The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-06-25

were assembled at tne great lnternaJlonai
Monetary Conference at Paris, in 1878, to
discuss this very question. We began
with no bias. When we heard that the
old silver standard dollar--the only real
dollar--had been demonetized in congress
so quietly that lots of the members who
voted for the bill in which it was deposed
did not know what they had done in that
particular, we became interested, and
wanted to enquire into it. We don't want
silver dollars to be coined if they are
going to do the country any harm. But
when 80 old law, the basis of our entire
coinage, and of our money of account,
was repealed in that kind Of way, we con-
fess that we did suspect cat under the
meal. When congress found out what it
had done, and put the thing back as it
was before, we wanted to know if that was
right. 1t was not a party measure. The
repeal and the restoration were made by
a republican congress, and democratic
congress has declined to undo the work.
Our public men undoubtedly believe that
the people want and will have the old
silver dollar continued as a legal tender
coin. And the strange thing about it is
that all the opposition to it springs pri-
marily from the capitalist interest in the
great cities.
The recent decline in the value of silver
bullion rightfully has nothing whatever
to do with the question whether we shall
have legal tender bi.metallic currency.
1t is introduced to complicate the sub
ject by the friends of gold standard (;
but when you ask one of these gold mono
metallists if he is willing to have the
silver dollar remain as standard legal
tender if made heavy enough to be equal
in value to the gold dollar he will reply,
"Nol We don't want 1t at all. A double
standard is unscientific." In saying this
he practically confesses that the argument
of the Bulletin, based on the present low
intrinsic value of the silver dollar, is the
argument of charlatan. They don't
want it at all-bu, to influence the popular
verdict, they make use of plausible ar
gument which they do not themselves &C.
cept as of any Importance. They know
that there is wide distinction between
bullion and coin. They will themselves
60 with their gold to the United States
treasury and buy with it at par silver GER
tificates by the million-with which they
can only draw silver when they want coin
again and yet they try to make the peo-
pie believe what their actions show they
don't believe themselves-that the Legal
tender dollar is not worth dollar. Why
then do they buy it, and pay gold at pal
for it
The answer to this is perfectly plain
They know that the whole credit of the
United Ststes-the entire wealth of the
nation-is behind whatever difference
there may be between the bullion value
of the silver and the gold dollars. The
same thing that makes the perfectly value
less paper of the greenback and the ma
tional bank-note worth, as money, just as
much exactly as the gold coin, stands be
hind the small and varying difference be
tween the dollars of the two metals. Tht
gold men know this, and act upon it with
out fear or hesitation-and then their or
gans, like the Bulletin, 90 to the peopl,
and undertake to tell them what, if il
were true, would prove the men behint
them to be unfit to be trusted with thu
handling of any money at all.
The only argument used for gold. mono
metallism is this fuctuating relation be
tween the two metals. This happens t.
be lately greater than ever before in tn
whole history of money. We say hap
pens," but in reality it is the result to tn
blunder made by Germany in demonetiz
ing silver after its triumph over France
If France and the United States woult
now join with England, Germany, and thu
few little subordinate states of North
western Europe who have demonetize'
silver, the value of that metal would b
reduced perhaps to half what it now is
and it would become totally and foreve
disqualified as money metal.
Thisis what the gold men want and the
wantit so for purposes of speculation. A
long as two powerful nations like Franc
and America concur to maintain the sui
stantial equivalence of the standard coin
of the two great money metals, the speci
basis of the world will remain unchanged
Break this down, and the quantity of ms
terial available as a specie basis for til
currencies of the world would be reduce
one-half, or more. What is the inevitabl
| result The doubling in value-in pu
chasing poDer-of euery ounce of gold
The ,oorld! 1t is a job like the "watel
!, ing" of the stock of railroad corporation
Just as old Cornelius Vanderbilt Gale
the stockholders of the New York Centr'
!, together, and, asking them how man
shares they held, said to them, "here
3 two shares for every one himself hol'
9 ing more than half of the whole, an