The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1880-01-22
DEMOCRATIC DOCTRINES AND
DEMOCRATIC MONEY.

DRmOCRATIC DOCTRINES AND
DEMOCRATIC MONEY.
We were telling the Changers, yes
te:d4y, if they would, only as
citizens, give an earnest support to the
effort now being made among Dino
crars to re-establish government upon
doctrines which, in years past guaran-
teed purity of administration, that they
would by such means reach, by the
shortest possible course, the goal
pointed out to them by Col. Lang. AS
he properly states, 1t has been the un-
wise legislation of many years that has
done much in reducing classes to MIS-
cry, and in making agriculture and
mechanics proftless. It has been an
| inhibition of "free trade and sailors
rights" that has produced the neces-
sity of paying five or six times as much,
in many instances, for manufactured
goods as profitable compensation for
mechanism demanded 1t has been the
smsssing q fortuna on upJust protec-
tive tariffs that has created extravagant
Ideas among the rich, and an effort to
vie with them on the part of the poor,
has resulted in the general expenditure
of more than they received; it has been
unbridled liberties granted favored
class by the government, that has laid
the foundation for the most
corruption disgracing the govern
ment of these United States, and max
ing it's impurities byword among all
people. The arrogant assumptions of
the Republican parry, fostered by
special and perpetual privileges granted
a petted class and favored section,
resulted in q cruel sectional war, in
the maintenance of which the national
government piled benefit upon bene-
fl until these same favored classes, for
whom it appeared the government
was alone conducted, became
the possessors of untold wealth.
The unlawful means used by the gov
ernment in moulding results are 80
fresh in the memory of everybody that
it is unnecessary to specially refer to
them. There were the bond bills, with
their high rates of interest, and their
exemption from taxation, in opposition
to which feeble Democratic minority
in Congress struggled in vain; later,
there were the demonetization of silver
and the legal tender acts, and special
taxation and high tariffs, all of which
became forces in the grand scheme of
plunder to enrich the few, while the
many we're descending to poverty and
to ruin.
We remember well enough the day
when no producer in Texas willingly
received greenbacks In payment for
marketable stuffs. Gold and silver
were the currency of the country for
years after the war, and had the legal
tender act never been enforced, it is
probable that this day hard money
would haYe been the only basis for
moneyed transactions in Texas. Our
people have had severe lessons upon
the subject of soft money. Rsdbacks
haa 1alsb their d day. sHd thSggh issued upon
ly worthless, and the Republic of Tex
as, with wisdom gathered from expe-
rience, decreed that no paper money
should ever be issued through public
OF private means within its borders.
Soft money was thus legislated out of
Texas, and 80 it remained till the state
was flooded with irredeemable Confed-
crate paper, entailing loss of millions
upon its people. Had the results of
war been different, greenbacks would
have shared a similar fate. And what
is there, please, at this day, to guaran-
tee that the value of greenbacks Is to
remain always as nowg The tendency of
an immense volume of paper currency,
amounting to $3.50, 900, 600, is certainly
against its convertability into coin.
Russia is a nation far more powerful
and populous than the United States,
possessing vast wealth and inexausti-
BILE mines and industries, aud l;mitless
agricultural resources, yet it's paper
rubble has been inconvertible into coin
for over q hundred years. History
shows that no nation has ever ex-
tingulshed legal tender non-interest
bearing debt equal to that of the
United States, and reason leads one to
conclude that what has been lmpossi-
BILE elsewhere is by no means possible
here. When Shermsn's hording pro-
cess ceases, and by sheer force it must
cease, when the folly of selling inter-
est bearing bonds to secure gold to be
laid away in the vaults of the Treasury
to keep greenbscks at par is ended, and
such folly is certainly doomed, there
| Will OC . NuuOAC III SACShOoShS, ohN
when this tumble comes, and the caun-
try's pledges all being for gold and
capitalists remaining secure, the masses
will have another taste cf distress. II
the Greenback theory were adopted,
with the legal tender character of
the paper retained, the result
reached world be an immediate
depreciation IN the value of
these paper pledges, and, when once
begun, the decline would be continu-
GUS until the Texas theory of hard
money would take possession of the
eutire country, as the only means by
which people may be protected. 1t
is such calamities as these. against
which Mr.. BAyard would protect the
country. He would place it beyond
the power of Congress, or any social
or physical revolution, to bring other
financial disasters upon the people.
He urges his resolution, be-
cause like true statesman
he sees probable dangers ahead, and
he would, by wise legislation, pre-
tect the very classes that under Rspub-
lican administrations have so long re-
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