Lyon County times. [volume] (Silver City, Nev.) 1874-1907, 1894-02-10
SCIENTIFIC R FORM OR DE
STRECTGON.
senator stewards Views or the Gold
standard and Bond Issue.

senator stewards Views Om the Gold
standard and Bond Issue.
Whatever ere dit devices may be
invented, whether government or
bank currency, redeemable in gold,
or private cheques, bills ofexchange
or other promises to pay, the volume
of the circulating medium must
ultimately depend upon the vol
ume of money clothed with every
money function. Money redeema-
BILE in other money is simply form
of credit. Credit is limited by the
means Of payment or redemption.
Since prehistoric times and up to the
year 1873, the fabric of credit, in
Guiding currency redeemabl in coin,
rested on both gold and silver. That
part of the foundation which con-
sisted of silver, has been removed,
and the silver coin, which formed
at least ore half of the base, has
been converted into credit money,
to be redeemed in gold. In round
numbers, the gold coin, silver coin
and paper money of the world, are
, about equal to each other. The pyr-
| amid was firm and substantial while
gold and silver were the base and
stituted two-thirds of the fabric;
and while paper, the apex, repre-.
scented only about one-third. 1t now
stands: gold coin, one third, for the
apex; and silver and paper, two
thirds, for the base; but the pyra-
mid is reversed, with the apex at
the bottom.
The load of credit resting on gold
must be greatly reduced to CORE
spond with the gold standard, and
that is the process now going on,
which has produced the current f.
nancial squeeze" and to which the
authors of the ruin point as an ''ob-
jpct lesson"
The hope Of relief by increasing
debts, or issuing more currency re-
deemable in gold, is vain. The in
tlation of prices, by issuing paper
redeemable in gold, without gold
for redemption, must end in panic
and collapse. 1t would be like at
tempting a permanent cure of de-
Hrium tremens by an increased in
diligence in strong drink. The
grasp of gold contraction can only
be temporarily relieved by credit
devices, as patient is sometimes
revived when suffering from the eff
fects of alcoholism. by cocktail in
the morning, only to be sunk to a
still lower depth Of depression by
the inevitable reaction later in the
day.
| The alternative of scientific
money, of material other than gold
and silver, or the restoration OF the
automatic theory, is presented to the
creditor class. The revolution
which they have inaugurated to de-
stroy the automatic theory, must
either be arrested by the restoration
of silver, or by the invention and
esta blishment of a better system.
The preliminary effects of the
! gold standard contraction, have
paralyzed enterprise and DESTROYED
the prospect of future credits. 1t is
now destroying existing obligations,
and, when its deadly work shall
have been fully accomplished. all
bonded debts will have been liqui-
dated by reputation and bank
ruptcy. If blind greed is to be the
only guide of the money powers in
the future, az it has been in the
past, the horrors of universal ruin
and the disnrga nization of society
may be realized before the work OF
reconstruction can be begun. The
hope still exists that there is suffic-
lent intelligence in the masses, to
direct their dormant energies in a
mighty effort to break the chains of
contraction, with which fraud and
avarice have bound the limbs of
enterprise. Ii this hope can be
realized, the civilization ofthe Nine
tenth Century will escape the abyss
of degradation and want in which
all preceding civilizations have
persisted.