The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1894-07-13
Friday, July 13, 1894.
WHY the United States Should Open
the nints to Free Coinage.

old SEMI barbara system with the newer
and more scientific civilization. The old
intrinsic value system of finance was the
first step in the evolution of barter which
resulted i'll hybrid money, which was
either commodity or money as circun-
stances required. The merchandise fea-
ture was retained as pledge or security
for the fulflment of the edict of law or
custom, growing out of common consent,
that the article used as money should not
be repudiated. Its merchandise quality
should sustain or stand surety for its
money function.
The advance of a more complex CIV
ilization, has made the merchandise func-
ton hindrance to the money function of
modern finance. Gold, a scarce and
costly merchandise, is the disturbing ele-
ment of the finances of modern civiliza-
ton, and the money question" will not
be permanently settled till the metals are
eliminated from it, and the public recog-
nizes money as matter solely of law.
The greatest difficulty the teachers on
finance have to deal with is to get people
to discriminate between the money of
metal or coin pieces, and the metal COM
posing the money. Many very intelli-
gent people stumble over this and become
hopelessly muddled. They will tell you
seriously there ought to be dollars
ort1, Ofe ;1x,a- -, ci1x,ar Ia11or
seem utterly lost if you tell them it would
be only worth a hundred cents if there
was twice as much metal in silver dollar
The fact that the coin at its present weight
is worth hundred cents for all purposes
of money, doesn't seem to strike them
that there is something wrong with their
reasoning. And that the same coin
passes from year to year for the same
value in account. does not appear to them
that the assumption that it is only worth
so or 60 cents is founded on fallacy. If
they want to use it as merchandise, and
convert the metal into a spoon or some
thing to apply to ones personal use then
it loses its function as money and becomes
a piece of merchandise. The law has
withdrawn its power and no longer
DEGREES it a piece of money by
which the laws of trade are enforced
among men. For this specific purpose
the law has ordered the piece to be fash
toned and coined, and in order to make
pieces uniform in every respect exactly
the same amount and purity of metal is
put in every piece of the same denom-
ination.
The money spectators palter in a
double sense, for the purpose of confusing
the masses of the people. And unfor
tunately they have provided themselves
with the best, the shrewdest and most
inscriptions attorneys and got them into
congress for the purpose of continuing
the deception as long as possible.
If all metal money of the larger denom-
nations was banished-demonetize
and the decree of congress was placed on
paper only, the public would soon be
freed from their delusion concerning gold
and silver as money. AS gold and silver
they are not money but only costly
metals, and the only tenable reason why
the United States should remonetize sill
yer, convert it all into money which
would be taken to the minis, under free
coinege, is that the nation is great pro-
Queer of silver, and the price would at
once be raised to coin value, which would
add to the value of that cyob-the annual
product of silver-nearly one hundred per
cent, and enrich the country to that
extent; the same as raising the value of
the wheat crop to one dollar a bushel in
place of fifty cents would enrich the whole
country to that amount
Without the silver produced i'll the
United States the supply in foreign coun-
tries, or old world countries, would fall
far short of the demand, and our silver
bullion being raised to coin value by the
minis coming all the bullion taken to
them, the price would necessarily, by the
laws of trade, raise to American coin
value every where.
1t is an utter impossibility to overstock
this country with silver money. France
has i'll her banks and i'll circulation
5000, ooo, 900 of her own and neighboring
nations silver coin. The population of
France is about half of that of the United
States, and her territory about one
seventeenth the area of the United States,
which has three to four times the amount
of internal commerce of France. The
extent of our vast territory as compared
with France and the amount of internal
trade, demand three or four times as much
money as France i'll order to conduct our
business, without being cramped for
money, which we always have been since
1865.
Frances large supply of silver money
is not too large volume for her business
Neither would all the silver which comes
from our mines ever make too large sum
for the demands of the steadily growing
business and increasing population of this
country. The demand for silver i'll
European and Asiatic countries would
continue to draw large amounts away
from this country.
The coin value of silver bullion here
would create the same value in Europe
and it would increase the demand for