The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-07-19
The Truth About silver.

Congressman Patterson, Of the Tenth
district Of Tennessee. has written an ad-
mirable open letter 10 his constituents on
the silver question. and in favor Of a
sound currency. -Four years ago he was
an advocate of the free coinage Of silver,
but after he had given the question more
thorough study he became convinced that
he was on the wrong side Of il, and when
the bill for the repeal Of the purchasing
clause Of the Sherman silver law came be-
fore congress he voted for il. and also OPP
! posed the free silver coinage proposition.
He asserts that the free silver coinage
! advocates do not discuss the silver ques-
/ tion fairly. They demand the free coin
/ age of silver at the ratio of 16 TO /, and
4 yet they do not pretend TO show that,
with free coinage at that ratio, gold and
/ silver could be retained in circula-
ton on a. parity. Why do they
not} The reason is they cannot show it.
And the truth is that those who know
anything about the subject believe that
| free silver coinage would result in a sin
gle standard, and that that standard
would be silver Gold would disappear
/ They have no argument 10 show it would
not, They pretend to be biWetallists,
| They are nothing of the kind. They are
metallists-silver monometaliists.
1t is true that some Of them maintain
| that this country alone can bring about
double standard. But can they quote any
recognized authority that maintains that
it is in the power of any one government,
| independent of all other governments, to
maintain the double standard? They
cannot. In the markets of the world to-
/ day the relative valueof gold and silver is
/ "a to /, and yet the silverites maintain
that this country can freely coin silver at
the ratio of l6 to l and maintain parity
! between the two metals. Such PROPOSE
tion is against common sense.
Speaking of the effect that single sill
yer standard would have in the south,
! Mr.. Patterson says: You are all de-
! pendent for money upon cotton. Sixty
| eight per cent, or IS out of every 100
pounds of cotton produced in the southern
states, is shipped abroad and sold in
| foreign countries. Scarcely bale of it
! goes TO any silver country. Eighty-five
| per cent. of ali the cotton we export goes
TO Great Britain, France, and Germany,
and the balance goes practically to lesser
European countries. These countries all
have the gold standard; and as long as
we maintain the same standard we can
! export and sell our cotton to them and
know exactly what we are doing. Sup
pose we were at the single silver stan
dard-we would be at their mercy. We
would be eaten up by exchange We
would receive gold for our cotton, and in
exchanging it for silver we would
enrich them and impoverish our
selves l will never, so long as
/ am in public life, place the people 1 rep
resent in such a plight. You can hear
men talking about this country being a
great, big nation, fully able to direct its
own policy independent of all other coun-
tries. This is an idle and absurd preten-
sion when addressed to southern farmers
engaged in producing cotton. They are
absolutely dependent on foreign markets,
and are as much interested in the market
at Liverpool as in the markets at Mem
| phis and New Orleans. For the southern
| people to be required to ship IS per cent
of their cotton 10 gold countries, and
when they have sold it for gold, then to
have to exchange it for silver when it is
| fluctuating even more in the market than
cotton, would result in hardships which
| for one will not entail on them. These
foreign countries would then have us by
the throat, as they now have every silver
using country in the world"
The southern people should ponder
| these utterances of Mr.. Patterson well.
! That he is right there is no doubt. He
calls attention to the fact that the south
| in many respects is in better material
| condition than any other section of the
| country, and says that the opportunity
| for the development of her resources is
! close at hand. If she stands with the
east for sound currency instead of with
the west for unsound currency her devel-
! opmeut will be something phenomenal
/ The section of the country north of the
! Potomac and Ohio rivers and east of the
| Missouri controls in wealth and popula-
ton, and its efforts will be in the direc-
tion of the building up of the south. 1t
is, therefore, better from every point of
view for the south to stand with that
section for sound currency.