Los Angeles herald., 1890-12-14
SUNDAY, DECEMBER II, 1890.
WHY WE OUGHT TO HAVE FREE COIN
AGE.

The question of supplying the people
of the United States with reasonable
amount of currency is and will remain
the leading issue in this country for
some time to come. Its most pro-
nounced form of expression will arise
in the struggle for the free coinage of
silver.
Onno proposition that has ever arisen
in the United States has there been
more shameless Misrepresentation OF
fact, or more sophistication Of argument,
than on the policy and right of rehabil
itating silver. The white metal was de-
monetized at the instance of British
financiers. The merchants of England,
in their dealings with India, require i'm
mense quantities of silver, which they
desire to buy as a commodity, in order
to. have it coined into rupees, with
which they pay for the wheat, rice and
other staples, which are raised by the
ryots OF Hindostan.
In the consideration of this matter the
fact must be borne in mind that the
circulating medium OF all the leading
Asiatic nations, including China and
India, is silver. They take no account
of gold as currency. So that they are
supplied with silver coin, of approved
fneness and standard weight, they are
satisfied. In addition, it must be re-
membered that England is the ruler of
India, and controls the mint OF that alb
normally populous country. If, there
fore, England can buy silver in ingots
cheaply in the United States, and can
coin them into rupees, she has. secured
the agency of an enormous profit to her
shrewd business men, and the lnstru-
mentality of stimulating the growth of
East Indian wheat. She has to get her
wheat deficit from some source. Russia
serves her purpose measurably
we'll in this regard, but it costs
great deal of money to raise
wheat in Russia. The United
States also serves capitally to exc out
the shortage of England in the cereals.
But if the Russian farmer will not work
for nothing, much more decisively is
this the case with the American farmer,
every man Of whom is sovereign, Out
side OF India, the cities OF Odessa, New
York and Chicago, are the points from
which the kingdoms of Great Britain
and Ireland must draw their supplies OF
wheat.
What an ignoble notion, therefore, to
make silver cheap, without regard to
the noble miners who have staked, in
the United States, their all in the ex-
ploitation of this standard metal? If
silver could be brought to as low price
as copper, the purposes OF the selfish
autocrats of Change and Leadenhall
streets, in London, and of the coupon
cutters of Wall street, in New York,
would be subserved to the point
of perfection. England desires to see
silver disappear as money because she
wants to buy silver as cheaply as possible
as commodity in ingots, in order that,
buying the white metal as she buys
copper, she may convert it into potent
currency, which will pay for and stimu-
late the growth of East Indian wheat.
The New York bondholder desires to see
silver reduced to a commodity because
such action would diminish the volume
of the currency; and, as he possesses, in
his bonds and debentures, the means of
attracting to New York nearly the sum
total of the currency Of the country, he
can make money scarce, and compel
periodical auctions of the effects OF his
fellow citizens, which he can buy in at
his own price, and raise the rate of in
terest while so doing.
No intelligent man, who watched the
effects of the demonetization of silver in
1873, can fail to remember them. The
prices of agricultural products steadily
declined. The California wheat farmer
remembers gruesomely the delightful
returns which he received from his
granaries prior to that disastrous event.
The demonetization of silver made the
stimulation of the growth of wheat in
India possible. The demonetized metal
was bought in bars, coined into rupees
and disbursed to the Indian ryot, who
gladly and unquestlonlngly clutched
the shining symbols. AS this action OF
the United States had been preceded by
the demonetization OF silver by Ger
many. the prospect looked gloomy on
every hand.
And well it might. Outside of the
Latin Union-which in sentiment is
famboyant, and in action always prac-
tical-there was not ray of hope in
the world for people who saw enterprise
stagnant, for the mortgaged who saw
their mortgages Tightening like a coil
around their necks, or for those just
minded people who delight in standing
in with the advancement and ameliora-
tion of mankind.
The people of the United States and