The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1892-09-16


gold, il it can be obtained. Is alwav.
taken in preference. All Of the cur
rency OF the United States to-day re- 3
on gold basis as far as the credit of
the country can sustain it. Virtually
the United States, by the act of 1890,
mas promised to pay gold for all its out
standing paper money"
1t would seem incredible that anv
considerable number Of intelligent in
dlviduals could be hoodwinked into adj
vocating monetary system, a defense
OF which involved the Endorsement of
Is many palpable absurdities as the
above clipping contains The whole
paragraph is string of 1imsy fallaaes
and specious sophistries.
Money is not measure of values in
the commonly accepted meaning of that
term, but If it was it would be a legal,
not natural measure; hence any value
1t might possess as such measure would
be legal and not ''reaL" Money may be
said to differentiate values, as numbers
dlHerentiate quantities, amounts and
sums. The terms indicator or numera-
tor more clearly convey an idea of the
province OF money as relates to values.
Articles possessing value, such as goods,
merchandise and commodities. are diff
ferentiated in value not by comparing
them with money, but by comparing
them with each other, and money does
but indicate the differences in value
that exist between such articles.
Gold and silver possess very little
'reap' value; indeed if the nations of
the earth were to entirely demonetize
both metals they would be compare
lively worthless. This is proved by the
history of the silver dollar, the bullion
in which was worth in 1878 more than
the bullion in a gold dollar, but has
since been, by adverse legislation, re-
duced in value 80 per cent, and which,
II the silver law of 1890 were repealed,
would probably lose as much as 25 per
cent of its present commercial value.
Gold is subject to the same law as silver,
and if treated as silver has been treated
would quickly demonstrate that the
greater part Of its present value is
given to it by the fat of law, instead of
being, as monometallists delight to
term it, ''real'' and intrinsic. The
law to which both of these metals
are subject may be stated as
follows. When any given quantity of
any certain metal is given by law
monetary value of a certain denomina-
ton, and such metal is accorded the
privilege of unlimited or unrestricted
coinage, the whole product or supply of
such metal takes to itself the coinage
value given to it by law and the COM
mercial value becomes merged in the
coinage value. That is exactly the po-
sition occupied by gold at the present
time, and by silver up to the crime of
1878. Take away the artificial value
given to it by the fat of law and either
gold Or silver is at once reduced to the
level of all other commodities and loses
it's value for use as money; i. e., it's coin
age value. This law is recognized by
gold standard England The London
Times of August % editorially declares
shat the closing of the India mines
against the coinage of silver would be
dangerous expedient, as inducing con-
siderable difference between the value
Of the coined and the uncoined metal,
thus stimulating unlicensed private
coinage and that the artificial value
given the rupee would deprive India of
monetary value of any kind"
And yet, in the face of these indisput-
able facts, a journal which is the organ
Of the banking fraternity and aspires to
be an authority upon finance and mon
etary science gravely states the exact
law which governs metallic money and
triumphantly applies it to the present
status of silver money, but pretends an
ignorance of the fact that gold money
is governed by precisely the same iden-
teal law. The dollar and it's value are
localities and would exist as affirma-
lively without material embodiment
as with it. We may say by our laws
that SO many grains of gold or silver
powerless to arbitrarily determine the
value of the dollar, such value being
dependent upon the number of units in
| circulation and the volume of valuable
commodities offered for exchange, and
to some extent the whims and caprices
of individuals. For after all, value is
but the measure of the desire of individ-
uals to possess certain objects Or articles,
while the ideal unit of value will just
! as surely measure such desires as do the
ideal Roman numerals measure and
differentiate numbers.
| Consider for moment the absurdity
of the monometallists' argument. Find
ing in 1878 law that said 25.S grains
of gold (9-1O fne) and 412.5 grains of
silver (9-10 fne) should constitute one
dollar, they abrogate the law as relates
to silver and continue it in force as to
gold and then ascribe the fall in the
value of silver to natural instead of le-
gal causes.
A never ending, constantly recurring
circle of exchanges constitutes what is
called commerce, and money, in its
legitimate and proper analysis, is but
the medium by which such exchanges
are effected. That this is the fact is a
very comforting truth in view of the
theories laid down by the Journal Of
Banking. We have in the United States,
in round numbers, $65, 900, OOO, 900 Of
| uo1,,oS and ovohanna annually ynopv