The Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1877-1885, 1878-09-18

promise or expectation of redemption.
He wants Q currency so poor that il will
not be recognized By foreign nations. 50 |
that it will remain nc home, That such .
currency would remain ct home there can
be no6oubs. for il would not be worth car
rying abroad nor would it be Of any. real
value at home. Gen. Butler is OF the
opinion that the whole national debt should
have been paid by issuing ereenbacks,
When asked how that could be done IN
face of the law of 1864 limiting the issue
TO 1900. 900 600, he replied that the Law
should not be regarded: and when told
that such a large issue OF greenbacks
would make them worthless he replied
that was Just why they ought to
have been issued and let them fall while
in the hands of the people, and thus wipe
out the national debt and startagain. Gen.
Butler has intelligence enough to know
that such an enormous issue of greenbacks
at any time means reputation. The ex-
perience of the French nation with paper
money ought to be sufficient to satisfy any
one that paper money cannot be main
tanned without reliable specie basis.
Though the Law of France imposed pun
ishment of confinement in the penitentiary
for twenty years for refusal to take the
paper currency at par it fell in value until
it become utterly worthless. In the So
called Southern CoDfederacy before the
close of the rebellion their currency de-
preciated 80 far that IS 600. of it would not
purchase 800 in gold, and if it wouldinot
buy one hundred dollars in gold it would
not buy one hundred dollars worth OF
wheat.
We are a commercial people, and we
cannot afford, if it were possible, to go
back 10 coon-skins and tokens for curren-
cy, or to ''6at" money. SO called. Can il be
that it ia left for few hungry debtors IN
this country to make the great discovery
that to declare a piece of paper dollar
makes it dollar? Why not declare it a
thousand or ten thousand dollars? 1t costs
no more time or labor, No, my friends,
money cannot be so made. By the com
mon consent of civilized nations coin must
be the basis of all currency, for it is the
concurrent experience of all nations that
the precious metals form the best basis
and measure of all other Udt1e.
1t is of the utmost importance to every
man who has anything 10 sell and to every
man who is dependant upon bis labor for
a living, that the country should have a
good. sound currency and that commodi-
ties should have stable value. There is
but one class who can be benefited by a
deprecated legal tender currency, and
that is the debtor class. To every other
class it must work great injury. To no
man is deprecated currency so unmixed
an evil as to the working man, who works
for wages. A deprecated currency in
creases everything else 10 price, more in
proportion than it increases the price OF
labor, and labor is the last to rise and the
FIRST first to fall in price.
The foregoing extract, given at consider.
able length 10 order that full justice might
be done to the speakers arguments and
views upon so important subject. brings
also to view another side of the question to
which he does not give full weight,and which
is destined to make itself heard however
much it may be quietly ignored. THE
few hungry debtors" of which he speaks,
unfortunately for themselves, are a much
more numerous portion of the citizens Ct
this country than is pleasant to coUtemp-
late, or flattering to any theory of enforced
resumption of specie payments.
The continuous shrinksge of values since
1873 has doubled and quadrupled the
burdens Of the debtor class who by the
operations. actual and prospective. of the
resumption act find themselves obliged tc
meet and pay their indebtness in some
thing which is from two to three times
more valuable than that for which the In
ldebtedness was contracted. Who profits
thereby? Undoubtedly the creditor OF
capitalist class. The hardship undel
such circumstances is really fearful. Tn,
J memorable law of reaction against an!
, period of initiation is sure to make itsel
felt, but so far frow its being sound polio.
for the government to increase the rigors o
the situation its favors should be exteude,
to the utmost constitutional limit in behal
of that same hungry debtor" class who
under any circumstances, are sure to fee
the heaviest burden when the shrinkage o
values has once commenced, The laws 0
trade and REIMBURSEMENT of values are suf
fciently rigorous without being enhances
by harsh exactions of governmental policy