The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1879-01-16
THE RESUMPTION OF SPECIE PAY.
MENTS.

THE RESUMPTION OF SPECIE PAY.
MENTS.
We notice disposition on the part of
many papers and politicians to hint at
some future undoing of the law unier
which the resumption of specie payments
is now prevailing. The further agita-
ton of this subject is, in our opinion, to
be productive of no beneficial results.
We were opposed to the law which has
forced the resumption of specie payments
by hasty and ruinous contraction of
our circulating medium, because we be-
lieved that it would injure the masses of
our people to benefit few capitalists
and government spectators who have
controlled the financial legislation of the
Republican party. The result has veri-
fed the worst fears of the anti-resump-
tionists, for under its operation values
have fallen so that the landowner and
the laborer have not to-day more than
from one-halt to two-thirds of what they
had Eve years ago in consequence of the
depreciation of values, while on the other
hand the capitalists who, with the means
and the information on this subject
necessary to avail himself of the oppor-
tunity, has, by investments in bonds and
secure loans, been able to keep his prop
erty at its value of FIVE years ago. To
illustrate, take the man who FIVE years
ago had fifteen hundred dollars, which
he loaned upon good security. To-day
he has fifteen hundred dollars, leaving
the interest out of the calculation. Then
take the man who FIVE years ago had little
home worth fifteen hundred dollars.
To-day by the results of forced resump.
ton that piece of property is not worth
more than about one thousand dollars,
and its owner has lost five hundred dol
lars by resumption. 1t will be seen from
this that the operations of the law have
not worked equally upon all classes, and
the landowners and laborers of the coun-
try are the men who have lost by the
change. The extent to which this has
injured the masses of our people can well
be imagined if the reader will think of
the sum which has been destroyed for
every landowner in order to benefit a
few capitalists in the leading cities. In
the South we have felt it most severely,
because we have received the least posi-
BILE benefits from it. The men who are
our capitalists have not been largely
benefited, if benefited at all, by the
change, for nearly all of them have lost
more in the shrinkage of the value of
their real estate than they have gained
by their loans. For these reasons We
opposed the resumption act and the
policy of the Republican administrations
In carrying 1T into effect, and if it were
to do over We would again oppose it.
Resumption has, however, been forced
upon the country, and by far the greater
portion of the injury likely to flow from
the measure has already overtakcn our
people. The greater portion of failures
to result from it has already manifested
ITSELF and the depreciation in values con-
sequent upon it has reached its minimum.
1t would therefore be most unfortunate
for the whole country to have our finan-
cial status again disturbed by a new revo-
luton in our medium of exchange, for in
these fluctuations the money spectators
or brokers are the parties who reap the
benefits. The people as mass are in
terested in fixed and uniform currency,
for their avocations do not enable them
to spend their time in studying finance,
and, if they were able so to do, their
property would not permit them to par
ticipate in the speculations on money
fluctuations. Men who have their capi-
tai invested in lands and manufactures or
merchandise cannot change their invest
ments in day or a month to take ad-
vantage of some rise or fall in the pre-
MUM on gold. 1t is alone the banker
or the broker who can turn his capital
from one channel into another and an
other, and so on as occasion may suggest.
Hence, if the Resumption Act were re-
pcaled tomorrow, and one hundred mil.
lions of greenbacks ordered to be issued,
the 6nanciers Of the nation would at
once realize the effect of the measure,
aud before the money was issued or the
relative value of things could be changed,
they would have their investments in
such properties as would be enhanced by
The change. It's financial management
has been one Of the greatest infamies of
the Republican party, for it has consist
emily legislated so as to have some change
in the value of money continually going
on, the whole of which has been in the
interest of the capitalists and to the op-
preston of the masses of the people. 1t