Evening journal., 1892-12-22
BAYARD ON FREE SILVER
The United States is in Greater
Danger Than France.
PUBLIC LAWS FOR PRIVATE GAIN.


The Standard OF Value in the United
states is Threatened-Free Coinage
Legislation Fraught with Peril to the
Financial Interests OF the Union-It
Would Pay the People BETTER to Buy
the Mines.
Hon. Thomas +. Bayard has written
the following open letter on the silver
question to the Philadelphia Public
Ledger:
My Dear Sir Complying with your
request that ! should state more fully
than has been reported in the public
press the point Of my remarks at the
dinner of the Sons of the Revolution last
Monday evening / will repeat, so far as
l may, from memory and scant notes
The principle for which the founders
OF our government contended was that
all the powers Of government were
created by law, and that all grants to
the crown were made out of the money
OF the people through their representa-
ives ana were grants, not royal rights.
Following this principle. our fathers in
n
dividual or class ownership of any public
power, and they saw clearly that when
ever public power can be converted
from public to private use, passing thus
under private control the principle of
liberty WAS endangered and therefore
that no private claim to exercise public
power in its own behalf can be permitted
without corruption necessarily accom-
panying it, and peril TO the Republic.
Traced to its origin, the real cause of
the convulsion Witnessed to-day in our
sister Republic of France will be found
to exist in violation Of this principle.
In which, TO sustain private enterprise
Of great magnitude lthe canal Of de
Lesseps at Panama, the legislative power
Of the Republic has been used at the
dictation or corrupt solicitation of private
interests.
II is an object lesson, full Of instruc-
ton, and most distressing to the friends
Of popular self-government.
Even in finding a remedy and seeking
to visit with punishment the individual
legislators and their confederates in
crime we see consolidation Of legisla-
tive and judicial powers destructive of
justice and personal liberty.
IL is sckening to see how deeply the
betrayal Of public powers into private
hands has permeated French society.
until the entire framework is racked
with its result.
But, while we are shocked with such a
condition Of things in France may we
not anxiously turn our eyes TO what is
going ON In our own countryi-where a
financial danger threatens our whole
people, immeasurably greater than even
the enormous pecuniary losses Of the
Panama canal.
Have not our own public laws been so
subjected to private control and for
private interests that we are threatened
to-day with a loss Of that standard of
value upon the strict retention of which
depends the just performance of every
contract great and small, public aud
private. throughout this broad land2
Have not our coinage ,aws-our laws
Of legal tender-our whole system of
finance, been surrendered in the exigen.
cies of parties to the control Of a class
of our countrymen whose business was
the excavation of one of the earths
metals for their private emolument; and
have not the public powers Of this gov
ernment been lent TO bolster up the price
Of silver bullion, just as the French
Legislature attempted TO prevent the
collapse Of an impracticable feat Of
engineeringl
The danger to the people Of the
United States is more deadly than the
mere loss Of a sum of money, however
great, for a departure from a stable
standard Of value and the adoption Of
variable and fluctuating medium of con-
tract ana exchange is filed with dis
nsters which cannot be measured either
in their extent or the period Of suffering
they would entail
The proposed free coinage of silver Is
nothing but proposition to use public
laws to further private profits. This
has gradually, but all to frequently,
been allowed under the forms Of our
taxing power. but never before has it
been accompanied so closely by results
so dangerous to the best interests Of all
classes of society.
Better for the people to buy the mines
and pay more than their value to the
private owners than to permit disloca-
| tion Of the standard and measure Of
every contract, from the daily wage Of
the laborer to the greatest corporate or
State loan.
Therefore, If / understand the great
| principle upon which our fathers placed
their hope to establish justice and secure
the blessings of liberty for themselves
and their posterity, it was by placing the
great and essential powers of govern
ment over men high out of the reach and
beyond the control of private greed.
And this principle is fatally invaded
/ by such claim as is now set up by those
interested in the mining and production
Of silver bullion. Very truly yours,