Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1878-08-29
Labor and Credit.

| 'Oue-l lnlIu Ol d udl hOOI OOuSuI UOuu
of the United States for 81; therefore it is
just that one-third of days labor should pay
bond of the United States for 81. Money
has been made scarce, and it buys more labor
than it did when the bonds were issued. But
it is unjust to make the laboring people pay
J 300 days labor for a bond which cost the
holder only the equivalent of 100 days labor"
| OF all the arguments of the Greenback men,
not one is more specious than this. But let
us see how much of reason there is in it.
1t is obviously based upon the presumption
that days labor, of a given kind, is really
worth as much at one time as at another. 1t
does, indeed, require the same exertion of the
same muscles and skill, but is that all {? The
worth of thing is determined not only by
the effort which is required to get it, but by
the demand for it. A bit of ordinary stone
from the top of the Rocky Mountains would
cost many days labor to obtain, but nobody
| would give anything for it; therefore it is
worth nothing. The labor spent in making
an old. fashioned spinning wheel might be as
great to-day as it was century ago, but now
nobody wants the article, and labor spent in
making it would be worthless. So of every
other product of labor; the demand for it de-
termines the value of the labor expended IN
getting or making it. Iron costs as much la
Dor, let us say, as it did in 1872, but there is
very much less demand for it; therefore the
labor expended in making iron is worth less.
Labor necessarily would fluctuate in value
quite as widely and frequently as the prices
of the articles which that labor would pro-
duce, but for the expenditure of capital to
sustain labor during period of depression in
prices, and this expenditure is prompted by
the hope of ultimate profit upon the articles
made. Hence, there is no reason whatever
for the claim that the labor which was worth
a bond of the United States years ago should
be worth that bond to-day; the labor may
now be in less demand, as in fact it is, and
therefore deprecated in value.
But this argument also goes upon the pre-
sumption that the credit of the Government
is always the same; that its promise TO pay
was worth as much when it was doubtful
whether the Government could maintain its
existence as it is worth now when all foes
have been vanquished. Everybody knows
that this is not so. There was time when
capitalists of Europe, and very many of this
country, would let their money lie idle rather
than lend it to the United States on any
terms. Had that last deadly charge at Gettys
burg ended in a Confederate victory, who
knows what United States bonds would have
become worth? Those who took the risk,
and lent to the Union, did so because they
were offered high price for the loan, and it
was then high price, for the future was
doubtful. If paid in gold, they will get
exactly the payment which led them to take
the risk. If paid less, they will be swindled. |
When man who is about to take great risks |
asks money from neighbor for that purpose,
and, because all will be lost if he fails, offers
half the profits if he succeeds, what is he but |
a scoundrel if, after success, he refuses to pay
the promised profit? But the scoundrelism |
is still greater when patriotism as well as
sober judgment has urged the loan. Those
who brought forward their little savings to
aid the Nation, and staked their all upon its |
SUCCESS, deserve not such treatment as would |
be held seandalous and dishonorable, if be- /
tween two neighbors in a purely business
venture.
The holder of bonds who has purchased
since the war is not less entitled to his profit.
I 10 fonlZ viz |
small, that ignorance and dishonesty would
combine to rob him. He paid higher prices
than were paid during the war, because the
risk was thought to be less. But he paid
what all the world then considered a fair
price for the bonds of nation ruled by uni
versal suffrage lie took the risk of Demo-
cratic victories, and of the creation and final
success of party of reputation. If it would
be dishonest to rob him of all the money
loaned, it would be not less dishonest to rob
him OF any part of that which his risk was
then deemed worth.
The laborer who receives less money for a
days work than he did when bonds were
issued or sold ought to remember that he can
buy in full proportion more with his money.
Prices have declined, on the whole, even a
little below the specie standard. All know
hat the wages of labor, on the other hand,
have not yet fallen to the level of 1860. A
lay 8 work, according to the average Fate of
wages, will buy more of food, shelter and
clothing now than it would buy in times of
he greatest initiation. The only respect in
which the laborer has to pay any part of the
cost of the war, and of the enormous loans
made during the war at great risk, is that his {
axes on whisky, tobacco and some imported j
rticles have been raised. If he sees fit, he {
an reduce those taxes to a very small figure
indeed. But whether he sees fit or not, he 6
las no right to rob those who lent TO the ,
Union of their just profits for the risk they q
ook, nor to make others pay his share of the g
resulting from that temporary &
depreciation of certain kinds of skilled labor 4
which now appears all over the civilized G
Y. Tribune. t
Working Out Prosperity.
The distribution of labor is a proposed
emedy for forced idleness that finds much
avor with large class of theorists upon in :.
ustrial and economic problems, and we must a
Omit that on paper it seems quite plausible. v