The White Pine news. [volume] (Treasure City, Nev.) 1868-1906, 1894-04-28
Who Is RespOsa siblee

Who Is RespOn siblee
Concerning the demonetization Of
silver in 1873 which placed the coun-
try on a gold basis, A. J. Warner,
President of the Bi-metallic League
says:
Nobody publicly petitioned for such
a change in the money standard. No
body except a few cunning bene6ciaries
knew of the act till long afterwa rd.
There was no public discussion of the
question, for nobody knew of it. There
was no honest reason for passing it.
President Grant, who signed the
bill, did not know he was approving an
act that demonetized silver. The
Speaker of the House, Mr.. Blaine,
did not know it. It is not certain
that any member of the House except
Mr.. Hooper, of Massachusetts,, who
had charge of the bill, and possibly
one or two others of the committee,
knew that it demonetized silver, and
it is pretty well stated that no one in
the Senate but Mr.. Sherman, who had
charge of the bill in that body, and
perhaps Senator Bayard, knew that
the bill changed the money standard
of the United States from gold and
silver to gold alone.
The claim recently widely published
that the act demonetizing silver was
several times printed and freely and
fully discussed, in Congress and out,
is absolutely untrue.
There was no discussion at the time of
the passage of the act, in either House,
to lead any one to suppose a change
was being made in the money standard.
It is true that the Deputy Comptroller
had recommended that no more silver
dollars be coined, and that this was
endorsed by Secretary Boutwell, and
printed as Senate document as far
back as 1912 but nobody saw it or
heard of it outside of the printer who
set the type and those who were at
that time intriguing to get the money
standard changed. Mr.. Hooper also
printed speech in the Congressional
Globe advocating gold standard, but
when the bill that finally became a
law was afterwards up in the House
it was denied by the chairman of the
committee that any change whatever
was made in the coins of the country.
In the Senate the remarks of the chair
man of the Finance Committee, in
calling up the bill, bear evidence on
their face of intended deception, and
Senator'S were deceived into voting
for the measure, and the President of
the United States was misled when he
signed the bill, as attested by his own
letters, and by the declarations of his
Attorney-General, Mr.. j. Edward
Pierrepont. For proof of what is here
said, see also the testimony of Beck,
Thurman, Conkling, Allison, Blaine,
Holman, Garfield and others of both
Houses; and as further proof that
the deed was consummated in the
dark, it is perfectly safe to say that
the entire population of important
States knew nothing of the act till long
after its passage.
It is perfectly safe even to say that
not man from the great State OF
Ohio, except the chairman of the FL
nance Committee of the Senate, knew
that such wrong was being perpetra-
ted upon the people of the United
States as was involved in this change
in the money standard, which would
change all debts and contracts, public
and private, in the United States.
The act was undoubtedly foreign
device. It came from Lombard Street,
and whatever London advises Wall
Street accepts, and Congress, if it re.
lates to the finances, usually carries
out.
But whoever is responsible for the