The weekly Union times. [volume] (Union C.H., South Carolina) 1871-1894, 1879-08-22
: UNION G. H., SOUTH cARoLlNA, AUGUST %, 1879

minutes and hours are now required since
the adoption of the submarine telegraph.
The balance Of trade in our favor for the
last fiscal year amounted to some two hun
dred and fifty odd millions speak from
memory. Suppose this amount could be
paid III Silver at eighty five cents in the
dolar-instcad of gold-and you will have
some idea Of our immense losses If these
BALANCES should be paid in silver, at its
present value, instead of gold, our losses
would be more than thirty million dollars.
So that We have not the same conditions as
when silver was the dollar of our Daddics,"
and it Is much easier TO talk about restor-
ing it to its former relation to gold and to
the business world, than to accomplish it,
For the life OF me, | do not comprehend
how any man who has pound of cotton
to sell can desire any other than q gold
standard. The price of cotton in this couu-
try is regulated by the price, IN gold, in
Liverpool. Why then should be required
to take for my cotton u currency which is
deprecated in England as well as America,
when | ought to get the best price in the
best currency? Let us see how it affects
the chief market crop Of the South. The
value of manufactured cotton exported
by us for the ten months ending April 30,
1879, was one hundred and fifty million
eight hundred and scventy-nine thousand
three hundred and forty five dollars (S15O,-
SD, ,345.) Run fifteen cents in the dollar
through that SUN, (and merely adopt that
to represent the depreciation Of silver, by
way of fillustration-it may be more or less }
and the measure Of loss to the cotton pro-
duce may be approxmated. This, of course,
would not happen if we could control tho
price Of silver in England, France, Germ
any and other countries with which we
have commercial transactions; but we can.
not make cighty.fve cents worth of silver
worth one hundred cents in England by
placing the government stamp on it, as We
can at home, for when it gets to England
it rates simply as bullion and passes there
only at its bullion value"
do understand you, then, to favor
single standard Of coin currency :"
"No, not absolutely. think that it was
wise and proper to rcmone;ize silver and
to limit its coinage, us believe, with prop
er limitations upon the coinage of silver, to
be regulated by circumstances, the two
yvrsr, dupurHys-n,unI unIyuI6d --rvsure-l
as tho uhlimited' free coinage of silver, as
matters now stand, would haze the effect
Of driving gold out of the country and en-
failing great losses upon our people, as |
have endeavored to illustrate BY the losses
on cotton alone"
''Rccurring to your suggestions abont
the National Ba aks, would not their aboli-
ton tend to unscttle business and produce
confusion in monetary circles Z"
81 think not The repeal Of the provi-
sion Of the National Bank act, which impo-
ses a tax OF 10 per cent. on State issues,
would settle the troubles, at least SO far as
We in the South are concerned. The COM
parativcly small amount Of capital invested
in South Carolina in National banks would
be transferred, no doubt, to institutions Or
ganlzed under State authority as banks of
issue Issue, aid become much moro satisfactory
to investors in bank stock, We should
then have currency answering all the pur-
poses Of our people in their business opcr.
aiCns, as under State banks before the war,
and would be all the better by being kept
at home if such should be its fate. Our
merchants and business men would have
no difficulty in arranging their exchanges
with New York, Baltimore, or even with
Europe, as thoy had none before the war.
The government issues ofGpccnbacks would
remain in circulation. / have no doubt of
the ability of the government to maintain
resumption upon the present amount in
circulation, or perhaps on Il larger amount,
in the progress of the DEVELOPMENT of our