The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1893-08-20

ing him with deserving them in their en-
Urgency. Among the foremost enemies
of the Sherman bill is Senator Sherman ;
he has proclaimed his position in advance.
Saturn will devouP his child before the
world and his adversaries will say he
does public penance for his political sin.
1t is not, however, the first time that
the senator has been placed in this pre-
dicament. In 1862, at critical juncture
of the war, after the suspension of specie
payments by the government. he advo-
Gated the issue of legal tender notes, and
it was his efforts with those of Chase,
the Secretary of the Treasury, that sue
ceeded in carrying the measure. He was
the leader of the Republican party in the
Senate in all financial matters, and by
this action did as important service to the
country as his brother, the general, in the
field. For, the armies that overthrow
the cOnfederacy could not have been held
together without money; and money at
this crisis was only to be had by ting
it, by making the notes of the govern
ment q legal tender. Sherman saw this
clearly and impressed his views on those
who had to act and thus helped to save
the nation quite as certainly as the great
soldier whose name he shared.
Yet in 1857 he introduced a bill of an
exactly opposite character, the resump-
ton act, which was adopted in 1870, al
though at first without the resumption
clause; the statesman was feeling his
way to the end he had in view, for which
the country was not yet ready. In 1874,
however, he was chairman of the com
mittee which reported a bill fixing re-
sumption for January l, 1879. This bill,
with almost premouition of his own flu
ture, left the manner of resumption en-
tirely dependent on the Judgment and
measures of the Secretary of the Treasury
Five years afterward the epoch ar
rived, and found Sherman himself Secre-
tary of the Treasury, under Hayes. AS
soon as he entered on his duties he set
about preparing for the result he had so
long contemplated, and six months before
the date fixed by law, he had $40, 900, 900
in gold in the treasury. When resump-
tion day arrived there was practically no
demand for gold in exchange for notes.
This was absolutely his achievement, and
will undoubtedly remain his strongest
claim to separate and notable place in
history.
1t was however the reversal of his pre-
vious action during the war; it undid
what had been so indispensa BILE in the
to make the paper money for the govern
ment a legal tender; eighteen years after
ward he superintendent the overthrow of
his own work, and did his country almost
as essential service in one act as in the
other Like a real statesman, he adapted
his measures to the varying emergencies
that were requisite to the salvation of
the state in one crisis and threatened its
financial genius in anothert he saw the
second necessity as clearly as the first,
and himself tore down the very fabric he
had assisted to build. No greater proof
of the senator's sagacity can be found
than the fact that at different crises he
was for and opposed to the issue of paper
money as legal tender.
The situation now is not dissimilar. 1t
is hardly three years since he introduced
the silver bill which bears his name, and
which many believe to be the origin Of
the evils that threaten the country to-
day. He thought in 1890 that unless this
measure was adopted still more nOxious
ones would follow, and this tub to the
whale he hoped might prevent greater
disasters. Others thought the tub far
too large and the disasters were certainly