Nevada County picayune., 1891-08-13
THE SUB-TREASURY.
A Strong Argument Showing the
 Impracticability of the Plan.


 ed before the Old Hickory Democrat ic Club of Little Rock by Professor James Mitchell, editor of the Arkan- sas Democrat:
 The demand for what is known as the sub-treasury plan, like the fiat money craze of fifteen years ago, is due in part to an inadequate supply of circulating medium; to the many wrongs to which the agricultural cla~,cs have been subjected by vic ious legislation, to gambling and combinations agaInst them in the markets, and partly to spirit of unrest and discomfort, which always follows periods of speculation and great commercial activity. History is all the time repeating itself in the evils men suffer, as 1t is in the rem edles that are proposed to correct them The great agricultural classes, the classes upon which the people are more dependent than any other, the very substratum of the social la bric-harc just cause for complaint.
 It is not to be denied that they suffer intoIcrable evils, and if they sometimes strike blindly and with ont reason at evils that we all ad- init to exist, every patriotic citizen will have more sympathy for them on account of their wrongs than criticism of their methods in their attempts to rcdres. these wrongs. Does any intelligent and right thinking man doubt that the agricul- tural classes have just cause for complaint? There is in the long list of grievances that they present to the country an array of evil, which may well engage the sympa- thy of every patriotic citizen, with out regard to party. There IS, first, taxation which is dishonest, unjust and opprcssive the taxation which in the language of one of our great est jurists, lis not the less robbery because it is accomplished under the forms of law" Added to this enor- nous and un just taxation, there IS, as have said, scanty supply of money. The population and the business of the country have grown at an enormous rate, while the cir culating medium stands adjusted to the needs of the country ten years ago. To this grievance we may add the insatible greed of corpora tlons, the aggressions of combined capital which always finds it's readi- est victims in the agricultural and laboring classes. Then there i. proaigate expenditure of the public money by the government, reckless waste of public funds drawn from the people in taxes the spectacle of congress expending . billion dol lars in a time of profound peace -a billion dollars, dollars collected from the people, hundreds of thousands of whom are struggling for the com moncst necessities of life struggling with usurious interest and with iron clad mortgages like mill-stones about their neCks ks-when we contemplate this picture i'll comparatively new country, and free country, where there ought to be general prosperity we not are surprised at the discsn- tent among the farmers.
 In the midst of such condition . the farmer ssks q remedy for the evils and abuses which surround him. He sees favored classes all around him; protected industries, giant corporations, trusts and con- binations, men who are mlllonalres who neither toll nor spln, million aires among bankers, brokers, man ufacturers and traders millionaires by the hundred among mere specu- lators- milionaires even among statesmen and politicians million aires 100 to 1, as compared with the better period when men grew rich by slow and steady accumula- tions, the result of honest dealing, industrious habits and frugal living
 millionaires on every side, but none among the farmers. In the midst of such condition the sub treasury scene was born. It was adopted by quite number of farm CTS organizations, and recieyed the indorsement of the Alliance at the St Louis and Ocala meetings. IL may be remarked that, although the measure had its origin in the Farm ore X lliangp that nr0aniZ at inn ia