The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1893-08-09
a POPULAR ERROR.

One of the effects of the general dis
cussion has been to bring out remarka-
BILE common expression of opinion that
this country has done all it can to
bring about the return of silver to its
former value and that now it is time TO
abandon the attempt as hopeless. The
repeal of the Sherman law is treated as
the abandonment of the attempt. We
say this is remarkable because every
one who has paid any attention to the
silver question knows that the Sherman
law was not and is not an attempt to
bring silver to it's former relations. 1t
was passed for the purpose of preventing
that very result. Every intelligent silver
man condemned it at the time of it's
passage as a fraud and a false pretense
as a miserable sell-out by the repub-
lican congressman from the silver-pro-
ducing states. This fact has now been
admitted by the purchaser, and, further
than that, John Sherman has admitted
that he foresaw the results of his law
and that he intended it as an "object
lesson" Nevertheless, speakers and
newspapers continue to discuss the Sher-
man law as a creation of the silver men
and an effort to restore the white metal
to it's old relations. Even so intelligent
a journal as the Boston Herald says:
We have coined silver dollars that did
not represent what purported to be their
face value at the time they were issued,
and are never likely to represent such
assumed value at any day in the future.
We have piled up silver bullion in the
treasury, for which we have paid more
than it is worth, or is to be worth What
is the utility of renewing the one under
taking, or continuing the other? The
silver question is practically settled
among the nations of the earth and it is
settled against the contention of the
advocates of silver as a standard in our
country. They fight against fate in con-
tinuing the controversy.
The preliminary statements are true
We have for fifteen years been pursuing
financial policy that has demonstrated
itself an utter failure but, what is more,
that policy has been followed under false
pretenses. 1t has been talked of all the
time as a movement to restore and
maintain the value of silver. as a form
Of bimetallism, and yet every one who
understood the rudiments of the theories
on which currency and coinage are
founded, knew that the country was all
the time on a single gold standard and
that the effect of the Bland law and the
Sherman law would be merely to fasten
that standard on the country The
really discouraging feature of the whole
affair is that at this late day we find
many earnest silver men who do not
realize that they have been duped and
who are now hot-headed champions of
the very measure by which their cause
has well nigh been brought to ruin. Most
certainly the continuance of the silver
purchase policy would be the very worst
thing that could be done for the future
of silver and for the future of the
debtor classes of the earth, and the idea
that the abandonment of it is the aban-
donment of silver is preposterous.
What the American people need to do
is TO get down to fundamental principles.
Money is necessarily an international
subject BY money we mean basic
money. ultimate money. money of re-
demption, money In which bank notes
and legal tenders and subsidiary coin
must be redeemable, If desired. No one
country can fix that basis. and no one
country can maintain a basis different