The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1885-04-06


statement of the case. Disguise it as
the advocates of the gold standard
and the demonetizers of silver may,
this is what they are after in this lit
tie Kingdom as well as in the United
States. Special conditions may diff
fer, but the intent and purpose is the
same. It is falIacy to suppose that
money becomes better in proportion
as it becomes dearer, because it is
plain that dear money can mean
nothing else than low prices, falling
wages, debts growing heavier and
credit liens upon property more de-
vouring, as weli-known writer on
the double standard very pithily
formulates this economic proposition.
Now, inasmuch as the rejection
of silver in the Hawaiian Kingdom,
except as token money, would rap
idly enhance gold, there being a scare
ity of gold coin in the country, il
follows that property of all kinds
would become unstable at anything
like present values, and debts paya-
bic wholly in gold would be artifi-
cialIy Increased by the exact in
creased premium on gold. This
would necessarily paralyze trade and
industry, and the only class which
could possibly profit by such a ruin
Gus condition of things would be some
half dozen men who are in position
tn control credits, and to profit by the
ruin and bankruptcy of their neigh
bors. That is what the Press and its
newspaper abettors are working for !;
and, strange to say, they have en-
listed, as a free lance in this raid
upon the business and producing
classes, at least one of the religious
journals published in Honolulu.
But to return to the Pacific Coast
press, and their position on the silver
coinage: one very significant fact has
escaped the attention of our contem-
poraries and their mentors. Cali
fornia alone of all the States of the
Union enjoyed an exclusive gold cur
rency up to the resumption of specie
payment in 1879. 1t therefore had
ample opportunity for testing It's eff
ficiency as compared with the double
standard now in operation. And
what is the result? Why, simply
this, that there is not a newspaper in
the State, with one exception, that
does not condemn a return to a gold
standard. This surely is not the re-
suit of caprice, but of experience; and
the experience Of the great common
wealth OF California is not to be
lightly regarded by the Hawaiian
Islands, which there find their mar
ket almost exclusively. It cannot be
said that California does not under
stand what it is about. or that it is
unmindful of its own interests. Those
who are familiar with the CONNER
cial and Industrial methods of the
Pacific Coast need not be told that
Californians are anything but fools,
although the Press calls them, to-
gether with the vast majority of
American citizens, "silver manfacs. {"
And there is another strong point
which should not be lost sight of in
this connection. California Is not a
silver State.n It is the great gold
producing country of the world its
silver output being triaing. Yet,
after thirty years experience of a
monetary system which gave arti-
fetal value to its special product,
gold, it unanimously abandons its
policy, aud declares most strenuousIy
in favor of a standard of value
of gold and silver. Nay, more, Cali
fornia does so after having made it
a condition of its remaining in the
Union, that gold coin only should
circulate in that State. To empha-
size its anti-silver policy its LegisIa-
ture enacted a special contract law
compelling the payment of all debts
and obligations in United States gold
coin, although distinctly in contra
vention of national policy.
In the face of this overwhelming
testimony in favor of double stand
ard of gold and silver, after the test of
long and specially favorable ex-
perience Of gold circulation alone,
the Hawaiian Islands, which produce
neither gold nor silver, are asked to
adopt a policy which would dis
credit silver and lower the CONNER
cial value of all its products. Let US
assume that the anticipations of our
contemporaries are realized, and that
the United States adopts a gold
standard, demonetizing silver, what
would follow? Why, simply this:
The purchasing power of gold would
be increased % per cent, and Ha-
waiian planters would be compelled
to export 125 tons of sugar to the
Coast in return for the same amount
of gold that 100 tons of sugar now
buy. Is that a change which our
planters are prepared to welcome as
a special providence in their favor?
| We think not. If they would only
investigate this subject without pre-
iudice or bias, they would find that
the interests of producers and wage
earners are inseparably bound to a
double standard of gold and silver