The New Orleans Democrat., 1876-08-27

The eventual monetary insanity Of this coun
try Is only question Of time The late little tiff
over hard and soft money, now safety laid to
rest has aroused a great deal of interest in the
question of moneys and values. and shown how
terribly mixed. mujdled and confused we were
in financial matters.
Won have your pocket full Of silver change, Il
roll of gteenbacks in your portemonnaic. hH you
stroll down town in the morning but this Jug
gler. Finance. as great u magician as ever lived
out of the Arabian Nights. commences his tricks
and sleight-of hand upon your pockets. for not
an h ur. not even a second. does the money in
your pocket remain the same. Oae minute you
are richer: the next. shout Of some broker In
the Stock Exchange ot New York or London has
robbed you of your gain disspated it In mir.
II was a long time ago that we discovered that
the greenbaek dollar shifting and un
stendy We were still believers In coin then
and rushed back TO the old-fashioned currency
OF our younger days. Of Washington and Jeffer-
son-siIver. In 1874. or thereabout. Congress
was astoundod TO flnd that dollar. silver dol
lar was dollar no longer. had fallen 10 IS
cents: and that the Chinese refused to furnish
us with hreeraekers or ten in return for them
A now silver piece worth full dollar. and to be
called trade dollar. was specially created for
foreign use--any money. no matter now much
Or how little 1t was worth, was good enough for
us but in two years these had 40 sbrunken
in value that they were useless. and the
United States minis arc even now filled with
Jkese still-born children.
Strangest OF ~ is the change In value Of the
American gold dollar, simply from the almost
unappreciable amount Of alloy in it. In seven
years the gold dollar managed TO fall from 4
shilngs sterling TO 1-42 shillings sterling
The Cincinnati papers. In tho hot IN oney con
troversy raging in that State. have hoisted at
heir beads and next to the weather report n
daily financial report showing how the gold.
silver and greenbark dollars are doing. report
which. by the way. shows money to be still more
uncertain than The weather. Such daily changes
rs these tables exhibit are almost laughabe.
To-day IL Is the greenback dollar that IL up
while the gold and silver dollars drop behind a
point or two; to. morrow. the silver dollar goes
up and the greenback down while gold remains
at a stan'istil
It was claimed by the very hard money men
that gold only was the stable currency. yet gold
itself has proved very uncertain and unreliable
In It's purchasing power The New York 7fi-
bune shows that gold will buy Is per cent more
OF anything than It did In 1873. Consequently
gold is up. Tho discovery of gold in California
and Australia diminished its purchasing power
fully 30 per cent: and. were few more gold
mines to be found tomorrow. we would have to
pay more for our flour. wheat everything In the
world. In the good old days long past. we are
told. a shilling would purcha.e 20 an OK: later. 1t
would buy a sheep; and now we believe Its value
or purchasing power is hardly equal to good
spring chicken. And yet we are told gold is
steady and stable. Perhaps. after all, We might
ind that the old proverb-we believe 1t dates
from Confucius-" there's nothing certain
under the SUM-" will apply to all moneys as well
as to winds and women.