Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1890-06-19

''to reduce the burden of obligations
freely taken" As though our people
had no pride, no honesty. no desire
to pay their indebtedness!
Would that John Sherman could
have been answered "Your insinua-
ton Is an unjust one, you misrepre-
sent our people who are the bone
and sinew of our land, our wealth
producers, our wage workers. They
are honest, and have as much PRIDE
in paying their just debts, as any
people or class of men on the face OF
the globe. They do not ask to be re-
lieved of one dollar of their ''obliga-
tons freely taken" but they do ask
to be relieved of the payment OF
double and treble those obligations.
They ask to be relieved of those de-
mands OF payment of more than they
ever incurred. They are not obliga-
tons freely taken, they are demands
unjus,ly thrust upon them by the
class legislation Of the past fifteen
years and more, Legislation in be-
half of a very small minority Of our
people, and against a very large
majority; a legislation that while it
has made you rich has made ten
thousand Of your fellow citizens the
poorer. They ask that this legisla-
ton that has been forging the chains
of poverty and bankruptcy around so
many, shall be undone and that abil-
ity once again be given to debtor
class to pay its obligations freely
taken, that their pride and manhood
be not broken by passing through a
process of bankruptcy, and the taunt
thrown at them of dishonesty, of
Sinking obligations"
Do Senators Hiscock and Sherman
think we are fools when they talk
about no silver being in circulation,
and the inability of the government
to get it out of the vaults? When
they know that silver certificates bas-
ed upon these very coined dollars
are out in circulation, and are alb
SOrbed as fast nc issnod7
Do they think that we are in such
financial ignorance that we cannot
detect the falacy of their argument,
when they say that statistics show
that but about 4 per cent of the bust
ness of the country is done by cur
rency in actual circulation, and the
rest by checks and drafts, and that
therefore the amount of money in
circulation is immaterial? Why, the
average schoolboy knows that trans
actions conducted by checks and
drafts are as much conducted by
money in circulation as though the
actual money had passed from hand
to hand. 1t is but the thinest soph-
istry to talk about bank deposits sub
ject to draft as not. being part of
our circulating currency.
The dire predictions of calamitous
results to follow free coinage remind
one of the predictions made at and be-
fore the time of resumption of specie
payment. John Sherman knew those
predictions were false then-and the
history of that great event proved
their falsity-and he paid no atten-
ton to them, but went on and re-
sumed at the time he said he would, |
and so he should remember that event |
at the present time. The objections,
the dire predictions. the awful results
that are to follow all come from the
holders of these obligations freely |
taken, they come from Wall Street,
they come from England who loves
to dictate in what she shall be paid.
They come from those who having
freely loaned their money to those
who freely took the obligations upon
themselves, now demand payment |
not in the money value they loaned,
but twice and thrice that amount.
Oh, We Gods! with whom is the dis
honesty and tie injustice found7
And then to have the participants in
such foul class legislation calmly
throw into the faces of those they
seek to rob the taunt that '.they are
seeking TO reduce obligations freely
taken" Surely eternal justice has
been sleeping. While it is not asked
yet to one considering it thoughtfully,
it would be no more than just to
those who have been crippled and
impoverished these many years, to
have the volume of currency so ex-
handed that they coul6 nav tho;r oh.