The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1876-02-26


tenders, issued directly to the people
This system disregards the rights of
the taxpayers and ignores the capacity
Of the people for government it
is cheat and fraud-nothing more,
nothing less.
Again, the attorneys and other advo-
Gates Of the banks say that the Su-
preme Court of the United States de-
cided the legal tender act unconstitu
tional in time of peace. 1t will, how
ever, be found that the court has rem
dered no such decision. The substance
of the decision bearing on this point
was that the mode or manner of prOvid-
ing the means for the maintenance of
the Government was Il legislative and
not a judicial question: and as it is as
much the duty of Congress to provide
the means for maintaining the Govern
meut in time of peace as in time of war,
its powers must be the same in both
cases. This is common sense as well as
common honesty.
Another charge made by these parties
against the legal-tenders is that by their
issue in the first instance the public
debt was greatly increased. This, like
all the other charges, is false. The Gov
eminent creditors had the privilege of
taking a per cent coin-intereSt bond
in the first place, with the right to con-
vert the currency into bonds at pleasure.
1t was then the bonds, and not the legal
tenders, that were the standard OF the
Government credit; consequently we
would have had to issue just as many
bonds on the gold basis as on the cur
rency basis.
WHAT HAS BEEN SHOWN.
1t has been shown in what L have
said, and, il we accept the Decalogue
and Davies arithmetic as authority, l
believe fully proven
First that the rate of increase in the
national wealth is not above 3 per cent.
per annum.
Second, that the great Capitalization
of money and wealth, in bonds and other
forms of capital-wi withdrawing and with
holding it from natural channels OF in
dustry and business, leaving them de
prived of currency, and to shrink and
collapse-is due wholly to the present
rate of interest, and that its eXOrbitance
is the main, and is Of itself a sufficient,
cause for all our industrial, commercial,
and financial disasters, and cannot be
maintained without periodic recurrence
of those results.
Third, that depression in our indus
tries and commerce is the natural and
inherent effect of the delegation to pri-
vate corporations of the sovereign power
to make money and regulate the rate Of
interest. Public evil was planted in the
very nature Of the grant, was inevitable,
and is now brought home to all the rela-
tons and interests of labor and business
in disturbance, defeat, and ruin.
Fourth, that the sO-called national
banking system is founded on the same
principle as the banking systems which
went before it, but with greatly increased
powers over the money Of the country
and the facilities for enriching the few
at the expense of the many; that at the
rate of interest or profits derived from
far S1,OOO,OOO, 600, or 4 per cent. OF the
wealth of the nation so invested or so IA
vored, would swallow up the other 80
per cent. with the additions made there
to bv the labor Of forty millions Of peo-
pie in one generation, or in thirty-hVe
years.
Fifth, that the proposed system IS III
/ harmony with the principles OF justice
of equal and common right, and with
common sense, upon which our instltu-
/ tons are founded; that it would place
! the circulating medium under the con-
/ troll OF the people, to whom it OF right DC
! longs. and compel money or loanabl'
capital to cooperate with industry ana
ENTERPRISE in the development OF our
resources and the production OF wealth.
/ on equitable terms.
Sixth. that without any additional tax
alton it would discharge or remove the
| burden of the public debt in fourteen
wears. and at the same time provide the
people with safe, adequate, and con-
yenient currency; and that, by the reduc-
ton in the rate of interest on loanable
canital consequent upon the influence
Of the system, it would, relieve the
industrial and producing classes from
the payment Of over one million and
half of dollars daily to the money-lend-
ers. now unjustly and unnecessarily ex-
torted from them under the adverse
powers and tendencies and the double
interest subsidy Of the existing sys-
tenn.
THE ISSUE.
| Tho icSna il NOT hafXaPn gold aDO le-