The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1893-11-07
AUTOMATICALLY PURE MONEY.

on The Automatic Regulation or
Money" by Hon. A. J. Warner, presl-
dent of the American Bimetalllc
League. Papers favorable to the cause
of bimetallism are requested to publish
it. The article is an abridgement OF
the ideas contained in Gen. Warner s
paper entitled "Silver or Fiat Money
Which Shall it Be?" printed in the DC
tober Arena, which had oerore aI-
tracted our attention. But we
enter a strong caveat against any pub
lication and unintentional endorsement
.of the financial doctrine which the ar
ticle. or both articles, were specially
written to teach. viz that paper
monev cannot be safely issued unless
based on gold and silver redemption
coin.
We agree with Gen. Warner fully in
the first paragraph of his briefer ar
ticle. where he says: The Importance
of the principle of automatic regula-
>tion of money is in danger OF being
overlooked in the mad race to set up
the single gold standard" But we
would go further and say that the
free coinage of both silver and gold
would guarantee no such regulation OF
the value of the dollar as is needed,
would not prevent private money mo-
nopoly and wealth concentration by
means of usury or interest.
According to the figures made use of
in the article we are criticising the
stock of both metals, in the period from
near the beginning of the Christian era
to the close of the 18th century "a free
coinage period, fell from about 81. &c.
900, 600 to 1854, 600, 900, an actual con
traction Of ninety per cent, and this in
the fact of the natural growth of
forty-fv generations of the worlds
population, with multiplying money
needs; which shows conclusively that
gold and silver were not God Al
mighty's money, or natural money,
or automatically regulated money. If,
as Gen. Warner says, The world has
never suffered from an Oversupply Of
these metals" then it must have suf-
fered greatly from an undersupply of
money in the fifteen hundred years of
contraction, the dark ages of poverty,
ignorance and barbarism, which sue
ceeded the Greek and Roman civiliza-
ton.
But the vital part of the money
question is not simply a question of
volume. Tt is how to justly distribute
it; how to prevent a monopoly of it in
the hands of a money loaning class;
how to so contcol it's distribution that
actual wealth producers alone shall be
able to SECURE it. Up to 1873 we had
unlimited silver as we'll as gold coin:
age, but it did not prevent money,
wealth. and capital being concentrated.
II did not make it impossible to exact
usury, or interest, as it is now called.
And ''usury," as Lord Bacon said and
all men can see, tends to bring the
wealth of a realm into few hands" 1t
matters not very much to borrowers
and to the masses who have no money
what the per capita circulation is, how
much money the rest may have, the
money loaning and capital controlling
class. If the volume in their hands is
.arge, interest rates will be high as we'll
as prices of goods and labor; if the vol
ume in their hands is small, interest
rates and prices of goods and labor will
be law; but a days labor would buy as
much real wealth, goods, market com
modities, under a small money volume
and low prices, as it would with large
volume and high prices. So also a low
rate of interest, under a small volume
of national currency, would command
as much commodity, or labor product,
would draw as much real wealth from
the borrowing and producing class, as
would a higher nominal rate, with its
corresponding higher prices of every
thing. 4 simple increase in the cur
rency volume by means of the free
coinage of silver, it is clear, then would
not permanently benefit the wage earn
ing and borrowing classes. So also
with paper money issued and loaned
by national or state banks. 1t tends,
1T has tended, to draw all money, and
with money all wealth and capital,
into the hands of those who issue and
loan it. And with money and capital
being drawn into the hands of the few,
it gains greater and greater power over
the labor of the many, increasing the
dependent number, and forcing the
producing class to accept as the reward
of labor a smaller and smaller percent