Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1893-06-21

unreasonable discount, is that any
worse than she requires now? But will
England find any merchants in our
land so insane as TO buy her good, and
allow unreasonable and exorbitant dis
counts of the money with which they
are payed for, which is equal to unreas-
enable and exorbitant prices, when
they can pass their money to home
manufacturers at its face value. Again,
England will be compelled to accept
our silver on reasonable terms, or step
aside and leave the field to American
manufacturers. Another phrase of the
question is that we export as well as
import. If the British merchant says
to us, IL must have gold,' the Ameri-
can merchant will say to him, II must
haYe silver" If the British merchant
says, II will only take your silver at a
discount" the American merchant can
say, ''gold is of no use TO me here as
money. so must discount it if take
it."
But when the British merchant stops
to reflect that silver will be as useful
to him as gold, in that he only needs to
send to America to get what it is worth
in money here; and when the American
merchant reflects in the same manner
about gold, there is little danger that
either would be unbusiness like and alb
surd. They Will accept payment in
either coin at its given value in the
country where it circulates, or at trif-
ling discount at least. Business men
do not haggle about theories, they deal
with conditions, and accept any prac-
tical method of making fair exchanges.
Exchanges would still be made by
drafts through banks. Clearances
would still be made through clearing
houses. Little gold or silver, compared
to the amount of the business done,
would cross the water. And when
clearances were made in favor of Amer
lea, the Englishman would find little
difficulty in purchasing enough silver
in America itself to balance his &C
counts. When clearances were made i'll
favor Of the Englishman, the American
would have just as easy time in max
ing his balances in gold.
Another element to be taken into ac-
count, is that few of the nations of En-
rope are gold producing. America is.
England must have the gold, and does
not produce it. We produce it. The
consequence is that the higher the val
ue she gives the yellow metal. the
greater the value of American mines.
Gold and silver as articles of exchange
in settling balances are not money.
They are commodities in the same
sense as wheat and cotton. We pro-
duce the commodities, and therefore,
have the advantage, If we will but use
it.
Suppose en- the other hand, all the
other nations of the earth come to a
gold basis. All obligations, all balan-
ances, must then be paid in gold alone.
The monetary basis would be con-
tracted more than half. Gold, the
most treacherOus money basis, the
world has ever seen, is not sufficiently
plentiful to perform the exchanges of a
single great nation. Let all nations
adopt 1t, and then such scramble for
gold will follow as the world has meyer
seen. We are having slight taste of
it now. In this scramble, the creditor
nations. TO whom interest, dividends.
and other payments are made, will al
ways have decided advantage. Eng
land is the great creditor nation of the
world. Her tenacles sap the wealth
and industry Of every other nation. In
the interest, dividends and profits of her
foreign investments. she possesses the
feeders capable of conducting to her
Golfers rapidly, the gold of the world.
Thus she becomes absolute mistress of
the gold market, and dictator of the
worlds finances. She can gather in
her gold with certainty, and part with
it at an ever-incleaSiGg premium.
Suppose again, instead OF coming
either gold or silver, the government
issued notes redeemable for taxes and
obligations due the government, in such
amounts as al increasing population
and growth of trade might demand.
Would, or could Europe discount these
so that they would be less valuable
abroad than at homer To do so. would
force American merchants to patron
ize American manufacturers, and use
American produce. Would foreign
merchants and manufacturers ever con-
sent to thisq BY no meaGs, when they
know that the promises of the govern
ment, being of value to American citi-
zens, would easily be exchanged for
whatever they might wish. Suppose
they should demand gold OF silver to
settle balances, could they not be held
IN bullion form in this country where
they are produced, Just as easily as
they are nowY They must be reduced
to bullion anyhow, before they are ac-
copied abroad. Such great 6nanciers
as Mckinley, Foster, Sherman and
Cleveland, men who believe in rule of
the classes, make terrible bugaboo OF
this money Of the world business,
when they kr ow thatit 10 Q great will
o-tbe-wisp. A money of the world
does not and never has existed. What
concerns us a thousand times more, is
the moasy of the United States, and
our home trade.
The plumber of failures for last week
throughout the eonntry, was S22 against