The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1876-08-11
THE FINANCIAL QUEsEloN.
EkepIy TO Esesusnp1iOn's Article
of August 4fFR


must leave it to be settled by gen.
tlemen who always manage to set
tie 1t in favor of their own special
interests. This is one reason why
bankers explanations never enable
anyone to comprehend finance, and
another reason is that because they
almost invariably study the subject
solely to protect aud benefit the
banking business, they rarely COM
prehehd IL themselves further than
that point is concerned. An easy way
of muddling the question is to get
honest and generally intelligent per
SONS thoroughly muddled, aud then
set them at work to elucidate it..
They make the most successful kind
of muddlers, and when they find
themselves fioundering about in I'M
expected confusion, they very nat
uraliy cry ''cuttle fish" at every
fact and argument that they cannot
dispose of in any better way. 1t is
for the readers of this discussion to
decide who is most interested in
muddiing the financial question, and
who plays the part of cutie fish.
judge that Resumption has allow
ed European and American bond
holders to ink bag him until he is
completely bewildered, and I adj
wise him not to chase after cutie
fish, for they are more apt to turn
upon and devour their pursuers
than to run away from them, and
when they once place their tenaGi-
cous grip upon their prey, the in
cautious victims struggle in vain
to escape the fate that has overtak-
en- them. The gold that Resum p
ton and the American people have
been trying so desperately for years
to get, is bound to sink to the bottom of
| the capaeious maws of its European
owners, and the more we depend upon
them for advice how to get it the more
we will be bamboozled, muddled and mys.
titled, and less able to adopt q financial
policy that Will ensure our own rights
and prosperity. l would as soon go to an
English manufacturer, Russian prime
minister, or an Italian cardinal, to follow
! their advice how to establish American
manufactures, laws and schools, as to go
to German banker for advice how to es-
tablish American finances. Their meth
DDS may be the only suitable and prac-
ticable ones for their countries, but this
country is entirely capable of having its
| own financial as well as its own political,
religious, educational, and social institu-
tions, and of basing them more firmly
upon fundamental principles than any
foreign institutions are based. I care no
more for the financial laws and customs
of Europe or Asia, than for their govern
mental or other laws and customs. The
American people solemnly resolved 100
years ago to be tree and independent of all
other nations, and it is time they began
to be financially as well as politically, a
free and independent people. 1t is time
| that this sort of spirit animated our great
political parties, and found expression in
political platforms and nominations, but
it never will while we depend upon
European capitalists and their allies In
this country for light on the financial
question.
Resumption must rem amber that "the
experience of the ages" is not perfectly
conclusive. It was only 100 years ago
that Watts developed the steam engine
into a working machine, and yet men had
made steam for 5000 years at least. tits
much less than 100 years since steamboats,
and railroads came into existence,
against the disbelief and opposition of all
the wise men of that day, and it is less
than 50 years since the first electric tele-
graph was constructed, although electric
ity is co-eval with creation. Had the inr
vention and adoption of these and hun
dreds of other great modern improve
ments been left to the professional scien-
tIsts, the educated engineers and mathe-
maticians, it is safe to say we would now
be jolting along IN stage coaches, lying
becalmed in mid ocean, transporting prod
uce in wagons, and sending messages by
post horses. And it is equally safe to say
we will fail to improve on the financial
methods of medieval Europe if we
leave financial questions entirely to
bankers and bondhOlders. 1 do not pre-
tend to any more financial knowledge or
sagacity than the average American voter
possesses whenever he will give the sub
ject careful attention, but do assert and
stand prepared to demonstrate that it is
entirely practicable for the United States
to adopt and maintain financial system
which will be In every respect a decided
improvement upon any other system used
now or at any previous period of our
own history. To all doubts and de-
malls and epithets have but one reply
investigate fret, and decide afterward
That such attempts have failed is not
conclusive proof that they must continue
to fail. By failures, errors are detected;
by preserving experiments, success is
often secured. 1t is not in accordance |
with the experience and spirit of this age |
to say when improvement can go no
further and where discovery must cease.
The principles Of finance are unchanged
bIe-their discovery and correct appiica-
ton have not yet been fully made, and |
probably never will be; but there is room |
and necessity for understanding them |
more clearly and applying them more |
practically than has y ct been done. Eff
forts in this direction are meritorious,
whether successful or not.
Assumptions article, reprinted on the
first page Of this issue, is like his pre-
Vlous ones, such happy mixture of facts,
fancies, truths, errors, correct premises
and Illogical conclusions, that it is al
most as magnificent q middle as Tilden's
letter Of acceptance. And as it is abso-
lutely necessary for the general interests
L try to represent that the subject be
kept clear from mystifcation and confu-
sion, add the word gold in parenthesi
after the word money, where he means
gold. To avoid muddling we must avoid
confusion OF terms. For instance, when
Hayes 81 Wheeler, and Tiiden & Hen
bricks, announce themselves in favor of
redeeming our currency and paying all
debts in s'coin," and do not say which
kind Of ''coin' they mean, they are pal
ably humbuggIng, because they know
that gold coin is worth 20 per cent more
than silver coin, and it makes an i'm