Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1878-08-13
Greenbacks not Money.

Every body is in the habit OF speaking
of greenbacks and bank bills as money.
But in the true meaning OF the word they
are not money. They are only represen-
tatives of money, promises to pay money
/ This distinction ought to be kept In mind.
/ for i is OF great importance. No person
would call the note of an individual
money, yet it is as much money as gov
eminent note or the note of a banking
corporation.
Daniel Webster declared that the
precious metals alone are money, because
they alone answer the purposes OF monty'
and ''whstever else is TO perform the tunc-
tons of money must be their representa-
tive and capable of being turned into
them at VIII. So long as bank paper re-
tains this quaily it is "A substitute for money.
Divested of this nothing can give it that
character
When the bill for the creation OF green
backs was under consideration in Con-
gress, nobody in either branch contended
that they would be money if issued. 1t was
under,t Dod and declared that they would
be only substitutes for money. repreSen-
tatiyes OF money, promises to pay money,
not money itself They were So regarded
by the country and by the courts. The
Supreme Court of the United States. in
the legal tender cases of 1871, said:
The legal tender acts do not attempt to
make paper a standard of value. We do
not rest their validity upon the assertion
that their emission is coinage, or any reg
ulation of the value OF money: nor do
we assert that Congress may make any
thing which has no value, money. WHAT
we do assert is, that Congress has power
to enact that the governments promises 10
pan MONEY shall be, for the time being,
equivalent in value to the +, preventative
of value determined by the coinage acts,
or to multiples thereof. 1t is n
mistake to regard the legal tender acts as
either fixing IA standard of value or regu-
lating money values, or making that mon
en- which has no intrinsic rdlue."
In the case Bank OF New York VS. SUI
pervisors, the legal tender notes were
held to be securities. obligations of the
national government, therefore not mon
ey, and exempt from State taxation.
Indeed the legal tender notes themselves
do not purport to be anything else than
promises to pay money. They give thu
lie on their face to the greenback delusion
that they are money. That idea was.not
born with them but originated in the
brains of crazed or dishonest men.
Bank notes and greenbacks are not
money" says Mr.. James 5 Pike, in hi
volume recently reprblished, "they are
only counters or tokens that represent
money They are worthless except as the
representatives of things which have lust
as much real value without their exist
ence as with And it would be a blessed
thing if every body would get this truth
into their minds. 1t would be found a
key to unlock many financial mysteries.
The want OF intelligence in
regard to the character and office OF the
paper tokens with which the channels OF
our circulation are filed, is one of the
marvels of the times. They are regarded
as money and regarded as capital, and
thence arises the presumption that their
increased issue by vote OF Congress will
add to the money and adj to the capital OF
the country. But such issues are actually
worthless to everybody because they are
out OF the reach of every body who has
not in possession something to exchange
for them. Aud wherever that something
exists money can now be obtained for il
at its market value wherever money cir
culates throughout the civilized world"
Money cannot be created from nothing
as the greenbackers foolishly contend.
Money has a value in and of itself, to
which the government stamp does not
add, and which the absence OF the STAMP
cannot take away. 1t is good the world
over. The greenback is not money, it is
only Il substitute, and only full represent
tative when it is actually convertible into
coin.
Fiat Shad,