The Meeker herald. [volume] (Meeker, Colo.) 1885-current, 1893-08-19
The White Metal Gaining.

The w lite Metal Gaming.
Much comment has been created the
past week through the flop of the New
York Recorder on the financial situa-
ton. From a special to the Denver
Republican we CLEAN the following per-
tinent extracts:
The Recorder believes that the time
has come when the will of the people
must he enforced alike upon congress
and the president, and the minis of the
United States be thrown open to the
free coinage of silver.
THE business of the country cannot
be done upon purely gold basis. There
little gold to do it with to justify the
experiment of currency based wholly on
one metal, and that one the scarcest and
dearest of two.
The total Acknowledgement of silver
as money metal, which seems to be
the aim Of the gold extremists at Wash
ington, means violent and ruinous
contraction of values. The mere threat
of it has already given the first sharp
twist to the screws of contraction. To
persist in the total elimination of silver
from our currency is madness. The
lead of the gold monometallists has
been followed far enough. 1t is time to
call a halt and demand that silver shall
be put back in the place it held for
eighty years from the formation of the
government down to 1878, and be made
again one Of the two main pillars of the
American system of currency and coin
age. 1t is evident that his party in con-
gress is not fully with the president and
will not act upon his initiative unless
he will assent to provision by which
silver shall be retained as partner
with gold on just and u fair ratio in
the metallic basis of the nations money.
TO postpone the definite readjust-
ment of our currency laws, leaving sill
yer demonetzed and its use us stand
ard money metal wholly prohibited,
would, in the Recorders opinion, pre-
cipitate financial and business catas-
trophe compared with which all past
panics would seem to have been mere
bugaboos. Absolute gold monometal-
lism means ruin universal and unspar-
ing for the people Of this country. The
single gold standard has never been
sanctioned or desired by the people of
this country. Their Will has been over
and over again expressed to the con
trary ut every election and in every CON
grcss Tor sixteen years past. Their de
termination that silver shall not be out
lawed at the minis has been clearly and
forcihly shown by overwhelming ma
jorities in both branches of congress.
1t was never stronger than it is to-day.
The Clamor of the money chargers,
the usurers and the stock gamblers, in
spired by the English influences that
...,.is.,t.. s',s'. ,...' - .,a. - --.i;i.
the organized rapacity of the
world, has not shaken the faith of the
American masses one iota in the hon
esty, the business, the fairness, and.
above all, the vital necessity of MAIN
tanning silver side by side with gold in
their national money system. There
may have been a change in the relative
values Of the two metals.
That has often occurred in the course
of history, but that change, whatever it
may be, can be corrected BIZ n change
in the ratio Of coinage from the present
10 to to, say, 10 or even ~ to l. 1t
does not justify the total abolition of
silver as q standard money metal.
England is reported to be at this
moment exchanging her gold for Indian
silver on the basis of - to l, showing
that even the leading gold standard
country recognizes that silver possesses
an exchangeable value with gold at
some ratio that can be fixed, and we
may be sure that the Bank of England
in fixing it at - to has been as unfair
TO silver and rs partial to gold as it has
dared to be. The money power has
spoken for gold recommendation and
Mr.. Cleveland seems to be its executive
echo. Now let the people be heard and
MIR. Cleveland be clearly informed that
and not he, represents the ma
tional will on this matter of admitting
silver as well as gold to the minis.
Bad rs business is, it would become
worse if congress were to yield
to the single gold standard movement
and surrender the cause of silver. Such
n surrender would mean disaster to all
classes except the vultures that always
flesh their beaks deepest and gorge
themselves fullest on field that is
5trewn with the victims of vast com
mercial and industrial calamity. The
merchant and manufacturer, the big
business man and the small tradesman,
the great mass alike of employers and
employed, the professional man, the
brain worker, and the brawn-worker,
and, more than all, the labOrer and the
wage Garner in every occupation, will
ell be drawn down together in the vor-
tex of contraction, If silver is outlawed.
To make gold the sole standard and the
only currency is TO diminish the volume
Of our money by onc-half. That is con-
traction, and contraction means the
complete paralysis of all enterprises,
the utter collapse of credit, the com
plete prOs,ration of trade from New
York to California, and the consign-
ment of mYriads of working people in