St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-05-24
CRAZED BY SILVER.

Gov. Waite is at it again. The echoes
OF his defiance to Wall street-his dec
laration that he would fight through
blood up to the brides of his Nurse to
preserve the integrity of oul silver coln-
age-have scarcely ceased reverberat-
ing down the corridors of time ere he
is again at the front with an alliterative
declaration of his purpose to raise Cain.
He has expressed the hope that the
ballot would soon overthrow the DOM
ination of Wall street, but if the ballot
were not successful the man who would
not bare his breast to bullets was not
man. Of course, the governor will not
be the first to ''bare his breast to the
bullets" Of the minions of the money
power, as the barking dogs are not the
ones that do the biting. And Gov.
Waite has been doing good deal of
barking of late-barking that has made
him ridiculous in every part of the
country. But there is no means that
can be employed to close his lips. He
insists upon the great American priv
ilege of making fool of himself in sea-
son and out of season.
Gov. Waite has a silver wheel in his
head. and its revolutions are pheno NJ
enally active. He seems to think that
the world moves by virtue of the
silver that is in it, and that without sill
yer the universe would lose its equiIib-
rum and dash off into linitless space
like lost neteorite. The gearing of
the wheel is we'll oiled, and its motion
is maintained perpetually, but it is
varied with the caprice of the moment
1t always retains its general character =
istics, however, and is in no danger of
being mistaken for ore of the other
wheels that occupy the brains of other
cranks.
Fortunately for the country, there are
but few men of Gov. Waite's way of
thinking. We all have a good opinion
OF silver, but we do not worship it as
does the Colorado statesman. We rec
ogniZe the fact that it has its uses, chief
among which is the manufacture of
spoons and watch cases. 1t is only re-
Gently that cranks have been manufac-
tured by means of silver, but not of it.
And these seem to be the most absurd
and unreasonable of all cranks. They
are not susceptible to argument; they
cannot be convinced Of their error, even
though mountain of the metal they
worship should fall upon them. They
labor under the delusion that the scarcer
precious metal. gold, is the enemy of
their idol, and that the one can be main
tanned in the popular estimation only
by the overthrow of the other. They
cannot be made to understand that
both metals have their uses. but
that they can never be maintained
upon parity, of values unless their
production is regulated and kept in
the same relative proportions from
year to year. They cannot be made to
realize that the natural law Of supply
and demand applies to silver with the
same force as it does to the production
of pork and wheat and cotton, and that
when the mines yield an Overplus of
silver ore the product must decrease in
value just as wheat declines when the
farmers raise more than is necessary to
supply the wants of the public.
II looks as if the silver lunacy was in
durable. Few men ever attacked re-
cover from its effects. Like the grip, its
after effects are prostrating and debili-
tating to the mental and nervous sys-
tenn. 1t produces insanity just as surely
as diabetes produces imbecility. Unless
taken in time the progress of the dis
ease is rapid and the mental disintegra-
ton is constantly active. We need not
hope for Gov. Yates cure. That is