Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1885-12-12
THE MARTINsBURG HERALD, SATURDAY, DEC. II, 1888

s5S. ~: amount OF debt less cash IN treasury,
ST. sos, III, S1S.64
spThe indebtedness of the United States on
November /, 1885, including therein tne
bonds issued on account Of the Pacific rail-
road companies, was 81, S4s, $40. 335. ~; cash
n treasury. $500, $50, 767. 65; amount OF debt
less cash in treasury, 81, 447, 657, 56s. o9; re-
duction OF debt during above period, Sos,-
054, 245.55.
1.-THE conditions of currency are,
aFirst. Without shock and disturbances to
the Industries, the business enterprise, tna
domestic trade, or foreign OF the
country.
aSecond. Without degrading the United
States monetary unit of value to a cheaper
dollar, and without raising the United States
monetary unit Of value to q costlier dollar.
ssThird, Without loss to any who now hold
the promise OF the United States to pay a
dollar.
"Fourth, Without reduction of the present
volume of the currency or hindEance to its
free increase hereafter when every dollar
note shall be the certificate of q coin dollar
in the treasury, payable on demand.
ssFifth, Without pause in the reduction OF
the public debt, but paying more than TIRES
ffths of all that part CT the debt now pay
able at the option Of the United States prior
to September, 1891.
ssSixth, Without increase of taxation
ssSeventh, Without the sale of any silver
bought and coined since February, 1878.
Eighth, Without the disuse Of the 2l5, OOo,-
600 coined silver dollars of unlimited legal
tender, or any fall or discount in their pres
emit received value, and without the disuse
q l. Esn nm nftn o1;na1 1o1d dollars 0f nm
limited legal tender, or any rise or premium
on their present received value.
ninth, Without prejudice to the adoption
hereafter of an international bimstallic I'M
ion, with free coinage of both metals for all
corners, at a liked ratio of weights, into
coins of unlimited legal tender.
Tenth, Without the coins of the two
metals parting company from each other,
whatever may be the temporary fall, if any,
In the market price of silver bullion after
stopping treasury purchases.
81 would most respectfully commend to
the consideration of congress the question
whether such a reform of the currency ought
not now to be endeavored; whether these
are not among the prudent and just condi-
lions of its reforms; and whether such q re-
form might not be promoted, with immedi-
ate advantage to all our industries and
trade, by repeal of the clause requiring
treasury purchases of silver bullion, and re-
peal of the act making compulsory treasury
issues and reissues of the legal tender notes.
"Gold is 60 per cent. of the metallic circu-
lation of the United States at the present
moment; although it may need explaining
that with free coinage for everybodyis sill
yer into full legal tender silver dollars, the
people of the United States asked for only
S,045, 1888 in eighty years, but that congress
required the coinage of 215, 000, 600 in ebout
eight years.
'sGold is the standard of value in nations
from which we in the United States took 81
per cent. last year of all our imports and to
which we sent more than 90 per cent. of all
our exports. And with most of the coun-
tries having silver as a standard, or in
nearly exclusive use, where we do the small
remainder of our foreign trade, settlements
are effected by the gold standard through
sterling bills on London.
s'Gold from all the mines of the world has
doubled in quantity within unlrIy-nve years
silver about doubling in the last one hum
bred years. Gold, like silver, is a princi-
pal product of mines in the United States,
which have yielded of the two precious
metals:
For the last 40 years ~ per cent. 23per cent.
For the last IA years. 5ox per cent. 5o-per cent.
Lately as 4 years ago 50x per cent. 50-per cent.
Last year............ 39-per cent. 61x per cent.
"Who, then, would propose the disuse of
gold or ask the enactment or the continuance
of laws likely to promote the expulsion or
its use at a premium instead of as the stand
ard of value, to which, by stopping the coin
age of silver now, the legal tender value OF
the 215, 100000 silver dollars already coined
may be held up and made to conform, until
these trouble be overpast.
sBut our 215, 900 silver dollars are here,
and cannot be expected sensibly to decrease,
as our gold may. Nobody will export OF
melt them. The reasons are plain. They
will not flow abroad, for the legal tender
quality given them by act of congress car
not procure their reception elsewhere; moi
in Germany, just as her legal tender laws,
applied to her deprecated four or five hun.
dred million silver marks in thalers of un-
limited legal tender, can not procure their
reception here or in France; not in France,
just as her legal tender laws,
applied to her six hundred million
five franc pieces of unlimited legal tender,
cannot promote their reception here or in
Germany. Ceasing to coin more, our 2..5,-
100000 silver dollars will remain. Nobody
will melt them, since the silver melted is
worth 20 or IS per cent. less than the silver
minted. while they remain a legal tender for
all sums. Therefore no silver to be used in
the arts or industries or for expectation will
be drawn from this stock. 1t is not to be ex-
pected that congress will Withdraw from
these 215, 600, QUO their full tender quality; it
is not to be expected that congress will re-
deem and melt them and sell the metal. The
fact, then, is that we cannot be two-met-
allists.
1.-The choice before congress is not between
silver monometallisrn and gold monometal-
hsm. Both are inadmissible. The choice
before congress is not between bitmetallism
and either gold or silver monometallism. The
latter are not admissible, and bimetalism is
only possible with the cooperation of other
nations which is not now to be had. For,
although France holds the same friendly at
titude and would be followed by some of her
associates of the Latin union, England now,
as in 1878 and 1881, is unwilling to
depart from her mintage of gold
alone into coins of unlimited legal
tender, and Germany now, as in 1881,
regards the concurrence of England in an
international bimetallic union, as a sine qua
non. Such being the facts established upon
abundant testimony, official and unofficial,
gathered by the department of state, it be.
comes plain that the choice of congress is
only in fact between stopping the coinage of
silver dollars, or risking by further coinage
the equivalence of those dollars with our
monetary unit, risking the fall of the value
of 215, COO, 600 silver dollars from their legal
domestic rating to their commercial interna.
tional value which is 20 per cent. less, and
involving such a disuse in our domestis trade
of $50, 600 dollars of gold coin, as when
gold was elected by paper during the war.
1.-THE only choice before congress, there
fore, is the choice between one-metallism
and two-metas ism. The silver dollar can
not be kept in equivalence with the gold dol.
lar II the coinage of silver continues. The
gold dollar can not be kept in full domestic
circulation if the silver dollar is suffered to
fall. Coming more necessitates its fall.
Doubtless some will hope that more silver
dollars can be coined, and yet their equiv.
alence with the monetary unit not be lost.
1t is respectfully submitted that there Is nc
e.