Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1893-02-22

merged into such money denomination
and will pass, as money, for such de-
nomination only. Such terms as sin
trinsic," or inherent" value, Gods
money" or natural money" are mean
ingless and void of sense.
Money is the creature and creation of
law, and its essence inheres in its debt
paying or legal tender quality, which
may be stamped on any suitable mate
rial in obedience to the fat of law. Re-
duced to it's last analysis, money is a
conventional compact or cooperative
agreement, entered into by the whole
people and given expression by the
sovereign will and power of the people,
or fat of national law. l use the term
national law" because am treating of
national money. Were it not for the
existing constitutional prohibition, the
several states. or counties for that mat
ter, might each have its own exclusive
legal tender money, adopted by legal
compact or conventional agreement
A national currency, for interstate
use by the whole people, must bear
upon its face the legal tender fat, or
promise to receive, upon the part of the
whole people, in form of statutory en-
actment. If states, counties and cities
would pay one-half of all their obliga-
tions in scrip, not in form promises
to pay but simply legal tender for
all taxes due their respective govern
ments, such scrip would form a valu-
able supplemental adjunct to the vol
ume of money in circulation and serve
every purpose of other money.
Money is solely a medium of ex-
change of labor and commodities and a
tool for the liquidation of debts exist
ing between individuals and between
the individual and the organized COM
munity or government" Money is a
certificate that the holder thereof has
performed certain labor for, or parted
with certain commodities to, an indi-
vidual or the community and that the
people or the community, severally or
collectively, owe to him or her like
amount of labor or commodities. Such
certificate should be printed on the
least expensive material suitable for
the purpose, from the fact that all value
inhering in such material is dead and
useless while such material is used as
money.
Putting it in another form: Legal
tender, or money, is an agreement upon
the part of people, severally and col
lectively, to receive such money in pay
ment OF all debts, public and private,
and in exchange for all labor and all of
labor's product. Hence, promises to pay
are self-contradictory upon their face.
The implied contract embodied in legal
tender money being, not promise to
pay" but a promise to receive The
ideal inscription upon legal tender
money would be, not This note is
legal tender at its face value for debts"
etc, etc, which is arbitrary, but rath-
er, eve, the people of the United
States, severally and collectively prom
ise to receive this bill as
in payment of all debts, public and
private, and in exchange for all labor
and all commodities" which is purely
voluntary and cooperative.
The true money unit, or unit of ac-
count, is some certain quantity of labor,
as the whole intent and purpose of
money is the exchange upon equitable
terms of one individuals labor for the
labor of another individual Broadly
speaking, one individuals time devoted
to labor is worth as much as any other
individuals time. Strictly speaking,
however, the true standards of value of
labor are time and life-force expended,
either in the labor itself, or in prepara-
tion for it, and the average duration of
life in the various occupations, depend
ent upon dangerous risks and hygienic
conditions. This is the basis of compu-
tation accepted by life insurance COM
panies in affixing policy premiums. As,
therefore, the value of labor differs to
some extent, dependent upon the skill
required, risks encountered, relative
healthfulness. etc, the effort made in
the invention of money was to unite
upon a common unit of account by
which the relative value of labor in all
occupations and channels of production
might be expressed. This unit, how
ever, should not be real and mate
rial, as certain quantity of given
commodity; but imaginary and imma-
terial, as the supreme court has said,
IAN ideal thing" the name by which it
is known being entirely irrelevent and
immaterial. Taking as a unit certain
quantity of gold or silver or any other
commodity is robbery, pure and simple,
which, while it robs the masses and en-
riches the few, adds nothing whatever
to the efficacy or usefulness of the
money as comparative measure of la
bor's product, or unit of account. 1t is
not because gold is actually more val
liable, that the unit of account we call
one dollar, has appreciated in purchas-
ing power so per cent. since 1873, but
rather because such units being limited
in number by the supply of gold, prod
ucts to be exchanged have increased in
volume in much greater ratio than
the unit of account, which, being real.
must sooner or later be actually OBJ
tanned and paid over to balance ac-
counts With an imaginary unit capa-
ble of being duplicated and multiplied
in obedience to the demands of
merce and exchange we could still.
nevertheless, just as easily assert
that a days labor in the different
and various occupations is worth
1, 1.50, ,, $50 or units a day, and a
man whose labor was worth units a
day could just as easily exchange the
paper bill of the denomination of
units, received by him for two days
work, for the product of four days Ia
Dor performed by the man whose labor
was worth only unit day. The ad-
vantages gained by the adoption of an
imaginary unit would be manifold, the
chief among them being that our vol
ume of money would not be limited by
the ridiculously insufficient supply of
the so-called precious metals; while at
the same time we should yet have such
supply of gold and silver, now avail
able for money purposes. to exchange
with other nations for valuable COM
moditiesA
The ideal monetary system of the
the fast approaching "age of reason"
will demonetize and discard entirely
the use of gold and silver, and stamp
(print) mutual promises to receive up