Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1888-03-14
ARGENTIFEROUSO
BECK AND SHERMAN TAKE ONE MORE
WHACK AT SILVER.

| The Old Question Whether Dads" Dollar
Was Dropped on the Sly Gone Over
Fnirehild submits some Financial Refiec-
tions-Timber Grabbers on Indian Lands
Days Work In Congress.
WASHINGTON CITY, March l4.-Beck and
Sherman appropriated most of the senate ses-
| sion Tuesday 10 a controversy on the retire
ment of dads dollar, Beck opened the dis
cussion in n speech advocating his bill to issue
coin" certificates in place of the greenbacks
and national bank-notes Of small denomina-
tons He insisted that the characterization
of silver was done ON the sly, and in support
of this statement quoted from speech made
in the house by Kelly of Pennsylvania, the
chairman who had charge of the bin, to the
effect that the bill was passed without any al
fusion in debate to the question of the aban-
donment of the standard silver dollar:
and that he kelly did not know anything of
it for eighteen months atterward. He also
quoted from a recent speech in the senate
by Stewart, who was in the senate in
1873, and who, although his state was deeply
interested in the question, knew nothing of
the bill demonetzng silver He denounced
as untrue the assertion that silver was demon
cited because it was more valuable than
gold, but declared it was because the capital
lists and landowners saw that gold was beCom-
ing more and more valuable every day. He
also charged that the bill demonetizing silver
was consuInmated through the revision of the
statutes The act of 1873 had not destroyed
the legal tender principle of the silver coin
then in existence, but the revised statutes
which prOfessed not to alter the law in "A sin
gle syllable-came afterward and declared
that silver coin should he Il legal tender for
not more than 50.
There was not a man in either house who
would dare to say that he knew that
the revised statutes took away the
legal tender quality of the silver dollar Even
the senator from Ohio [Shermanl would not
admit that he knew that tine thing
was done After that was done
the next thing determined upon was
TO strike the grccnback i'm the resumption act
to destroy it altogether, and to leave ma
tional banks omnipotent in the land Refer
ring to the efforts of the national banks TO
prevent the coinage of silver, he spoke of
those banks as failure, as no longer of any
account-as going down every day
Sherman criticised Beck's answer to what
he tShermanl had said when he last spoke on
the subject, as lame and impotent, and said
he was able now to show 10y original senate
records that the bill in question had been
'l'HlN tlN'un't'i -IulIy tpllNlNNlttl nlSHlt vi
congress and outside, As to the silver qucs-
ton, Sherman said he was not opposed to
silver He wished he could add 80 per cent
to the value of all the silver in the world in
the mines But silver dollars would have to
be maintained at the gold standard, either by
receiving them and boarding them, or by III
creasing the weight of the silver in them. If
the silver dollars now in the treasury were
forced into circulation their credit would
break down. But he did not want to |
prcciptate this silver question. He did not |
care to discuss it. He thought that the time |
might come when all the silver product of the |
country might he represented by coin celtif- |
Gates, but then it would have to be bought at |
its market value, not at an artificial value. |
After all, what had his silver friends made |
by their forced attempts to get silver into |
crculationl Silver had gone down steadily. |
He would like TO see it advance in value. |
Congress and the nation were powerful in |
many things, but they were not powerful |
enough to create values These had to be
fixed by the Matchmaking mercantile nations