The workingman's advocate. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1864-1877, 1876-01-15


cure such hard times, nor to point out
the economic error which has led to them
Contraction has done its work Of destruc
ton pretty thoroughly, but We have only
seen the commencement OF its blighting
effect.
Law OF NATURE.
The Chicago Times in commenting upon
this portion Of Prof. Summers stump
speech, declares that it is an snunciation
Of law of nature, that cannot be violated
without suffering the consequences. We
can understand that the same Law VI ma
ture governs the deposition Of gold, silver,
lead, zinc, Or any other vein mineral, but
We never heard Of Law of nature which
extracted gold from the rocks, transported
it to the mint, aud had it coined into
money We have lAbored under the i'm
| preston that II was the work Of man which
men to invent money Ii all this is done
/ by a Law Of nature, We should like To have
the Times man point out the particular la"
or laws, bat If 1t cannot point them cut
1t must stand convicted Of teaching the
most nnnltlgsted nonsense WHEEL = says
that Prof. Sumner lays down law d ma
ture which cannot be violated. T'.ere is
nothing resembling law Of nature to b.
found IN the Times report OF the stump
speech. Instead Of laying down law OF
nature, the Professor does not seem to un-
derstand the theory Of gold at all. The
best authorities On this subject all teach
that the so-called intrinsic value Of gold
IS due to the labor cost Of producing It.
Ricardo, who is Justly called the father Of
| buihunlsm, the author of the bullion re-
port, and the most eminent bulhonist that
ever wrote, has based the entire bullion
theory upon this sentence
If We suppose that the same amount Of
labor always will produce the same amount
Of gold, then gold becomes the best theo-
retIca' measure IF value which We cal
conceive.
Every intelligent person knows that the
same amount of labor will not produce
the same amount Of gold. But there is
no bulIionist who has ever written Who
has not based all that he has said upon
this absurd proposition. The Tunes man
may imagine that it is law Of nature, but
that will not make it so by any means. 1t
is labor which determines the value Of
| gold these savants teach, and Prof. Sum
ner III the extract gwen farther above says
that greenbacks ware paid cut for war ma
terial, for services rendered to the govern
ment, hence It cost labor to get them. The
| labor nect ssary To- get greenbacks then is
intrinsic value to exactly the same degree
as the labor necessary to get gold. In
! both instances II ia the labor and not the
thing, il We 90 to the bottom. and this la
| Dor alone imparts intrinsic value to both
| gold and sreenbacks, to tia same degree.
| t. establish his absurd Law Of nature,
| Prof Sumner has overlooked one great
! fact, greenhacks III the hands Of individ
uals, are money To the fullest extent Of
the meaning Of the uord The senseless
exl ression that We want to eat our cake
and keep it too. has no meaning what
ever. because ii il was true then each in
dividuai would spend hi money and keep
it. No one did any such thing when
money was plenty. Then people paid for
what they got II Was not until after con-
traction commenced that debts began to
! accumulate. and then these debts caused
the panic A commercial crisis and panic
| l. impossible when ali business is Gone
upon a cash basis Prof. Sumner would
compel people TO do business on a credit
basls altogether. He would compel them
10 eat their cake whether they wanted TO
or not, then lie would strip them Of every
thing they had To make them pay for it,
and this Is called wisdom by every robber
organ ia the country To give force to the
propositions claws If naturej laid down by
Prof Sumner, the government must com
mence to give away yrrenbacks for moth
Ing, then they cost no labor, they will
have no intrinsic value, but 50 long As
labor has to perform gold dollars worth
Of services to obtain a greenhack dollar,
80 long will the intrinsic value Of gold
and paper dollar be exactly equal All
political economists teach that It is the
labor alone which gives value, and as Prof
Sumner admits that grrenbacks ~er, paid
out for labor, he cannot by any logical
means prove that greenbacks have no val
ue His admission rs fatal t. his aryn-
ment He says
1t is SO With ali individual note. Ii
man buys barrel Of hour, giving his note
for II, he has got u redeem the note Or
return the -four.
During the war ~e all talked like child
rem about the future. We we're carving
over to fnturity the losses We met then.
1t is a tact that laws can't be set aside any
more than the laws of nature. One Of
these laws is any article Of no intrinsic
value is put Ia the place Of money, YOU
can keep money With it We had the
richest gold mines Ia the world, but AS
soon a. a paper currency was issued, the
gold all went by US. Then the amount of
greenbacks was increased beyond the re-
quiremeuts of trade, and We found that
gold was, after all, only a tool Of exchange,
and We didn't want too much Of it, any
more than too many ships or wagons to
transport produce, and business relations
were disturbed, mercantile transactions
burdened with extraordinary risks We are
trying to do what the boy failed in doing,
To eat our cake and still have It, We ate
the cake, and then wrote cake ON pieces
If paper, and hattered ourselves that we
had it yet Laughter. We thought We
were getting richer instead Of poorer BY |
the war, which was necessarily q grievous |
error.