Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1878-11-14
The Political Outlook.

Tor the Democratic party, all of>those.
States, excepting Maine in which the
election was held in October, being
carried by the Republicans by unex>:
Iectedly large maj"ri'ies. 1t has
,een apparent to the close observer for
some time that the Democratic party
cannot reasonably hope for any in-
crease Of strength in the, eastern
States, but tie late elections haze
shown greater Republican gains tlan
had been believed possible. We are
now fully confirmed in the belief
hat sectional lines may soon separate
tho. two political parties which are.
contending FOR the eon,rol Of the gov
ernment. There may be solid Dem
ocratic South and West, and solid
East. The nature Of the
Issues to be contended over, and che
distinctive interests that naturally ex>
ist between the two great divisions
named above, can hardly fail to pro-
duce this result. The colossal forts
unes that have been acquired in the
East, the large number Of persons of
moderate means who have money to
loan, and the whole structure Of soci~
ETY. and the manner Of life there, have
created such interests and have pro-
duced such caste Of sentiment with
the ruling classes, that they are begin
ming to require a policy on the part Of
the government that savors strongly OF
monarchical institutions. The ba"k~
ers and money lenders demand poll.
cy chat shall be run in their especial
interest, regardless Of the Industrial
Interests of the country. Encouraged
by the success they have had in di~
recting the financial policy Of the
government since the close Of the re-
bellion, they have organized to per-
cetuato their power, let the cost he
what it may. At the close Of the War
there were 81 .651 ,00C of paper money
in circnl ation, and the value Of this
money ranged frou, 35 cents in gold
on the dollar up to higher figures at
different dates, greenbacks having
sunk TO IS cents on the dollar nine
months before the close of the war.
The bankers and money lenders
bought interest bearing government,
bonds with this inflated currency, or
loaned it to private individuals and to
companies and corporation. The
bankers knew that after having loaned
enormous sums of deprecated curren>
cy, it would be highly conduci7e to
their interests to force the debtors to
pay on a gold basis When the bank
ers> of the world combine (for Ameri>
can and European bankers co>operated
in this movemenD to get policy ia,
vcrable to themselves adopted by a
nation, they generally succeed, and
did in this instance. Accordingly the
currency Was contracted nearly bill>
ion Of dollars in three yrars. and whe,,
it was found perfectly impracticable to
contract any longer, the Republican
party at once put a movement on foot
t" force grecubacks to par with e"Id
as If determined to leave nothing un-
done that would tend to make the
payment Of debt impossible and throw
the property and wealth of the coun>
try into the hands Of the money lend
ers. l" 1875 Congress passed t:,e
resumption act, which had exactly the
same effect as IL contraction of the cur.
rency, viz, to bring greenbacks to pa,
with gold sooner than the business oi
the country could bear. The same
policy, in some form, has been followed
from the close Of the war to the pres.
ent time. Well, what was the resul,
Of that policy? Money constantly be,
came scarcer, and its purchasing pow
er became greater. Railroad compan,
les finally learned that it would no.
pay to build roads, because the pr,c,
Of labor and Of iron and other materia
was falling so rapidly that it woule
pay better to scve thei1 money unit
this shrlnkaSe in values ended. Fo
the same reason all Improvement
stepped A mill or factory which cns
100000 during the period OF his1
prices, was not worth more than hal
that sum few years afterward, be-
cause the price of labor and materia
was reduced enough in that time t,
make that much difference il Its cost
1t can be plainly seen how this shrink
age in values effected those who ha,
borrowed half the money to make sucl
improvements. They lost every cen
of their own money, the property ulti
mately being worth no more than tn,
encumbrance against it. The none,
lenders became the owners of tn,
property at half, or less than half, it
original cost. People got their eye
open finally, and quit investing none,
in anything that gave employment t,
labor. 15a Laborers we're thrown out q
employment, and great misery pre-
vailed in all the manufacturing an,
mining districts inthe United States
L is perfectly plain that the fearfu
condition Of fairs that has existed fo
several wears, is due directly to tb