The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1885-03-30

WAGE-EARNERs AND THE GOLD LAW

The currency question is an import
ant one to the people, but its import
ance has none the less caused it to be
misunderstood. An illustration of
this fact is to be found in a letter in
Tuesdays Bulletin from Mr.. j. o. Car
ter, q gentleman of intelligence and
culture, whose character places him
entirely above the suspicion of inten-
tional misleading. Yet, if his advice
to workingmen were adopted, the
most mischievous consequences would
result-indeed, consequences precisely
the opposite of those which he as
sumes would happen.
In brief, he implores wage-earners
to insist upon payment in gold, and
he cites the authority of Senator Nor
rill of Vermont, that something very
terrible was going to happen the
workingmen of the United States if
the "coinage of silver dollars were con-
tinued until business was conducted
on the basis of the silver standard,
which practically meant that the pur-
chasing power of money in every
body's pocket would undergo a depre-
citation of Is or 20 per cent. He (Sen-
ator MorrilD warned wage-earners
and those who received fixed salaries
that they would be the first to feel the
evil effects" We quote this respect
able authority as we find it in Mr..
Carriers letter, merely remarking
thatit did not carry very much weight
in the United States Senate, where
the gold ring has been unable to Sc
cure q majority to repeal or modify
the Bland Silver Coinage bill, while
the workingmen, whose interests
Senator Morrill, protested to cham
pion, persistently cling to the silver
dollar as the coin which saves them
from the Shylocks of finance, one of
whose representatives and mouth
pieces in the United States Senate
Mr.. Morrill, VIGOROUSLY is.
The workingmen of America may
be trusted to understand what is to
their own interest, and it so happens
that their affection for silver is the
result of sad experience. They re-
member the ruinous effect upon man.
nfactures and trade in the United
States caused by the adoption of the
gold standard and the decentralization
Of silver by a trick in Congress
in February, 1873. Property values
gradually fell from 40 to 60 per
cent during that terrible period of
depression. Wages fell in equal
ratio, until the working classes were
driven to absolute desperation, and
the great labor revolt of 1877, in Penn
svlvania, and the Sand Lot agitation
in California, aroused the dormant
intellect of the American people to
the stupendous evil inherent in the
adoption of gold as the single stand
ard of value, and compelled the en-
actment of the Silver Coinage bill in
February, 1878, which was promptly
passed over the veto of President
Hayes, who represented then, as
President Cleveland represents to-
day, the banking and monopoly inter-
ests of the United States.
To ask either Senator Morrill,, or
jay Gould, or the Seligmans and
Rothschilds, or any other member OF
the guild of speculative usurers, or
President Cleveland, what they think
of silver coinage, would be precisely
az if the early disciples had asked
Caiaphas, the High Priest, what he
thought of the divine mission of their
Master. They would have received
the most plausible and apparently
convincing reasons for concluding
that he was an impostOr, and that
those who trusted him would be
deceived and ruined.
The gold adherents left no stone
unturned to prevent the Silver Coin
age bill passing. AS a last resort,
thew whipped up their servitors OF
the daily press, for be it understood,
all the great daily newspapers in
New York, Brooklyn, and most other
large cities in America, are either