The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1891-07-24
FINANCIAL PLETHORA.
A Stale and Unprofitable Article Dished
Up in tho East.

| A stale and Improbable Article Dished
| Up In the East.
| Professor Simon Newcombe pub
fishes in the Baltimore Sun an article
on the money question" under the
following headings: Professor Simon
Newcombe on Popular Decisions Too
Much of Very Good Thing The Ell
fects of Financial Plethora-Increase
Of Prices Makes Money Less Valuable
"A Few Spectators get Rich While
Others Workingmen and Profess
sional Men Suffer-" From these head
ings the character Of the article may
be readily inferred. It is a rehash of
the same old hash which has been so
often hashed up before It is stale
and improbable, and dishing it up
once more can neither freshen it's flaw
or nor disguise it's smell Professor
Newcome devotes one-tenth of his
space to the old fable Of Midas who SO
lusted after gold that he prayed the
gods (whoever the gods wereJ to grant
that whatever he touched might be
turned to gold, and they granted it.
But old King Midas neglected to make
reservation of his victuals, which.
turning to gold as they touched his lips,
he could in no wise eat. This somewhat
puerile and silly fable seems to have
been designed to hold up to scQrn gold
worship and has been told by school
master, or marm, as the case may
have been, to every school child that
ever went to school anywhere in the
world for some thousands of years.
The professor draws the conclusion
that ever since the day of poor old
King Midas mankind have suffered
from the same disease which he
suffered, which was an idiotic idolatry;
fatuous worship of the metal gold
for its own yellow sake. This disease,
proceeds the professor, the French ma
ton had, but it is curious manifesto
ton of gold worship which he de-
scribes. During the gigantic throes
sor proceeds to narrate, that moved by
the same arguments now urged by the
farmers out west they issued an enor-
nous amount of notes, supposed to be
secured by mortgages which led to
| financial disasters and ended in ruin.
To throw gold to the dogs and issue
clouds of notes on land is curious
way to worship gold. Ever since
when" continues Mr. Newcombe
1.-The French have adhered to gold
standard"
| To make comparison between the
French people at the close of the
French revolution when all public
authority was at an end; when society
itself was dissolved, values annihi-
lated, titles subverted, and wreck, ruin
and chaos reigned on every hand, and
the present reign of law and order in
the United States under a government
obviously the strongest and most I'M
assailable that has ever existed on
earth, is not to reason we'll. That a
vast cloud of notes found among the
effects of defunct power issued as
measure of desperate necessity by a
government then in extremis and now
having vanished from the earth, should
be regarded as of no value is matter
of course. Does any one marvel why
confederate notes are not at par in
Wall street to-day? Why not have re-
ferred to the recent financial achieve
ment of the French people, unPrece-
denied in the whole history of finance?
When writing of financial plethora,
why not have referred to the fact that
the French now have for the use of
their compact population a per capita
circulation largely more than twice as
great as is claimed for the widely diff
fused population of the United States
by anybody. And why not have ad-
mitted the indisputable truth that the
circulating medium actually accessible
by our people is scarcely one-fourth of
the amount claimed? If our condition.
is one of financial plethora, what is
the condition of the French people to-
day, and how was it that this people
stood ready on recent memorable
occasion to save the credit of the lead
ing gold monomaniac. England, by an
advance of gold? The circulation of
France to-day is 100000, 900 gold,
700, 600, 900, silver, 600, 900, 900 bank
notes, all legal tender, all circulating
on perfect equality, and none of them
driving the other out" Of circulation
i! or out of the country. It is the best
financial system ever known. Is this
what Mr.. Newcomb calls 'too much
of good thing?" If not what does
he call 'too much of good thing?"
| This is what the farmers want here,
and take notice, all of whom it may
concern, they are going to have it.
| u,
to $50 per capita, consisting of gold
and silver and treasury notes; all legal
tender, and all circulating together on
a plane of perfect equality before the
law. That is not al they want but
they want that. National Economist.
Farmers Weekly: The position of
chaplain in the Alliance is not one of
the least Importance. If we believe in
| tho oviofonoo of Surname R111or