The Iowa plain dealer. [volume] (New Oregon, Howard County, Iowa) 1867-1895, 1883-11-22
WHAT SHALL THE CURRENCY DE!
from tho Chicago Express

avoided, no inattet how mitch Tho ene-
mics Of apurcly Government issue maj
desire it.
Already the Comptroller Of the cur
rency is reported rs "being worried"
over the rapid payment Of the public
debt. Such language sounds strange
whes, WI think OF the Comptroller as
the servant Of tho people--thcir agent,
mourning because his principals have
supplied him with the money to cancel
their outstanding obligations. But, re-
meinbering TINT the Comptroller is the
friend Of the banks md working in
their interest, even to tho extent Of
falsifSing the official figures given to
the public, the language is not to be
wondered Mt.
If the people pay the bonds the banks
OF issue must go or find some other
security for their II, ties.
The terror which they eyince at this
thought Is net because they had not
| just Ms soon bank on other securities.
for they care not what the security is,
and would indeed prefer being per-
mitted to bank without giving security
ut MI provided they could be given
1
do fear is the discussion Of the advisa-
bility of dispensing with banks Of
issue altogether, which they know will
come with the necessity OF making a
change in the basis upon which they
are permitted to issue the evidences of
their Indebtedness rs money.
We have never believed that Con-
gress had any constitutional right to
grant the privilege of issuing the cur
rency Of the country to individuals or
corporations under any condition what
ever, and think the time not far dis
tant when the Supreme court will so
decide. But before such decision
can be obtained, victory for the peo-
pie must be won and the Supreme
court relieved of the pressure which
the allied usurers and money kings of
the world now bring to bear upon it
whenever any question touching the r
power to levy tribute upon the people,
comes before it for its decision.
For the present we prefer to argue
the question Of the currency from q
business point of view solely.
To us it resolves itself into very
simple proposition: "Shall the people
delegate the authority to issue and con-
troll the medium by means of which
they make their exchanges to corpora
tions whose interest it is to cause huctu-
atoms in prices and consequent periodi-
/ cal disaster to trade?"
No one who knows anything what
ever of the history of moneyed institu-
| tions in this or any other country ex-
poets the banks to do anything not cal
culated, in the opinion Of those who
control their affairs, to benefit them
selves, absolutely regardless of the
effect upon the business of the country
/ or the perpetuity Of our institutions.
/ Capital always looks out for ITSELF"
and capital knows no country" are
/ savings rs true MS they are familiar to all ;
and Of all capital that of the Insurer is
least mereiful; is, in fact, absolutely
without mercy, absorbing the cottage
| of the widow, the mansion of the lord
or the coat from the back of the beg
gar with equal avidity and heartless-
! ness.
No one who saw what followed the
panic Of 1873 in the great cities of the
country can have any doubt of this.
/ There are men in the insane asvlums
yet who We're sent there by the ALSO
lutclv Unsuitable greed of that class
already large and daily growing larger,
who obtain their incomes and amass
fortunes solely by proving off of their
fellow men and women through the
subtle powers Of usurv.
To other victims of the panic the
almshonse opened n way to the paupcr
burial ground; or, worse still, to the
dissecting table Of some medical college.
1t is blasphemy against the Most
High, and an insult to the common
sense Of the people to say that such
things must continue.
To say that they have existed in the
past is rather to brand those to whom
the Legislation of the past is due with
the responsibility for the suffering and
the crime which has resulted from the
systems and laws devised and enforced
by them.
Whether from ignorance or fiendish
desire to wreck the fortunes of others,
that they might gather the fragments
into their own Golfers, they, and they
alone, are responsible for the financial
panics OF the past, who shaped the
financial legislation of the past
That it was ignorance on part of
majority of Congress is probable. That
it was devised and anticipated-eyen
desired-by the few is no less certain
than that it came.
Ii no one We're interested in having
panics the common sense Of the people
would speedily induce them to devise
means to prevent panics. As it is,
every effort to do SO is frowned down
by those who desire recurrence of
these periods Of depression, and who
use freely of the profits which they get
out of the wreck in the work of mislead-
ing the people and binding them to the
cause of the disasters which periodi-
cally hefall them.
For this purpose works of political
economy are introduced into the
schools which teach false, aye, IN in
famous system; the great daily and
weekly papers of all countries are made
so dependent upon the usury and spec
ulative classes as to be useless to the
people in their efforts to arrive ut
clear understanding OF the causes of
their suiierings and losses; even the
church is made the bulwark behind
which the worst yiolators of the moral
law which the world ever produced
take refuge, inducing it to throw around
them and their crimes the cloak of re-
spectability, more impregnable than the
| armor of Achilles.
Money is simply convenience of
| trade.
1t is device intended to enable the
PRODUCES of wealth TO make an ex-
change of their productions among
themselves, instead Of which dishonest
men have turned it into machine for
robbing.
/. was never intended by the people
as means of extorting usury of any
] kind. and leist of all of enabling a cor