The Portland daily press., 1895-06-18

money-whether metallic or paper-as
every man, who consults his daily expert
ence must confess is will it pass? Is this
dollar which l take an effective instru-
ment OF exchange? That is, will it pay a
| dollars worth of debt or command. in
some article that L want value eqiiya-
lent to the article or the labor for which
l take it? 1t is as tool and not as raw
material that we take money We pay
| for plough, for a cooking stove, never
asking, never thinking even, OF the guam
| tity or worth of cast iron that entered
into their construction. OF the stove the
only question we ask is, will it cook my
dinner without an over-expenditure OF
fuel; of the plough will it turn fair
furrow without too great expenditure of
the tractive power of my team?
So of coin the only question that is
pertinent is, is this an effectual instru-
ment of exchange; and that depends, not
on the abundance or scarcity of the raw
material of which 1t is made, or the fiuc-
tuating market value of the same, but up
on the permanence of the convention, or the
ability of the government to maintain its
legal tender at fixed valuation measured
in any purchasable thing. Should it even
be conceded that there might be such an
enormous over-supply of either gold or
silver as seriously to threaten the conven-
tional valuation of coins, the mischief
of the government to maintain its legal
tender, it's effectual use in exchange.
Even when in case of coins we contem-
plate future utilities, and ask, as we
would in reference to check or bank
note: Will this piece of paper, by the
failure of the drawer, become a less relia-
BILE instrument of purchase or payment
next month, next year? The only ques-
tionable thing about the problem is the
ability of the government to maintain
their legal tender quality in contingency
that might occur.
But these propositions will more readily
command assent, if the values and utili-
ties of silver and gold, not as raw mater
ial but as finished tools be considered.
The first function which coined money
performs for human society is as a
MEDIUM OF EXCHANGE,
an instrument of universal validity of
purchase and payment
President Walker says: "It is evident
that the inconvenience of barter, arising
out of the difficulty of securing the re-
quired coincidence of wants and of pos
sessions, calls loudly, even in the most
primitive conditions of industrial society
for some medium of exchange, for some
commodity, which every one shall freely
receive, in exchange for what he has but
does not desire personally to consume, in
the confident assurance that with it he
can at any time, and of kinds andEEin
quantities to suit his immediate wants,
obtain from others what they have, but
| do not desire to use.
| The function itself is important, but the
| instrument wherewith it is performed,
arbitrarily selected, as l shall show, is
| not material to the discussion Such an
arbitrarily selected commodity, as Prof
Bonamy Price says, would be money,
whatever its material or form. Coined
silver and gold are convenient not the
Indispensable instruments Of exchange
| The most that can be said of this service
of theirs is that, on the whole, they have
performed it better than other commodi-
ties that have been used for the same
purpose. Corn, cattle, cloth were used
as instruments of purchase and payment
without serious inconvenience. Shells
and glass beads are still received by saw
, age races in payment for furs, palm oil
and ivory. Before there was mint in
California the miner handed over to the
re-keeper a buckskin bag of gold dust
in payment for his meats and drinks. The
old Colonial Ordinances used to levy upon
delinquent Indian tribes fines, tributes,
and damages to be paid in MAIZE furs
| and strings of wampum, the creditor ac-
commOdatlng hlmSelf, as ne always must
| to the currency of his debtor. Dried
Goldfish serve the uses of money in Nor
way and New Foundland, as do eggs,
potatoes and shingles to-day in Aroostook
county, and when I was a practicing law
yer in the vicinity it used to be said that
smoked herring were a legal tender in
the town of Lubec.
HOW GOLD AND SILVER BECAME
MONEY
When first the agreement of a single