Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1886-02-04
THREE SORTS or DolLARs.
Am Exposition That Greenbackers
and silver NHen ShOuId study.


P0St-SIB; ALI the dollars of the United
States are now equal to one another
They are maintained in equivalence, frs
by law and secondly by the treasury de
partment. AS the intrinsic value OF til,
metal in silver dollar is now less by
some 20 per cent than that in the gold
dollar, il "stand to reason'' that the two
coins could not be on par in purchasing
power were it not for some powerful arti.
tieial contrivances. Senator Beck, the
New York Sun, and many others in and
out of Congress- have conspired and are
toiling to break down those artificial
contrivanoes, and compel the gold dol.
lals and the silver dollars to "part COM
pany." To what end In order that
every one who has made a contract OF
promise to pay "dollars" as wages, OF
salary, or as an annuity, or pension or
legacy, or a gift, .or loan, or as the
price of house, or a horse, or farm,
may be enabled to discharge the obliga-
tion in cheaper dollar and in dollar
that is 20 per cent less than what the law
declares shall be the unit value and none
| tary standard.
What those contrivances of American
statute law are by which q greenback
dollar and a silver dollar are made equal
to gold dollar need not now be specified.
1t is enough to say that they are of the
same general character as those by
which, as binetallists insist, gold and
silver can, by a combination of the great
governments, be kept at ratio of 1 to
15a, and all mints be open for gold and
silver alike. Nor is it necessary to
specify the ways and means by which Mr..
Beck and the Sun intend and hope to
expel all gold coins from this country.
Some two and half centuries ago there
lived in England clever man who
founded the Royal Exchange and
Gresham's College in London. He
formulated the rule that bad money will
always expel good money. Therefore, if
in this country our mints were open and
free, at the rate of to 16 for all corners
with gold and silver bullion, who could
receive therefor, without price or deduc-
ton, coined dollars, and an owner of sill
yer bullion, costing only so cents in gold,
could receive therefor full legal-tender
silver dollar, of course no gold dollars
would be coined. One ounce of gold will
now buy 20 ounces of silver, but in law
l6 ounces of silver will buy one ounce of
gold.
Mr.. Beck and the Sun denounce the
associated banks of New York because
none of them will take silver dollars on
deposit unless subject to an agreement to
return the same sort of dollars. Mr..
Beck and the Sun demand, in effect, that
the bIIiks shall take silver dollars and
agree to'return gold dollars on demand,
which no banker is ''guuse enoughn to
10. Ii Mr.. Beck or The Sun borrow
1000 gold dollars of bank, promising
pay ''dollars" therefor, the payment
an of course be made, by virtue of the
egal-tender law, in silver dollars, but
perhaps neither Mr.. Beck nor the Sun
would get another loan at that bank.
Whenever there have been u variety of
legal tender dollars in this country, the
debtors have tried to pay, and will try to
pay debts in the cheapest dollar, if they
can select the cheapest at time of pay
ment. But by New York law the dollar
to be paid is the dollar of the date, and
not of the performance of the contract.
When, in 1869, we had by statute three
sorts of legal-tender dollars, of which the
silver dollar was the dearest. the gold
dollar cheaper, and the greenback dollar
still cheaper, what happened? There
were those who insisted that the bonds
should be paid in paper-promise dollar,
but Congress in 1869 said the bonds
should be paid in ''coin" meant in gold
dollars, which then cost less than silver
dollars. ALI went well till cyclone came
in Europe in the form of the Franco
German war, at the end of which, Ger
many having adopted the gold standard,
France aud the Latin Union closed their
mints to free silver coinage, and in 1884
our gold coins and silver coins changed
places, and gold became the dearer coin.
Soon after, they who had in 1869 de-
manded that all debts, public and private,
he paid in deprecated greenbacks, de-
manded, when the greenback dollar was
interchangeable with the gold dollar, that
the old, and then cheaper, silver dollar be
coined. That dollar was the dearest
dollar in 1863; now it is by far the
cheapest dollar. Hence they who in 1863
shouted for the greenback dollar, now
yell for the silver dollar, but only as
debt-paying dollar.
What is the moral of all this? If q
government will have three sorts of full
legal-tender dollars, as we now have, they
should be kept in equivalence. The test
and standard should be the monetary
unit, which is now the gold dollar. MIR.
Beck and the Sun really, wish either to
make an inequiyalenee between these
three dollars, or to make the silver dollar,
of 37lI grains of pure silver, the unit,
and SO Danish the gold dollars, and then
put greenbacks on parity with silver.
That last would be q form of robbery
md socialism brought about by lessening
and debasing the unit of value by 90 per
cent. The controversy is the greenback
question and initiation repeated. As
greenback dollars were the cheapest dol
lars, more of them were demanded as
debt-payers. So now more of the silver
dollars are demanded for similar reasons.
What Mr.. Manning is trying hard to do
is to keep all o;ir dollars on par. For
that Mr., Beck and the San denounce
him.
Mr.. Manning is making every lawful
effort to keep the three sorts of dollars in
equivalence, and to that end he has, as
finance minister, advised Congress, in the
interest of silver dollars, Of the Bland
law, and of international bimetallism, to
suspend for while the coinage of silver
dollars, and await the effect on bimet-
allism in Germany and England. His
purpose is to permit and enable every
bondholder, pensioner and other public
creditor to select either of the three sorts
of dollars. Mr.. Beck and the SuR insist
that the creditors shall not have ouch an
option. What do pensioners any?
BENTON.