the Sub Treasury in legal tender
|. o. u. as money OF account
OF triiiing account, we may say A third def
milton was: "rhe standard is neither gold
"nor silver. but it is something set up in the
Imagination to be regulated by public
opinion" Such were the definitions of tho
standard of value seriously put forward by the
ingenious predecessors of Mr.. Brindlc and Mr..
Kelley. The Bullion Committee Of $40, in
opposition to the views of the advo-
Gates of floating standard. here to-
day, there tomorrow, and the next
day nowhere to be found. came to the
conclusion that the pound meant nothing else
than definite quantity of the precious metals,
and that those who promised to pay pound,
the Bank of England among the rest, ought
to pay that quantity. Our dollar, as defined
by Act of Congress, is for all payments of
more than five dollars, 25i5 grains of stand
ard gold-nothng more and nothing less.
grains of gold as the standard, is not at lib
erty to reduce the weight to 20 grains, and
then to -, and so down toward zero. That,
as Mr.. Henry G. Carey told us twenty years
ago, would he frdud-a demOralizing" and
"ruinOus" frdud. This fraud was very COM
mon i'm old times with the mOnarclis OF France
and England. The Hrre or franc and the
pound sterling were originally each pound
troy of silver. Between the time OF William
the Conqueror and the reign of Elizabeth the
standard was repeatedly debased, bit from
1867 until 1916 it was honestly main
tanned without variation. I'm 1916 gold be-
came the sole standard as it il, by the Con-
stitutiOn and the Constitutional Acts of Con-
gress the sole standard with Ills. The Brindle
dollar, as nearly as we can get ut it, Is to be
a piece OF first-class paper, and an integral
unit of that number of paper dollars which
shall be equal to onc-eiphtl part OF the value
in Bnndle dollars Of the entire property OF the
country, and its value is vanishing quantity
Mr.. Brindle could fnd 40 presses fast enough
to manufacture assign0ts with sufficient rapid
ity to make them equal to once. hth ,hc as
sigaat valuation OF the property in the conn
try. The experiment was tried il France and
miserably failed, on account of the Govern
ments becoming too poor to provide The PAPER
and ink for carrying on tho experiment.
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