The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1876-08-11

not moke any difference, why not resume
Tomorrow if we had only enc gold dollar
TO do 1t with. I am afraid Resumption
is very badly muddIed on this point.
1t (goldi Will always be scarce until
we produce something TO bring it here.
Inc man who has corn or cattle or wool
10 sell mas no difficulty in getting money
Solo Ior tnem and never viii have II
trade Is allowed to follow natural laws.
Now this may sound like an axiom
like the whole truth liz nutshell. But
it is really one of those cutie fish dis
charges which muddIes people who don't
ascertain the facts in the case.
The first fact is that we do produce all
we can to bring gold here. Our country
is full and oyerfiowing with corn, cattle,
wool, wheat, cotton, petroleum, hides,
butter, cheese, pork, and all kinds Of
manufactured goods that our ingenuity
and material can furnish. We 90 ship
to Europe all the products that Europe
will buy, and if We doubled our produc-
ton and shipments we could not get any
more European gold in return than now,
because prices would fall rs the supply
Increased above the demand, If we did
produce and ship enough TO turn the ag-
gregate balance of trade in our favor, it
would be paid In our bonds, or in silver,
instead of in gold coin or bullion, because
gold is the last article that European
capitalists will ship here. Every dollar
of gold there represents 4 topping mass
of credits, and making gold the only legal
tender is causing an increased demand for
and value of it. The more we add to the
demand for it the more tenaciously
Europe will hold on to 1t. When silver
was legal tender there and of equal
value with gold, no large amounts Of
either Kind of coin could be shipped to
this country even though it had been
bought with our bonds and belonged to
our government. On this point let me
quote the proof as related by an excellent
hard money authority:
"When the negotiations were going on
in London for the sale of the largest
amount Of United States bonds that have
ever been sold there at one time, it was
foreseen by the Bank of England that a
quantity of coin would accumulate as
the proceeds of these bonds to the cred
it of the Government of the United States.
As matter of fact there was an accumu-
lation of about $21 100000. The Bank of
England, fOreseeIng that there would be
an accumulation of coin to the credit of
the United states, which might be taken
away bodily in SPECIE gave notice to the
officers OF the Treasury Department of the
United States that that the power of that
institution would be arrayed against the
whole proceeding unless We gave u
pledge that the coin should not be remoY-
ed, and that we would TeinYest it in the
bonds of the United States as they We're
IN OF of -inRE a
lcere compelled to cOmpiy!'-Sp of
Senator Boutwell,, formerly Secretary of
the Treasury. (COng. Record, 43d Cong,
1st Session, vol. =, part 6, p. % of Appen-
dix
And if Resumption wants to increase
production he must raise, not lower, the
legal tender price of products. Raising
prices increases production - lowering
prices decreases production. Yet my
friend wants prices lowered and produce
ton increased. 1t won't work. To appeal
to the people who have greenbacks which
are increasing in purchasing value while
locked up in bank vaults to exchange
them for corn, cattle, wool, real estate,
manufactured goods, ETC., viii CHI are de
creasing in value, is an appeal that will
not be needed.
It seems to me that the idea of getting
gold from Europe by lowering the prices
of products there. is the most palpable
absurdity that ever seized upon credu-
lous people and a crazy Congress. The
masses of the European people are in
debt, and so are we in debt, to the owners
of gold there. The gold is practically
monopollzed by the creditors. The Eu-
ropean people have to live and to pay
their debts on the amount of gold they
get for their labor and products. They
are industrious, skillful and economical.
They produce all that Europe needs or
will buy from us except say 800, 900, 900
per year more than they sell to US, and
the sale of this Amount of our products
is largely dependant on European pro-
ducers getting good gold prices for their
products. for they are the main consum-
ers and purchasers there of our produc is,
and the lessogold atheyget for what they
produce, the harder it is for them to pay
their debts, and the more they have to
economize and stop buying goods from US.
When we compete with them. SO as to
force them to lower the prices they get to
a point that embarrasses and bankrupts
them, we begin to hurt instead of help
ourselves. We then cut of our sales, cut
down our prices, sell less to Europe and
get less gold for what we do sell there
than if the gold prices of products was
kept up. We cannot pay costs of trans
portations and under bid European labor.
silver there as legal tender
and thus making gold more valuable, was
not the way for us to get gold from there,
if that is our object. Resolving to pay
the interest and principal of our bonds
in gold, and to pay all other debts In
gold, and to get enough gold over here
from Europe by January 1st, 1879, to re-
deem 800, 10000 of paper currency, was
under the circumstances the most I'M
wise, unjust, ruinous, and absolutely
policy Congress and our
''fnanciers' could possibly have under
taken. Why if we were to rake and
scrape the entire surface of the United
States, and ship all we have above ground,
and all we could get below ground, and
ground itself for ballast, to Europe, and
stop all importations of goods, and go
naked and starving for economy's sake,
we should only reduce the gold prices of
all kinds of property, products and labor
there until the masses of the people there
were reduced to poverty and degradation,
aud we would be just as far aud
further than ever from obtaining that
European gold.
am in favor of gold as a legal tender
because it has all the desirable Qualities I
have mentioned aud manV more.
Granting this, it does not justify running
ourselves to make gold our legal tender
when the circumstances of the case pre-
vent US getting it. Circumstances alter
cases and control results, with nations as
we'll as individually and we must do the
best circumstances permit to meet the
practical difficulties of our situation.
But gold has not the money qualities
that silver has, and paper can be given
better money qualities than either, Silver
Is and always has been far more unIVer-
ally used as money. than gold. Its pro-
iuction is more uniform ana reliable, the
Talues fixed in it are less fluctuating, Its
upply is more elastic and self regulating.
t was legal tender all over the world