Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1875-09-23
The Democracy the Hard Money
Party.

FdEty.
The Baltimore San, noting the fact that the
| established doctrine of the Democratic party
is gold currency, and that the Democratic
platforms of Ohio and Pennsylvania are at
war with the very heart and soul of Democra-
cy, treats this departure from the established
faith of the party as only or merely 'lOoal ut
terances." They are not to be regarded as
indicative of its faith or future action, which
| means, of course, that these platforms mean
nothing, but are intended merely for local de-
eeption and the delusion of all who may fool
ishiy put their confidence in them.
This is a Maryland Democratic view, and
ii aeeords with what we have heretofore said,
viz: that the Democratic party of the country
cannot be looked to to carry out the 'local ut
terances- Of Ohio and Pennsylvania dema-
gogues. The party is a hard-money party.
Every instinct in its nature prompts it to stand
by gold and silver as the only national cur
| rency. 1t broke down the United States Bank
upon the ground that the National Govern
ment could not, legitimately, authorize the
issue of paper money. 1t established the sub
treasury system, to divorce the National Gov
ernment thoroughly from the banks. 1t Or
dained that nothing but gold and silver should
he received into or paid out of the National
Treasury; and it branded all paper money as
not only unconstitutional, but unsafe and un-
worthy of public favor.
Such is the Democratic position, as estab-
lished by policy running back three quarters
of q century, to th9 days Of Jefferson. The
party is, in essence and in grain, in its body
and in its spirit, an anti-bank and anti-paper
party, and it has clamored for seventy-five
years for metallic currency as the only safe
and trusty circulating medium. In every
State, outside of Ohio and Pennsylvania, it
has, this year and last, adopted hard-money,
resumption platform; and the Democratic
leaders in those two States are not, therefore,
merely at war with the time-honored position
of their party, but have chalked out course
which they cannot bring their party to follow.
They are simply deceiving the people when
they hold out the idea that the Democratic
party can, by any possibility, be brought to
establish the doctrine that the National Gov
ernment can constitutionally, in time of peace,
issue the entire paper currency Of the country
The party stands on record, in Congress and
on the Supreme Bench, in their party organs
and party conventions, against the right of
Congress to issue or to authorize the issue Of
single dollar ofpaper money. They never
would and they never did coneede it, even as
a war power, and they are shut out, by num-
berless precedents of their own establishing,
from attempting to exercise that, as a peace
power, which they denied and resisted SO
stoutly as a war power.
If, therefore, the people of Ohio and Penn
sylvania want more currency or want the na-
tional brink notes replaced by greenbscks, the
Democratic party is the party which, above
all others, is unable to crafty their wishes
1t must, to do what its faithess leaders in
these States have promised, go back absolute
ly upon its seventy-five year record; it must
reverse all the precedents it has established; it
must upset all its hard-money declarations; it
must uproot the sub-treasurY, and it must COW
er with infsmy the names and the doctrines Of
Jefferson and jackson, of Benton ond Of Silas
Wright, of Calhoun and of Cass, who have
given it all its glory, and distinguished by
their fidelity to the Democratic idea. No
party can thus be wheeled around to an antag-
onism OF itself; and any one Who trusts in it
to do so, will be deceived and disappointed
-Pitttsburgh Commercial.