Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1886-02-19

dollars in actual circulation, outside OF
the treasury, it also appears, has been
constantly growing less since 1881, being
then 30.S per cent and now only 1873 per
cent. We have coined over two hundred
and fifteen million of silver dollars, and
have only been able at any time, through
much cost and tribulaton. to get not
quite fifty million into spasmodic specula-
ton.
1t is true that it is often smartly claimed
that over 80, 100000 of the 165, 000,0 600 now
in the treasury of these standard silver
dollars is represented by an issue of that
amount of silver certificates, meaning to
convey the inference that these certlh-
Gates will ultimately all be met and paid
with silver; but this is practically a cir
cumlocutory fraud cheating nobody, how
ever, but ourselves, so long as the holders
of the certificates have the option of tax
ing the turkey instead of the buZZard, or
so long as the holders have the option of
rendering them at the custom house rs an
equivalent of gold. None ever have been
redeemed with silver and none ever will
be. When gold has been exchanged for
silver certificates, the owners made their
calling aad election sure" through the
custom house
1t would be well to remember that no
country in the world has been exempt
from the depreciation of silver. Mexico
cannot obtain any higher price for her sill
yer bullion than can our miners in the
rupee of India, with a nominal value of
two shillings will not buy more of British
merchandise than about what one Shll-
ling and siXpence would be an equivalent
for in the money standard of Great Brit
ian The Indictment for conspiracy will
have to cover the whole world. 1t is diff
ficult TO see how parties in America could
conspire to cheaper the price of silver in
the markets of Europe or of India, and
silver in bars or bricks may be expected
everywhere to obey the law of supply and
demand with as much regularity as the
same bars and bricks obey the law of
gravtatiOn. regardless of petulant epithets
distributed upon bankers and bondhold-
| erS
The senator from kentucky referred
to France and other members of the Latin
union for an eXpample that we should
follow, but forgot to mention that they
have all, or nearly all, some years since
France in 1S79-ceased to coin silver, and
have limited even minor silver coinage.
They stopped about the time we began,
willingly surrendering the whole business
and the whole responsibility. BY that
means they have been able to maintain
their present stock of silver on a par with
gold, and that is now the most important
part of their example which we might
safely follow, but from which the senator
blinds his eyes and turns and runs.
To continue the coinage of the present
much more than $50 grains of silver can
be purchased for dollar is exposing the
country to very grave risks, not of coun-
terfeits, but of dollars made in exact sim
ilitude of our own and containing an
equal amount of silver. Twenty-Five per
cent of clear profit is great temptation.
There is no kind of manufactures known
anywhere promising equal or safer profits
to bold and INSCRIPTIONS enterprise.
What is to prevent the establishment OF
competing mints in Mexico, in Canada, or
anywhere else, from injecting into the
country a multitude of alien but undis
tinguishable dollars, in every way just
like our own, and, by all the known tests
OF experts, just as good rs our own III
the hands of innocent holders, how car
they be arrested, or who can be punished
The danger signals may not now be heed
ed, but time may disclose the fact thai
they should have been needed
But our gold and silver coin, together
with all the authorized paper circulating
as money, has had prodigious expansion
within a half dozen years, and may nov
? be said to be overabundant, or far NOR
than is really required. 1t amounted Jan
uary l. 1879 to sl,055, 1856 $40, and on No
vember |, 1855, the amount was Sl,5o6,
9l4, 19s, having been increased by owe
, S500000,00
e The large nominal profits in the coinag
of silver dollars are subject to very heav.
, drawbacks. The cost of coming is Il
cent for each dollar, amounting since lS1
to over 100000, or to about $1,000 TO
! each and every month. The lncon
l venience and = expense for additional
vaults has been large, and even the eX
pense attending Geographic correspon
, dence is not small, amounting at the NeN
l Orleans mint sometimes to 300 in slngl
r quarter of the year. But the expense c
/ transportation incurred by the treasur
! department in its Industrious efforts I
: pOpulariZe silver in all markets and wa
e places is enough at least to dissipate an
u surprise that no private enterprise has al
I tempted the task.
:, The suspenion of the COMA ge of the 81
r yer dollar will not depreciate its value
e nor increase the value OF the gold dOlla
|. They will then 2both pass from hand
y hand equally current in all our bushes
+ transactions. Confidence and Stabllt
y will be restored to our commerce, to IL
u vestments, to contracts.
o Is it possible that Americans will eve
II which will subject us in all our fOreig
traffic to payments in gold for all we blu
2. and to receive for all we sell nothing bI
III silver | do not know how it may /
with Others but confess that, should W
% ever sink to the level of those nations
,e the second, third, and fourth rank, who's
5, wealth and enterprise is too inconslde
rs able to require all and the best monetal
Il instrumentalities, including both gold an
y silver, in 1.-THE conduct of trade and con
E. merce, | should feel it to be a sad degrad
lie ton, a complete surrender, of the prou
lie position we now hold as the foremo
" power among great and enlightened n
t. tions.