The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1894-02-14
moro restricted bank credits, lower

moro restricted bank credits, lower
prices: with the bimetalic standard, q
larger volume Of currency. moro ex-
banded bank credits and higher range
OF prices. and any attempt to maintain q
large volume of currency, extended bank
credits. high wages and high range Of
prices with gold as the single standard
must end in failure and disaster. As well
expect to make smaller the bushel meas
ure and have it hold more at the same
time. Legislation is utterly Intellectual
to change this law.
The only way, therefore, to maintain
the gold standard and keep gold in this
country is to reduce the volume of cur
rency, reduce bank credits and bring
down prices and wages. The attempt to
maintain the gold standard by selling
bonds and buying gold, with the expec.
tation of keeping in that way larger
volume Of gold permanently here, is ut
ter folly, and any one who believes the
gold standard can be maintained in that
way is unfit to have charge of the finances
OF the country. There is, I repeat, alb
solutely but one way to keep gold here,
or to maintain the gold standard, and
that is to cut down prices to fit the
standard, or, in other words, accept the
results of gold as the pricing instrument.
We may temporarily borrow gold, but
we cannot buy gold and keep it as ours
except by paying for it as dearly with
our commodities as other countries pay.
Do we shrink from the consequences of
this policy, or ask where labor will 20,
or where property will go, or where the
debtor will stand, or what will be the
consequences to mortgaged property, or
to insurance and trust companies that
depend on this class of securities? The
answer is, The time to think of these
things is before it is determined to 20 to
the gold basis. All that am saying is
that we cannot at once go there and at
the same time stay away. We cannot
make gold alone the pricing instrument,
and at the same time by legislation or
legerdemain, by credit bubbles, by tar
ifs or by confidence in something i'm
possible maintain range of prices in
consistent with that standard.
Will all countries suffer alike in the
process of readjustment of things to
the altered monetary conditions? Not
necessarily. The situation of all coun-
tries is not the same. Prices will fall in
gold standard countries, and industries
will suffer in all such countries, but all
nations will not suffer in the same de-
gree. Debtor nations will suffer most.
Indeed it is question whether any debt
or nation can permanently maintain the
single gold standard. It is very certain
that only the strongest commercially
can do so. Weaker nations like Spain,
Portugal and Italy have already found
it impossible to maintain gold curren-
cy or even the gold standard in their
home circulation. The trial of the Unit
ed States is to come. We certainly can
not maintain the single gold standard by
going into debt for the gold.
The relative conditions of the United
States and England as nations in the
matter of maintaining the gold stand
ard may be seen in the one fact that the
income Of England from interest on in
vestments in other countries is not less
than $500, O00,0 900 annually and is proba-
bly, more. This is more than the equiv
alent of the value of the entire wheat
crop and cotton crop of the United
States for 1898. That is. if instead of
her interests abroad England had handed
over to her our entire wheat and cotton
crops. she would be no better off than
she is now with her foreign investments.
On the other hand, the United States
is required to pay on her debt to Eng
land interest equal to more than the
value of our entire cotton crop. Are
these two countries, then, as nations
equally interested in maintaining the
gold standard? And yet, to our shame,
we subject our financial policy to the
dictation of foreign interests.-A. j.
Warner in New York Sun.