Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1892-03-30
HIS LAST SAY.
Enquirer" Responsible Demo
crat" on Free Silver.
A Readable Contribution to the Current
Issues of the Day.
no tha robaceo Leaf.chronlcle.l

1 10 bDt lOUdcCO 1<Cni-OAioAANASsJ |
find very little in Democratic re-
ply, which appeared in your issue of
the 23rd inst THAT calls for notice. 1t
is made up mainly of statements
which have been sufficiently an
swered in former communications.
He says: "There was not hint of
the abandonment of the double
standard until 1873, when the de-
monetization OF silver suddenly and
unexpectedly came.' Here are the
facts: On the 18th of April, 1870, the
bill alluded to, one ofthe provisions OF
which was the discontinuance OF the
silver dollar, was referred to the
Senate Finance Committee, and a
large number ordered printed. Ii
was afterwards brought up in the
two houses at least dozen different
, times, amendments made and
stricken out, and its passage persist
emily urged by the Secretary of the
Treasury. The debates upon the bill
occupy many columns of the Con.
gressional Globe. Thus 1t appears
f that the measure was prominently
before the country for nearly three
years before it finally became law
/. on the 18th OF February, 1878. He
I says again: at has been shown, too,
n or is a fact, that at the time the act
! of decentralization was passed there
!. was not dollar in either gold or
f silver in the country" On the con-
8 trary, according to careful esti-
mate made and published in the
United States Mint Report, Deem
Der, 1873, there were:
20 subsidiary silver .,................ 5,O0O,000
- Total. .,.....,.......,...,. " l4U,Ou0,VOO
u We exported during the fiscal
4 year ending June 80, 1874 over $66. 600,
00Oof specie. We could not have ex-
y ported what we did not have. Gold
i. was the basis Of all Of our jnterna-
!, tional exchanges, and was freely
e paid out in New York in the panic
= of 1873, Notwithstanding its greater
J. value, because of the scarcity Of the
" ordinary currency, q scarcity brought
u about by overtrading and high prices,
always the ultimate result OF an in
creasing abundance Of money. DEM
ocrat should ba less careless in bis
statements. He says again: "There
Is are now in the United States five
hundred millions Of dollars of silver
l, at par with gold at the present legal
;, ratio" The silver dollar now
passes al par with gold because it is
5, convertible into gold. So far as its
intrinsic value is below that of gold
T. it is credit currency. Destroy its
At convertibility and it will at once
drop to its commercial value.
9 Twill give few facts supplementary
9. to those heretofore given in reference
to the coinage and decentralization Of
le silver. From the foundation of the
mint to 1870, period of seventy
m years, there were coined only 1885,
1872 silver dollars, the remaining
n, silver coinage being of fractional
pieces, manifestiy coined, especially
Of since 1884, for purposes of change. /
was only to these dollar pieces
ly which had been coined in so limited
10 N nNtHnnl
= they were not wanted, that free
coinage was denied by the act o
1878. This privilege had been de
MED to the halves and quarters 10
twenty years by the act o
,,s 1858. In fact the act of 1884
to undertaking silver, passed avow
" edly for the purpose of retaining golt
IL in the country, was the beginning o
,s- the decentralization of silver. From
"a, that date gold became the basis o
h h contracts and the measure of value
1g There was no iniquity discovered
ge here because silver was and con
tinued to be the dearer metal. 1t il
OF discovered now in the act of 1873
IT. because silver is at a discount o
IA thirty per cent. because, In the Ian
u guage of Democrat, ''there are al
Ie. ways those who would legalize bogu
ge money so they may pay their cred
pc itors less than they owe" He say
again: "Your correspondent Insist
lie that the mere fiat of government
tn cannot make a seventy-cent silve
'ee- dollar equal in value to a hundred
~, cent gold dollar. It's hard arguing
. with a man who looks PERSISTENT.
ire at one side of a question and will no
I'd look at the other" There are som
questions which, like the moon, pre-
nf sent but one side to man
wv Such are all primary truths, and 4
ire this class belong some of the truth
nd involved in this discussion. Gov
= eminent cannot create value. j
cannot make seventy equal TO on
m hundred any more than it can max
nd two equal tothree. The prvposition
III are identical. can see but one sid
~ to either; the gods may see two. I'll
saws agafn: "We need NOR