The Hawaiian gazette. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1865-1918, 1878-04-10

FROM the United States, we have strange
statement as coming from Hon. John Sherman,
the present Secretary of the Treasury. The
Secretary confesses to Committee of Con-
gress. that he has been entirely mistaken as
to his opinions of the consequences of the re
monetization of silver at home. and its iniu-
ence upon the bonds in Europe. A large
amount of bonds had been returned from
| Europe during the debates in Congress on the
silver bill, but the volume is gradually de-
creasing, and all that have been returned have
been readily taken up in the United States.
Not only this, but he says, larger amount of
bonds could be disposed of in New York, and
throughout the Western States at 31S and
per cent. In these respects, the passage of
the silver bill has been of vast benefit to the
financial condition of the United States.
But aside from these good effects, Mr. Sher-
man asserts, that the remonetizing of silver
! will facilitate resumption, and obviate the
necessity for the repeal of the act passed for
that purpose, to take effect in March, 1879.
He is confident that the treasury can begin to
resume at that date, and that there will be on
hand in the treasury, not less than $50, ,O00-
600 in coin, which will suffice for the purpose.
| Yet, better still he also feels certain, that
before or by that time, there will be barely a
nominal difference in the market values of
gold, silver and legal-tenders, and that each
will stand at par. This is substantially the
position contended for by the advocates of the
silver bill for ten or more years past in the
States; and Mr. Sherman has only acknow-
| lodged the fact, when he found that the
masses of the people held sounder views on
the financial question than either the Secreta-
ry or the President did, and the confession is
only extorted from the Secretary, who has all
along exerted himself, and made use of his
position to defeat the silver bill, in the inter
ests of the capitalists and money-changers of
Europe and the United States.
Mr.. Sherman was not satisfied with oppos-
ing the passage of the silver bill in Congress-;
but after it was passed by Congress, he induced
the President, it is said, to interpose his veto
in the hope of carrying his point through that
means. But both the President and Secretary
are forced to the wall on this question, by the
overwhelming power of public opinion. From
the experience of the past there can be but
little faith placed in opinions expressed by Mr.,
Sherman as Secretary of the Treasury, on the
monetary situation of the country in the near
future. He is poor financier and if he were in
any other cabinet than that of the United States,
he would be compelled by the force of public
opinion, to lay down his portofolio after such
a humiliating confession of utter Incompetent
cy as he has made to the Committee of Con-
gress, on the financial situation of the country
The fact is patent to all men in the United
States, who have watched the course of Mr.
Secretary Sherman for many years in the
Senate, as Chairman of the Committee on FL
nance, that he always leaned to the side o.
the capitalists and was controlled in his
whole Legislative career by the bondholders o
Europe and America, and against the best in
terests of the people. But the cat is out o
the meal tub at last, and Mr.. Sherman ha
; acknowledged the corn, because he finds tina
the masses have taken the matter in hand an,
with terrible emphasis pronounced agains
Sherman's policy in the management of tn
u monetary affairs of the Union.
:. This brings to mind the forceable languag
+ of the poet.
"Truth crushed TO earth will rise again.
The eternal years OF God are hers;
. But error wounded writhes In pain,
= And dies amid her worshippers.'
n The toiling masses may and do suffer griev
Gus expressions at the hands of bad or cor
p p rupt rulers, but when once aroused, the
e generally think correctly and act with th
Is force and power of an avalanche. In a cour
try like the United States this is surely th
ID case, because the people have the power
. = change by the peaceful process of the ballc