Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1891-09-03
given are official as furnished me by the

Director of Mint.
When the bullion in silver dollar is
of the market value of one hundred
cents, the market value of an ounce of
fine silver is S129 in gold. If the gov
ernment had paid to the silver miner
S1.29 for every ounce of silver bullion
purchased. instead of having it now in
the Treasury, it would have paid back to
the silver producer, the above S14, ,4S9,
040, in addition to what it paid them in
fact. But it paid them for their bullion
only the market value thereof, which
was considerable less than S1.29 per
ounce, the gross difference being the
said sum. 1t paid them the market
value of their product, which is all they
had right to demand. Their clamor
for free coinage now is that the govern
ment instead of paying them market
value. shall coin their bullion and return
the excess above its market value to
them, thus augmenting their wealth by
this gratuity.
UNEQUAL RICHES.
1t is customary for Democratic and
other calamity orators to decry the un-
equal distribution of wealth. The de-
nunciation of large incomes and noted
millionaires is chief element of their
elocution. But how can this be recon-
ciled with their clamor for silver policy,
which can only result in swelling to
greater excess the already gigantic for
tunes and millionaire incomes of silver
producers, without comforting any special
benefit on any other class or citizen
whatever. Under free coinage the above
S74,00O,00O, now in the Treasury, would
have been added to these private for
tunes. Under it the demand is that of
the annual coinage of S60,000,000 or
SS0,000,000 expected to be coined, a
gratuity of 20 to 25 per cent. thereof
shall be added thereto in the future.
Consistency, thou art jewel.
A MYSTERY.
How the intelligent farmer, mechanic,
wage-worker, or other rational citizen
can be hood -winked and ensnared by
this delusion is a mystery. And yet
hardly mystery either, considering the
means employed to bring it about. For
a few years past failure of crops pro-
duced temporary depression. Societies
known as Farmers Alliances and others
of kindred nature, had commenced to be
formed throughout the West. The de-
preston had prepared their members to
accept on slight evidence false state
ments of its cause and the remedy.
The silver industry seized the occasion
to build itself up by instilling the pre-
tense that it was victim in common
with them of great national fraud, by
which the coinage of the silver dollar
was suspended and its full restoration
refused. Silver literature was scattered
and emissaries were sent among them to
excite and inflame their hostility towards
the money power of the East, as the
cause, and involve their assistance in
building up and establishing the money
power of the West as the remedy. The
present political decentralization of the
country is the fruit of this gigantic
At its pretended National
at st. Louis in 1889, its
was consolidated and per-
fected. A national committee was
created with General A. J. Warner, of
Ohio, at its head, who is now serving
his country under employment of this
especially constituted to
instruct the farmer in the cause of and
remedy for all his woes. This commit
tee was clothed with full power to pre-
pare the literature and commission the
necessary orators and lecturers to go as
emissaries among and
poison and inflame these Alliances, not
for the benefit of the silver, but for the
salvation of the farmer! The fruits
thereof we are now witnessing. 1t
might be circumvented, but in all the
States east of the Mississippi large
owners of mining stocks, going about
in disguise as patriots aud saviors of
their country, continue secretly, and by
the press, to instill their
poison. The eyes of their
victims will be opened sooner or later.
But like other epidemics the disease will |
have to run its course.
w. ii. WEST.