The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1894-08-11
Silver Must Be Restored.

Following is an extract of speech deliv-
cred by Hon. Richard P. Bland in the House
of Representatives on July 30:
Mr.. Speaker, the restoration of silver as
money in this country is the overshadowing
issue. The money question is the coming
question.
The full measure of prosperity so longed
for by our people can never return, in my
opinion, until we have readjustment of our
standard and money volume.
On this point | wish to quote from an
eminent writer and scholar, an Eastern man,
Prof. Andrews, of Brown University. At
the summer meeting, held in Philadelphia on
the 14th instant, Mr.. Andrews said:
When the present business depression began
nearly all referred it TO the Sherman law This law
has now been repealed some months. but the situa-
ton is not improved. Besides, in England where
there was no Sherman law, times are as bad as here
More recently the depression is charged to the plan
of change in our tariff laws This fear would
naturally have some effect, but it can not be the
fundamental cause of our woes Great Britain
fears no tariff change, yet suffers no less than we.
The election of Mr.. Cleveland and the present Con-
gress can not have occasioned our trouble, for it
began more than year after that event; nor the
actual beginning OF tariff legislation. for this was
several months later than the beginning of the
panic.
The true of financial distress is the pro-
greSsfve scarcity of full money leading TO contin
uous and discouraging fall in general prices, which
first made production less and less profitable and is
now making it less and less possible. Our present
malady is only aecentuation of that through
which the gold using world has been passing ever
since 1873 when Germany and the United States
demonetized silver, an act which, with the similar
acts of other nations, caused shrinkage of nearly
one-half in the supply of fundamental money in
Europe and North America. The inevitable result
of this has been rise in the value of each monetary
unit. each grain ofgold; or. what is the same from
the other side, fall in general prices Since go per
cent. of all producers are weighted with fixed
charges, like mortgages, which have to be paid dol
lar for dollar. matter how incomes fall off, the
general fall in prices has led to constant lessening
of income as compared with oulgo. Small bust
nesses have been ruined: the most prosperous firms
have had to cut wages; none make money unless
enjoying some special advantage, natural or
artificial The cause named perfectly explains all
these phenomena, and explains why they prevail,
in the gold world and nowhere else.
Since the demonstration of silver in 1878
silver has declined in value as compared to
gold; so have all farm products, especially
wheat and cotton. Silver is now at the
lowest price reached since 1873; so is wheat
and cotton. But it is the rise in gold; for
while we say that silver has fallen, we only
mean to say that as compared to gold it has
fallen, and not as compared to other things;
for gold will buy nearly double the amount
of wheat and cotton that it would buy in
1878. Hence it is gold that has risen.