St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1893-10-17
SENATOR HARRIS COMPRO-
MISE


The amendment proposed by Senator
Harris, to retire all the notes below and
including the fives and to recoin into
larger denominations, the gold half and
quarter-eagles, is, of course, designed TO
force into actual circulation silver coins.
1t does not strike the senator as at all
worth considering that he is trying to
oblige the people of this country to use
coins which his measure itself indicates
an unwillingness on their part to use.
Money is not 50 plenty in any form that
one would think it necessary to use the
federal arm of power to make them use
any one form; but it is fact, and the
senator admits it-aS, in fact, the history
of our monetary laws since 1878 admits
it. After using every device to secure
the use of the silver dollars coined I'M
der the Bland act congress was COM
PEELED, in order to have them utilized,
to substitute for them the silver Ger
tificates, which were readily taken be-
cause the common sense of the people
demanded that the money of exchange
should be as little buldenSome as pos
sible.
Now the senator would fly in the face
of this experience, and load down the
cash exchanges of the nation with a
burden whose weight it is worth while
to calculate. There are in circulation,
as appears from Mr.. Ford's latest re-
port, 1924, AZ, AT i'll notes of the de-
nominations OF 50 and below. At the
present ratio of coinage the weight of
the silver coins with which he would re-
place these notes would amount to %
49S,4 24 pounds, which the people of the
United States would have to handle al
most daily in making their exchanges, if,
as he evidently intends, the COINS
should remain III constant use.
OF the minor gold coins there are no
data by which the exact amount in use
can be ascertained, but there have been
coined $500 1862 of them since 1892
1t about half of them remain. their re-
placement by silver coins will add a
third more to the burden, making the
total weight about 50.000,000 pounds. or
nearly half pound for each individ-
ual of our population To this must be
added the weight of the coinage to be
derived from the Seigni0rage, which his
amendment also provides for.
The senator ignores one of the funda-
mental laws of nature, and one which
operates III the affairs of men quite as
forcefully as in other matters, and that
is that motion runs on the lines of least
resistance. This is as true of money as
it is of mechanics. Every device of
men to accomplish their ends with the
least expenditure of eXertion is all ac-
acknowledgement of this law. In response
to it have come along with other labor
saving devices all these representatives
of money-nOtes of banks, checks,
drafts, bonds, the use of paper instead
of metal. Under its operation men al
ways select, where the selection is left
to them, that form of money which is
the least burdensome, which is the most
convenient to carry. Hence men prefer
paper to gold, and gold to silver, and
silver to copper.
The result of the operation of this de-
vice, if enacted, is easy to forecast.
Wherever tax were 10 be paid. silver
coins would be rendered. The coins
would flow back into the treasury as
they did after 1878. The exchanges of
the country would be INSTRUCTED by the
scarcity of the smaller media of trade,
for which substitutes would soon be
adopted. Nothing would be accom-
plished by it except the further annoy
ance of the people by this interference
of dabsters in their affairs. We have
had enough of the spawn. of force bills,
of which this is but another variety.
Let US have more freedom and less reg
ulation. In other words, let us have
more Democracy.