The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1892-04-16
z u - -
The Trail or the Serpent.

] The Trail Of the Serpent.
! When our civil war broke out il
1861, the government found it4el
in need of funds. To supply tAi
need $50, 000, 600 in greenbaeks wsr'
issued. These greenbacks were mad
q legal-tender money, for the pay
ment Of all debts, dues and de
mands, both between citizens il
their dealings with each other anc
between citizens and the govern
ment, even to the payment Of in
terest on the public debt and o
duties on imports. Against this
dangerous innovation" by the gov
eminent, ignorant and interested
men raised an outcry calculated
to frighten even the well-informed
Our government, totally ignorant oil
finances, took alarm. The bankers
were also alarmed, but their alarm
arose from a widely different cause,
The government doubted the stabil.
ity of the ebt-paying aud purchas-
ing power of q paper money it could
not promise to redeem in coin on
demand. The very opposite of this
terrified the bankers. They foresaw
that paper money based upon the
wealth and patriotism of the people
of the United States was as good as
coin for all the purposes of distri-
button and commerce they fore
saw that the government could 60 on
issuing legal tender money and thus
defray the entire cost Of the war
without borrowing a dollar or pay
ing cent Of interest. This accom-
plished, they 1.-THE bankers) further
foresaw that the people would be-
come apprised of the Righteousness
of their financial jugglery, and that
their evil power over the toiling
masses would be forever broken,
and the trade of usury largely cur
tailed if not wholly destroyed. To
avert this danger and to keep the
burden-bearing public still in ignor-
ance of the dishonest and dishon-
orable means by which the many.
are kept in poverty and servitude;
and to see to it that public debt
was 'created out of the war" for
their benefit, the bankers of London
and Berlin originated and, with the
assistance of their traitor henchmen
in New York, Boston and Philadel-
phia, put into successful operation
the most gigantic scheme of public
robbery ever devised by man.
Having completed their arrange
ments for plucking the great Amer
lean goose, they prepared and had
printed, in London, a circular in
which their brazen scheme WAS out
lined with degree of brutal direct
ness that would have repulsed an
ordinary villain. That circular was
put into the hands of man named
selected because of his
special fitness for the villainous
work to be done. That circular
of which we regret we have not a
:opy) promised that chattel slavery
would be abolished by the war,
which, said Mr.. Hazard, is "just
what I and my European friends
want, for slavery is but the owning
If labor and carries with it the care
If the laborer." Instead of this the
circular proposed capital control
If labor by controlling wages, and
his was to be done by Contracting
he money volume of the nation"
"The great debt" proceeded the
circular, that the capitalists will
lee to it is made out of the war,
must be used as a measure 10 con-
rol the volume of money. To ac-
this, bonds must be used
Is a banking basis at will not
10" went on the circular, ito allow
he greenbacks to circulate as
money for any length of time, for
We cannot control that"
Armed with the circular of which
re have given a skeleton, and
'acked, as he boosted, by unlimited
Mr.. Hazard arrived in
Ii. country and began a work Of
among our leading
who, seeing profit in it,
he only thing they honor or regard.
eized upon it with an avidity and
reed that would have done dis
redi: to the humanity of an enemy
n arms. The greenbacks were de-
raded by placing two exceptions
n their backs, their legal-tender
haracter was taken away from
hem, and the foundation laid for
he creation of a perfectly needless
ebt of 81 600, 100000. This debt
ur laboring people have paid twice
yer, and are still laboring to pay
. with the end as far off as when
hey began.
And this was but the first link in
he great chain Of crimes against
onest government which, Matched
ut in Europe, have been perpe-
rated in this country during the
ast thirty years for the control and
obbery of labor. In the same line
nd for the same robber purpose
- Al. l. e 30 OOA 900 000 l., |