The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1893-05-06
BIMETTALISM.
GIadstone's Latest Views on This In
teresting Subject.
Twenty Ways in which Gold May be
Linked with Silver as Medium for
Interchanging Commodities.

PREMIER GLADSTONE in a late speech in
the city OF Edinburgh is reported as fol-
lows:
Mr.. Gladstone said:
"Now, am sure we all have most
profound veneration for the currency,
and there are at least three aspects in
which the subject might be regarded,
but as time is at present of great value
you are familiar with the popular and
highly expressive saying that time is
money, and 1t has a currency OF its own
which we cannot, and at the time
of life at which 1 have now arrived l
especially must not Disregard shall
content myself with saying in a single
word that currency reform means BIZ
metalism. Loud and prolonged cheer
lngl might refer you to my former ut
terances on this question, but though
am not aware that any OF the principles
which | have on previous occasions eDun
ciated are obsolete or inapplicable to ex-
listing conditions, am now in position
to say that / regard bi-metalism as q
question which is fully ripe for discus
sion, and that we are rapidly approaching
the time when it must become ripe for
settlement on broad and final basis.
Gentlemen, we are bound to take into
our consideration not only the limited
class of creditors for whom an appreclat-
ing standard of value has naturally a
strong and irresistible attraction; but we
must acknowledge that it is the duty of a
Democratic legislature to supply the
much larger class of people who require
money for the payment of their debts
with currency to which they may have
access on easier terms. Loud applause. !
''It is essential at the same time to pro-
vide standard of value which shall be as
little fiuctuating as the variable condi-
tions regulating the supply and the de-
mand for the precious metals will permit.
Now, it has been demonstrated by Mr..
Giffen and other high authorities, that
| from 20 to % per cent, and even from 30
to 40 per cent. in relation to other COM
modities. The people, whose judgment
on all such questions must be final,
guided by that divine intuition which
| distinguishes those whom may call the
masses from the more artifcially
moulded components of society desig-
mated the classes, have arrived at the
conclusion that, to correct the variable
tendency of gold, it must, as a standard
of value and as legal medium for the in
| terchange of commodities, be linked in
Idissolubly with silver. 1t has been said
that it passes the wit of man to devise a
scheme by which variable standard of
value shall be made less huctuating by
linking it with another metal which is
much more variable.
'sBut l say there are at least twenty
ways in which the desired end may be
attained, or at least approached in such a
degree as may appreciabIy alleviate the
present unfavorable conditions; and it
will be the duty of any government which
you may choose to administer the affairs
of this country to find plan and provide
for the debtors and the wage-earners of
the country that plentiful supply of cur
rent coin which they most reasonably
demand as an elementary right, and at
the same time so secure for farmers and
other producers those higher prices for
their commodities which they have an
equal right to insist upon. Loud and
prolonged applause. 70