The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1892-07-30
The Free Coinage Arguments.


The Free Coinage Arguments.
i Under the above caption the En-.
cheering and Mining Journal Of
New York city undertakes to dis
prove that England developes the
resources of India, feeds her people
at home cheaply and enriches hel
creditors, while she bankrupts Amer
lean farmers and paralyzes legiti.
innate business in this country by
keeping down the price Of silver.
But the Engineering and Mining
Journal makes a sorry fizzle of the
aforesaid undertaking. The Jour
nal quotes from Geo. 0. Jones OF
the American Rimetallic League, as
follows:
"The following table will show the
prices that can be paid for wheat and cot
| ton in India, and the difference in their
cost in gold when laid down in England
with silver selling at 90c., or 1910.
per or
Gold cost in England Gold cost in England
with silver selling with silver selling
At NC per Oh. at SOC. per or.
Wheat-ssNc. per bush. si.2oX per bush.
Cotton-Sc. per b. llAc. per ID.
"This table shows how England can paw
high prices for farm products in India
and feed her own people cheaply through
her control over the coinage laws of both
| countries. American farm products must
compete with gold prices in England.
This explains the present low prices for
American farm products and suffering
among their producers"
What is true in the case of India
is precisely true of the American
exporter who receives $50 and 8
cents respectively for his wheat and
cotton, as against $12O4 and III
cents which he should receive with
silver at 1921 per ounce-the diff
ference 81 cents and 81 cents, 60
ing to the enrichment of the English
speculator and the development of
India. The Journal says:
If the currency of the producing coun-
try is deprecated one, gold will buy
more of it, and since India is free sill
yer coinage country, there is consequently
no gold in circulation, and its silver coins
are worth only their bullion value, say
10 cents to the dollar, precisely as would
be the case here if we had free silver
coinage.
But discrimination against the
American farmers is complete and
bankruptcy inevitable under pres
ent conditions. Will the Journal
explain how it could be worse if we
had free silver coinage? We think
there is no possibility of its being
worse. We think there is a very
great probability chat the producing
and laboring classes of America
would be vastly benefited by free
coinage. There is no doubt that
the evils of our present financial
policy have oppressed them to the
lowest extreme, and if there is any
doubt as to the propriety of such
an effort to relieve them, why, we
say, by all means give them the
benefit of the doubt! The Journal
jumps at the conclusion that de-
preciated dollar would result, but
does not deduce this conclusion
from any course of reasoning. It
ventures the statement that 1.-THE
gold would disappear as it has in
every free silver coinage country,
as it did here when we issued too
many greenbacks." But we wish
to except the most notable exam
pie of bimetallism in the worlds
history, viz: that of the United
States from the establishment of
our minis in 1892, till the passage
of that infamous Sherman scheme
through congress in 1873-eighty-
one years of unparalleled financial
prosperity. That was period when
the production of silver to gold in
ounces was relativelygreater than it
has been since, with all the modern
improvements of mining and re-
duction; when gold and silver were
both coined in our minis and passed
on parity as the nations money
when in spite of a production of
silver exceeding 80 to l of gold, for
a period of oyer fifty years both
were practically maintained on a |
commercial parity. If the United
States was great enough and indie
pendent enough to arrange its own
financial policy THEN, why must it
now, with all its increased greatness,
ANONYMOUSLY bow to the dictation
of England? Ye gods! it ia enough
to raise our phantom fathers!
The Journal runs itself down and
is compelled to side track onto
greenbacks. Why didn't it say
land as it did here under our sys-
tenn of free coinage?" Obviously
because it couldn't.
The vast majority o: the American
people are also opposed to free silver
coinage, as is proved conclusively by the
utter rejection Of it BY both the political
parties.
This is idle fancy. The Journal
would voice the sentiments Of the
American people better were it to
Shylocks' of Great Brit
lin and Wall street have millions