The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1893-06-16
OUR FIR-T DOLLARS.
A Review Of the History of the Silver
Dollar from 1892 to 1879.

calculating the silver question in be-
| half of wofkingmen. Bankers who
are responsible for every financial
| enactment since the death of the great
Lincoln. and who have brought the
present misery upon wealth-producers,
are now showing how utterly unjust
our present silver law is, and are de-
termined to extricate laboring men
from the woeful pitfall into which
they have fallen. by digging deeper
and nastier pit beneath. They claim
that our present silver dollar, so soon
as our little gold is run out of the
treasury. will have only the purchas-
ing power of siXty-four cents, and that
the poor fellow who thinks he is re-
ceiving two dollars day is really
only receiving one dollar and twenty
eight cents.
| 1t is fact that very many bankers
| never study finance in connection with
political economy. 1t does not require
a phenomenal brain nor a profound ed
ucation to stand belinda counter and
| discount notes. That is as far as the
financial education of some bankers
goes. Those of them who have made
finance "a study have made their wealth
| by the use of such knowledge. They
| have learned to transfer wealth to
| their pockets. from the producers by
legal methods, and they have no desire
| to kill the goose which is constantly
| depositing golden nuggets in their we'll
! feathered IestS.
The great people are now studying
finance. knowledge thus gained is
| destined tt. do incalculable' in jury to
| the schemes of those great tinanciers
unless they can so mystify the subject
of finance that 4 majority of the people
| will again PROSTATE themselves before
the self-constituted financial guardians
of the people.
People are being constantly hood
winked by agents of the great money
| monopoly. That arch-demon. John
Sherman, had frequently given evil
dence of being wholly soulless in con-
cocting. schemes to rob the people.
When he brought forth the so-called
Sherman silver law the people were de-
! ceived in him and believed he had at
/ last a bill in the interest of the people.
His bill more than doubled the amount
, of silver to be coined. and it looked
well on its face, but so soon as we could
fully realize the spirit of the bill we.
saw that it was framed with the full
intent to- debase silver and create a
premium on gold. 1t gave to Wall
street agents secretaries Of the treas
ury) legal right to stop coinage
entirely, and that is what they did.
Our mints are virtually idle. while
the people are suffering loss of
property and courage for want of
money. Limiting silver coinage had
the effect the schemers knew it would
of reducing the price of bullion. Tn
limited coinage would restore the orig
! inal price of silver. which was higher
than the price of gold, till Wall street
| got hold of the machine.
1t may be interesting here to briefly
review the position silver has occupied
since the adoption of our national con-
| stitutiOn. An act esta blishing a mint
became "A law, April IL, 1892. 1t pro-
vided for the coinage of eagles, halves
and quarters of gold: dollars, halves.
quarters, dimes and half dimes of sill
yer: cents and half cents of copper.
| The eagle contained 2471l grains of
pure gold. which is equal to 2434 grains
of pure gold to the dollar The dollar
contained 3114 grains of pure silver
and i43l grains of alloy, making the
dollar of our dads weigh 41G grains of
the then standard silver. Fractional
parts of the dollar contained their full
proportion of silver. There was at that
time no short weight in our fractional
silver. The coinage at that time was
at the rate of fifteen of silver to one of
| gold.
The reason for adopting 3714 grains
of silver for the dollar was because pre-
| vious to our own coinage the Spanish
| milled dollar was the standard currency
| of this country. Alexander Hamilton
| was secretary of the treasury. lie had
| those Spanish dollars assayed and they
were found to contain just that amount
of silver: hence that amount was adopt
| ed for our own dollar. The act above
mentioned provided for the free and
unlimited coinage of both gold and sill
yer. =.
In 1903 France established by law the
| ratio of silver to gold at 1515 to /.
Other European nations did or had
| done the same. The United States at
that time had not attained that su-
| premacy among nations that would en-
able her to maintain her standard
against the world. Our adopting a
lower ratio than Europe for silver,
| placed gold at premium, and it soon
| disappeared across the Atlantic. The
| secretary of the treasury reported in
/ 1886 that there was not more than
81, 900, 900 OF gold in this country. and
| of that amount only trif1e was in ac-
| tual circulation.
| BY. the act of June 2S. 1894, the gold
| eagle was made to contain only 232
grains Of gold or 23.2 grains to the
dollar. This regulation fixed the ratio
| of silver to gold at about 16 I'd /, and
| placed a premium on silver. That
| ratio still exists, and silver would still
command a premium but for the legis-
! lation of 1873 and the subsequent
| botch-work of hireling congressman.
| BY the act of January IS, 1897, the
amount of alloy used in our dollars was
reduced from 4424 to Al a grains, thus
forming exactly one-tenth of our
standard silver. That reduced the
weight of our silver dollar from 416
grains to 4121l grains. but did not re-
duce at all the amount of pure silver
contained in the dollar.
Fixing the ratio of silver to gold at
16 to 1, while other countries adopted
the ratio at 15T to l, made our silver
dollar desirable to export. Compare
lively, we had now an abundance of
gold, while our silver was rapidly
vanishing. We had nothing but silver
with which TO make purchases less than
one dollar, and that subsidiary coin
left the country so rapidly that an act
was approved February 81, 1853, reduc-
ing the amount of silver in a dollars
worth of subsidiary coin from 41211
grains to 354 grains, thus taking from
each dollars worth of subsidiary coin
245< grains and reducing its export
value nearly six per cent. The. resul,
i of this lanisla finn Ivas to retain ON