The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1894-12-07
A GRAVE MISTAKE.
Cleveland's Unit Head of the Treasury
Departments.


Departments.
Even If the reports of disagreements
between the presidents and the secfe-
tar or The treasury aoont financial
matters should turn ont 20 BE false, tie
president must undoubtedly mare real
lied beIofe this time thaS be made An
unwise seiection for that post Mr..
Car-.sle during his service in congress
evinced considerable knowledge Of
most OF the great political issues OF the
day, and he IVES, in addition. honest.
courageous and popular. He had, IN
dssd, attained, or almost attained,
the altitude OF a presidential possible
ity. Throughout the whole o. his sec
ton he was the one man whose name
had, sibce the war days, been coupled
seriously with the presidential can
didacy- Like John q. Breekinridge
until the Charleston convention split
ana the secession conflict destroyed
mis- political prospects, Carlisle in the
four o.: five years immediately pre-
csoing his entrance into the cabinet
began TO be looked at in the light o. q
man of destiny within whose reach
were about to be placed the highest
prizes of politics.
But all these fair prospects have
been darkened b. his year ard three
quarters service in the cabinet. Thia
change has happened because he has
been out of place in his present post
There is a chance sL&t he might have
hnar, ~ cr-.fn
or an attorney general, although the
probability is that his talent did not
e-;.eEd beyond legislation. At all
events he was conspicuously unfit for
the poet of head of tie treasury. His
record as a free silver man was fatal
to his chances Tn rendering accepta BILE
service in that Office. 1t IS true hs
Geemcd during the last year of his leg
iElatiye service to have abandoned
the free silver heresy, and the
president undoubtedly thought that
the conversion was genuine and last
ing or else the appointment would not
have been made. But this belief was
illusory before he had been SIX months
in the cabinet. When the first test of
his financial faith came up in the sum-
mer of 1898 he turned out to be a
bachslider, and showed that he was
firmly joined to his free silver idols.
When the gold fund vas first down
near the danger line in 1898 it was
learned that Carlisle intended to pay
out silver for Sherman notes instead
OF gold, so as to avoid the necessity of
buying gold to protect the reserve.
That policy, which would quickly havc
produced scare that would have sent
the country to e silver basis, the presi-
dent promptly prevented. Later on
he was known TO be in favor of the
coinage OF the silver seigniorage.
which the president veeosd. The
seigniorage coinage, of course, would
have been less destructive than free
coinage, in the same way that the
poison which lays the patient on lis
back for FIVE Or six weeks or months
is less harmful than that which kills
him, bu. the fact that the head of the
financial arm of the government ia
vored it gave 4 shock TO bu5iness
which it did not recoIe- from for sew
eral months. Some persons are opti-
mistic enough to assume that even the
most perverze and besotted silverite
would be cured OF his folly by bring
ing him lace to face with the finance
problem in its practical and vital as
pect, but some allowance ough. to be
made for the age OF the sinne-:. There
may be chance Of reclaiming MIN il
ne is caught young, but Mr.. Carlisle,
at the time of his appointment, was
beyond the age at which he could
learn to forget anything in financial
matters. This selection contrasts
strongly with the admirable appoint
ments of treasury chiefs which Mr..
Cleveland made in his first administra-
tion.-St. Louis Globe-Democrat