The anti-monopolist. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1874-1878, 1878-08-22

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private corporations, whose reckless
ness, dishonesty, incompetensy, and
misfortunes. afterwards gave birth to
untold miseries, which would have
been prevented, as far as the currency
was concerned, had the latter been
national insteadi of sectional, been
eagle instead Of wildcat.
The causes which rendered the as
signats worthless, although not en-
tirely identical with those that made
waste paper of the Continental money,
yet present a certain parallelism
thereto, which clearly establishes the
fact that the fault lay not in the cur
rency, but in the contemporary cir
cumstances which initiated against
the practicable and profitable en-
ployment Of it as representative of
values. The French Directory had a
correct idea concerning the legitimate
office of currency when they issued
the assignats to represent the value of
the public domain and of Government
property generally; but they erred in
not making them thoroughly national;
in not proclaiming they were put
forth to represent not only public
property so-called, but all property of
every description within the national
domain; for when, to meet the grave
crises which sprung upon them in
rapid succession, the Directory issued
an amount of currency the face value
of which exceeded the estimated
worth in gold of the property set
apart to redeem it. public faith
wavered, then ultimately collapsed
under a heap that demanded hun
dred times more of property for it to
represent than what had been express
ly reserved for that purpose; whereas,
had the people been taught at the out
set that the currency was designed to
represent everything in the shape of
property belonging to the nation, both
collectively and individually, their
confidence in it would have been i'm
measurably strengthened.
A second cause of failure was the
impossibility of profitably utilizing
the currency as fast as it appeared,
resembling, in this respect, the expe-
rience of our fOrefathers in Revolu-
tiOnary timeS-an embarrassment,
however, that would have been felt
under similarly rapid influx of gold
coin. and, therefore, is not to be
ascribed to the assignats and Cont
tinental money merely because they
were made of paper and not of metal.
The arrangement caused by the sud
den appearance of an equal amount of
gold currency would probably have
proved less disastrous, since it's force
would, in comparatively short time,
have expended itself throughout the
surrounding nations; but the assig-
mats. being an exclusively French
currency, neither England, Germany,
Spain, Italy. nor any of the other
European states could utilize it; con-
sequently, instead Of exhausting it's
force by slightly enhancing the value
of all property throughout the world.
as an equal amount of gold coin would
ultimately have done, its influence
was concentrated upon the much
smaller area of French property, and
thereby very naturally effected it to
an enormous extent; result, repeat.
that would also have followed the
sudden appearance Of an equal amount
of gold currency had there been no
use for it beyond the French frontier.
or had it's expectation been effectually
prevented. Moreover, the assignats
would neither have Unfortunately en-
HANGED the price of property measured
by them. nor become dead weight
in the hands of the people, had the
latter been capable of utilizing their
currency by creating additional prop
for IN urhovoh1-
values would have receded to their
former level. This inability arose
from two causes first, the disturbed
state of the nation. which checked
every tendency toward individual en-
terprise; and second, the want of the
thousands of new avenues opened by
science and recent discoveries to this
generation for the profitable use of
money.
\ third cause to which the failure
of the assignats must be ascrlbed was
the unparalleled political condition
of the French nation. Every one is
more or less familiar with the deplor-
able state of affairs throughout France
at that time. and whoever is capable
of expressing an intelligent opinion
will admit that such a condition of
national affairs was. in itself, apart
from any other cause. sufficient to
destroy the efficiency of any purely
national currency; of any currency
the worth of which depends upon the
preservation of the government to
which it owes its birth. a remark that
applies with quite as much force to
government bonds as TO government
currency.
Neither the Continental money noi
the French assignats failed of their
intended purpose because they were
paper and not metallic currencies.
There are other reasons for that fail
ure. which / reserve to strengthen
and illustrate my future arguments in
favor of paper currency for this
country. These two currencies are
exemplars with those who would re-
ject greenback currency solely on
account of the material it is made Of.
/ have. therefore. purposely selected
them to expose more effectually the
utter fallaciousness of such reasoning
on the part of the hard-money advo-
Gates. The history, however. of every
paper currency which has disappoint-
ed the expectations of its projectors