The Portland daily press., 1875-08-13
The Standard of Value.

IL ought 10 be unnecessary with people
so well educated as ours to be compelled to
argue for the advantages of gold and silver
over paper as the basis of the circulating me-
dunn and the standard of value Unfor.u-
nately erroneous ideas in regard to the nature
of money and value obtain in certain sections
of the country. These erroneous ideas have
been adopted by great political party which
purposes to administer our financial system
in accordance with them should the people
entrust it with power. The falacies, of
little account when held by uninformed men
or men of little influence, become source of
great danger when entertained by those
into whose hands the management of public
affairs may fall.
The chief requisite of money is that its
value shall be at all times as nearly as possi-
BILE the same. Value is simply relation be-
tween two things. Thus the value of
bushel of corn may be two bushels of pota-
toes. Every exchange of money for these
productions should be an exchange of equiv
alents, and the money shonld be equal in
value to the goods. Gold fulfills this condi-
ton. 1t requires the expenditure of as much
labor to obtain the coin dollar which we may
consider to be the value Of the corn, as it
does to procure the corn ITSELF Money
should not only be the instrument by which
we measure the relations of value, but it
should as well be the equivalent of the things
whose value it measures.
Now it is true that the value of an article
may be enhanced or deprecated. A bushe of
corn on account Of great scarcity of that pro-
duct,may become in value equal to four BUSH
els of potatoes, and its money value may he
correspondingly increased. But the money
value of the potatoes has not changed. The
cause of the changed relations between these
three is due to the change in the supply of
corn. Had corn been the measure of value,
it is evident that the prices of al other COM
modities would have doubled, and had the
next harvest been an unusually abundant one,
the values of all goods, that is their price in
corn, might have shrunk to one fourth. Germ
then, is an unsafe standard of value, because
of its liability to sudden fluctuations. We
must have for our standard something as
nearly flexible as possible, something which is
not liable TO sudden increase or decrease,
something which has worth in itself.
Because their supply is not subject to sud-
den increase or decrease, is why gold and sill
yer have been adapted as standards of value.
A change in their value is so slow as to become
scarcely percep.ible in many years, tor all
that is mined of them in one year, is small
when compared with the gross amount in use
by the world. A surplus of them in one coun-
try is eagerly taken up by another. The re-
lations of gold with any single article, fire.
quently changes from year to year in compli-
ance with the laws Of supply and demand,
but the general rates of values is preserved
and no great disturbance in prices follows
for this potent reason, the precious metal is
generally used by the civilized world for mon
ey. lar r-.4 ~
For gold the Western infationists propose
to substitute paper, and to furnish all that is
asked for. This paper, it is evident, is open
to all the objections which are urged against
fuctuating standard of value, being subject
to great increase or decrease according to
the caprice of legislators and the demand of
spectators, and it has little or no worth in
itself. 1t deranges trade, destroys credit, and
defes calculation. No man can long afford
to deal in goods when their value is subject
to great change in day. No one wishes to
lend when he fears that the dollar he receives
back will be worth but one-half the one he
lent No honest man dares to borrow when
he may have to repay twice the sum borrow
ed. No one has strong inducements to accu-
mulate when there is probability that the
fruits Of years of .self-denial may become of
little value in single day. The only meas,
ure Of value will be the so-ealled "wants O
trade'', and trade will want all the paper it
can get. Its wants will rise in proportion to
its means. If on the other hand we have
gold as the standard of value, as regulator,
the legitimate wants of trade can be met by
the expedient of checks and ledgers which is
sufficient SO long as the credit system is
sound.
The question to be brought before the peo-
pie Of Ohio, is whether we shall have gold,
stable standard of value, or paper, fuctuat-
ing standard, whether we shall better trade and
paralyse business by the adoption OF an ex-
elusive currency, or whether we shall put
ourselves in closer relations with the business
of all nations by holding to the currency of
the world. The Republican party has de-
clared for gold. The Democracy is divided,
but great portion of it favors paper.