Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1891-06-18
RELENTLESS PLUTOCRACY
Efforts of the Republicans to Perpetuate
the National Debt.

1
! Efforts of the Republicans to Perpetuate
the National Debt.
i The significance of the deficit of half
a million revealed by the May state
ment of the federal treasury is empha-
| sized by the circular in which the
secretary announces the approaching
maturity of the four-and- -half-per-
cent. bonds. After stating the I'd of
| Septem Der next as the date when these
obligations are due and payable, he
makes the following suggestion of a
default on them for the purpose of
| forming a nucleus for a permanent
debt:
| Suggestions have been made the part of
| the holders of some of these bonds of desire
| to extend the payment thereof at the option Of
| the United States at the rate OF one or one
and one-haf per cent Per annun and
| the secretary of the treasury will hereafter
| consider whether the acceptance of such offers.
| or any of them, will be profitable to the gov
eminent and in that event. reserves the right
| to accept such bonds from this call.
| CHARLES FOSTER, Secretary.
| It is unquestionably the desire of
| the capitalists who control the repub-
| lican party to find some way of creating
permanent debt, and this desire was
iou iCSt vi III Itlc po1iSy WHICH
was acted on by the billion-dollar con-
| gress. In the seeming lack of method
| of its extravaganza there was always
| the idea that with deficiency instead
| of a surplus it would be more easily
| possible to perpetuate the high tariff
| and the national debt.
| The perpetuation of the debt will
| give capital invested in money-lending
or in trade in money as a commodity
| the enormous advantage of a system
| of controlling circulation in which
| there are two distinct features of adj
vantage, either CT which would be very
| great without the other.
| l. The delegation of the sovereign
| prerogative of issuing money from the
| government to private corporations.
2. A system of issuing money under
| which the basis for the note is reen-
| forced with an interest bearing capaci-
| ty apart from the interest bearing
| power of the note itself
If gold or silver bullion is deposited
| in the treasury, gold or silver notes are
| issued on it. These bear interest if
loaned. The gold or silver bullion on
which they are based does not.
But when national bonds are deposit
| ted in the treasury as a basis for notes,
| the bonds bear interest for the hypoth-
| ecation as well as the notes based on
| them.
This makes such notes the most
| costly form of money ever devised, be-
| cause, to use a common phrase, it bears
| interest lat both ends" as the gold
| note or the silver note does not. To
perpetuate this system, to keep in pri-
| vate hands the sovereign prerogative
| of issuing money, and to collect inter
| est both CD the notes themselves and
| on the basis for the notes-as it were,
| to make the hypothetical bar of gold
| bear interest as we'll as the gold note
Issued on it, is surely worth the ven
ture of desperate risks by those who
| would benefit by this magnificent priv
| ilege-the most royal that was ever
| accorded to capitalism.
| But it is not on this alone that the de-
sire to perpetuate the debt depends
| The millionaire class, already large, is
constantly increasing. What the mil
| lionaire who has made his fortune
| breads most is the risks of business,
| which for at least six in every ten cases
mean an impartial redistribution of
THESE llDmenSe w Hat
| this millionaire class with its fortune
| made desire most is that the govern
| ment shall by law save them from the
risks of investment in which either
they or their children have under the
laws of trade the odds against them
For without law to prevent natural re-
distri bution, these boards cannot be
held. AS far as our national debt has
been paid, the payment has, in that
proportion, deprived money of its
power of agglutination. Money
makes money" but one dollar will not
stick to another until there is million
of them permanently solidifed in a
conglomerate mass unless they are I'M
naturally fused together by some proc
ess of law. As the debt has been paid
there has been a quicl1ening in the ac-
tivity of production and distribution,
and special activity in land, because
next to national securities, land seems
to the moneyholder the safest invest
ment. But no Judgment is required to
put money in national bonds on which
all the people are bound to pay the
profits, and great deal of judgment is
required on the next safest investment.
Every mistake made in land dealing
helps to rcdistribute the money of the
millionaires. AS the debt has been
progressively paid off 'land specula-
ton has increased. 1t is not good
thing in itself, but, compared with the
giving of national bonds for principal
and interest of investment, it is good
thing, because it makes the possibilities
of boarding wealth depend on private
Judgment which. by its failure, redis-
| tributes the hoard into the channels of
productive activity.
\ national debt is as great curse as
the high tariff of which it is the compile
ment. What the tariff senables the
| privileged to get without earning, the
national bond enables them to keep
without risk. 1t is nothing more nor
| less than the agreement of sixty mil
lion people that if you are a million
| aire they will give bond and go bail
| that you shall remain millionaire,
| holding unimpaired the principal of
| your wealth, and drawing continually
| on their labor for interest on form of
| investment which earns nothing, pro-
| duces nothing; which is parasitic
| growth feeding from and sapping the
| strength of production.
No one who loses sight of these facts
can understand the policy of the re-
| publican party, which even in its wild
est and most seemingly incoherent
manifestations is policy of consistent
and relentless plutocracy.-St- Louis
Republic.