The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1892-02-19
SILVER.

price ever paid by The United States Gov
eminent. This reduces the value of the
silver dollar to about 20 cents. Were sill
yer coinage absolutely free in this country,
the plntocrats who own the MINIS from
which their i'll treated laborers extract an
nually for them, at the current rate, sixty
million dollars worth of silver, would get
an additional income oftwenty-iive million
dollars year. This means an additional
power, gratuitously given them, of robbing
to that extent the farm and factory workers.
For seventy cents worth of silver, the
silver branch Of the hard money gentry
could buy one dollars worth Of agricultural
products, or manufactures, or human SER
wives. Their purchasing ability would be
increased IN that ratio without their con-
tribuing one additional grain of salt to the
prodnct of labor.
The above is an extract from short edi-
torial from The People, Socialist paper
published 10 New York, and is generally
we'll filed with reform literature, which is
evidence that the reasoning here made use
of is sincere on the part of the writer.
Where it is fair to presume much honest
investigation has been given to economic
questions, it is really painful to fnd one of
our advanced thinkers laundering SO when
be attempts the discussion of the most I'M
portant Of all the reform questions in the
whole tangled web Of civilization.
Il would be superfuous to remind the in.
vestigu,or ofthe financial question that The
above reasoning of The People, is nothing
more or less than bald nonsense. If the
silver miner could send his bullion 10 the
mint and have il coined into standard dol
lars who would be the loser thereby? The
government would not pay him cent for
his bullion. He would as now pass the
coin to his employees, and others from whom
he purchased goods, and they in turn would
pass it on exactly as they do now with the
silver dollar. The silver dollar then as now
would buy as much as the gold or paper
dollar and has cost no one a cent. Being
made full legal tender it would increase
the volume Of money in circulation, increase
the wages of the miners, increase the price
OF all products by lowering the purchasing
power of gold money.
Under free Coinage law the silver miner
would receive exactly the market price Tor
his bullion as he does now, but that price
would be 81 20 per ounce in place of 80
cents as under the present law, which places
the English silver spectators in copartner-
ship with the government of the United
States. forming powerful bear monopoly
against the mine owners and the farming
and wage earning interests, to break down
and keep down the price of one of the most
important products of this country, pro
duct that every nation wants and must have,
and which no country except this, can sup
ply anything like the measure of demand.
In this strange copartnership between the
United States and the English spectators
in silver, the mcst novel feature about it is
that our government does not share 10 the
profit; the British speculater gets it all, and
the silver he buys Of our miners for 90 cents
an ounce he 6isposes OF 10 India Tor 81 .33
per ounce, making clear profit, barring
the expense oftranspor,atlug and other
trifing iDcidenials, 43 cents, on every
ounce of our silver.
The mine owners are the parties who
sustain the first robbery, and through the
unnatural partnership existing between the
British spectators aud our government,
the farmer and wage worker are compelled
TO suffer also; the farmer by the competi-
lion with the wheat from Asia bought with
American silver, and the wage Garner by
the general depression in the labor market
brought about by injury io agriculture.
The government is at present 5siug pretty
yearly ali the silver mined in the United
States. and By its power Of coinage making
every dollar in bullion it purchases from
the mine owner for 20 cents, worth 100
cents in gold, thus actually robbiDg the
miner of silver 10 that extent as we'll as
every laborer in the silver mines and every
farmer in the country to the same extent
by making the silver dollar which it pur-
chasas for 10 cents as dear as the gold dol
lar and compelling the laborer to expend
more of his labor, and the farmer more of
his products to purchase one Of those gold
price-in6ated silver dollars.
flour government were taken out OF this
English silver bear ring, and the mine
owners permitted to receive the true value
of their bullion, they would, in the language
OF our contemporary, be worth. for every so
millions which they extract from the mines
at present prices, 25 millions more. That
70 millions which they are justly entitled
to, whether "plutocrats'' or not, the English
plutocrat, who is a genuine article of the
plutocrat class, now receives through his
partnership with our government, and the
mine owner Is deprived of the power TO ad-
vance the wages ofbis employees to that
extent, in addition to the collateral loss
inflicted on the country. Under free coin
age of silver the price of gold would be
brought down because silver would advance
to the side Of gold and double the money
basis of the nation, as now that narrow gold
basis lifts up the subsidy silver Coinage Of
the present Law TO the purchasing power Of
gold. Under our present silver coinage
laws, silver is the servant Of gold and must
conform to the price it dictates. Uuder a