Birmingham age-herald., 1895-08-25
THE SILVER CRAZE.
SAM JONES ON TIE FINANCIAL QUESTION
iThe Less Brains a Man Has the More He Clamors for Free and Onlm-
 ited Coinage"


 years. The skating rink craze struck America about twenty years ago. Then followed the greenback craze. Next we had the sub-treasury craze. Then the sll- yer craze, followed closely. side by side almost by the bicycle craze. It is like a stampede in Texas cattle. Sometimes nothing disturbs them. Again, any little thing will stampede them. The stam-s pede spirit has to be in them. When once started nothing can stop them. If the precpice is reached those behind push the leaders oyer Such is the case with the free and unlimited sixteen to one-ners. They will soon get upon the brink of obseurity and push the leaders and promoters of the heresy before them. They, however, stand some chance Of reaching heaven God has made speclai providence for fools and children. Silver ties will get in on the former bench. But some of them are so prejudiced that If Gabriel blows a golden trumpet they will just lie still and say: No, l am not going to move" Their trouble is above their eyes. Their heads need working on.
 I have thought some over the causes and curses of the various crazes Very few really busy, industrious, intelligent people take hold upon any of these crazes. The skating rink craze, if l re- member right was run largely by the same gang that runs the football and the baseball today The greenback party and the sub-treasury crowd were com posed largely of the calamity howlers who are running the free and unlimited coinage of silver gang today.
 I have lately made tour through Ala bama, Mississippi and Louisiana. The silver craze is both epidemic and indemic out there It is like smallpox. for the less brains a man has the more he clam ors for the free and unlimited coinage of silver at 16 to 1. They Know not where- of they speak. Their brains, if they pos sess such a commodity, must certainly not -lJe-.eonnected with their tongues. Their mouth is like pepper-box pistol it goes off anywhere they touch it. They will lend no ear to reasonable and sound ideas, and are never affected by them. They pass in at one ear and out at the other for the very good reason that there Is nothing inside to stop the words Men could have their heads split open, filled with sawdust and sewed up and make a better showing and advance more sen sible arguments than these independent, unlimited free silver hereticS. It is like smallpox-those who don't die of it will eventually get well. It is like smallpox in another respect-none ever have it but once. Mississippi has it now tremen- dously bad. Every candidate from con stable to governor announces himself first as in favor of the free and unlimited coinage OI SllNtI dt 10 lO l, anu lhcy don't propose to argue the question eith- CT. l said to some of them: "The most difference between you and billy-goat is a matter of hair and horns! If you catch a billy-goat by the whiskers and tell him to hold still, you want to give him an idea, he shakes his head as much as to say: If you don't turn me loose I'll butt you down." and when he gets loose he walks off and goes to eating grass and dog fennel He doesn't want ideas; he wants grass. He's hungry. 50 with the average silverite. You catch him by the lapel of his coat and tell him you want to give him some ideas on the financial question and before you can get an idea half advanced he pulls loose and gets him paper bag of peanuts and a glass of red lemonade. He doesn't want ideas he wants something to eat. He's hungry.
 advised them not to go to sleep lying on their sides, that their brains would all run out of their ear But if they did they would put them back next morning with teaspoon.
 When the times of depression and strin- gency come. then the calamity howlers get in their work For instance, the old farmer whom I met in West Virginia a strong sixteen to one-ner-said the de- monetization of silver had ruined hlm; for thirty years ago he could have gotten $50 per acre for his farm and was getting s2 a bushel for his wheat, but since con gress demonetized silver his land had gone down to S20 an acre and his wheat to 60 cents bushel. Now, if that old fel- low would take a trip into the northwest, the granary of the world, which has all been opened up in the last thirty years, and see the millions of bushels of grain raised there and the great trunk lines of railroads hauling the wheat from the northwest to Baltimore, Md, for 15 cents a bushel, more or less, that good old sil- tot Rrad mt what hit him. The cheap lands of the northwest which produce forty bushels of wheat to the acre have surely cheap ened his land as well as his wheat. But nothing could make him believe, in the narrow world in which he lives but that the characterization of silver had done the work.
 They cry: "Bimetallism," Double standard" and so on. Suppose on that hypothesis we make diamonds and cut glass the standards. Let congress pass a law making cut glass and diamonds of equal value. A diamond as large as a grain of wheat is worth S100. A piece of cut glass that size is worth the one hundredth part of cent. But congress has passed law saying they are the same in value. Now let jeweler offer each for sale to the old society sister. She asks what is the price of each. Each is worth S100." She says: II will take the diamond, but I don't want the cut glass" "Oh," says the jeweler, If you get tired of the cut glass at any time the government will redeem it at s100." She seys: "Welr if I can get my money back on it at any time l will take it." The jeweler will unload the cut glass on the old sisters and the old sisters will soon unload the whole business on the gov ernment.
 Is the government able to make gold and silver of certain relative value, or continue the parity of 16 to 1? I don't believe it is. No government. so far as my knowledge goes, on the face of the earth can long mSintain a parity with free and unlimited coinage. I am a bi- metallist in the sense that want both metals as money, but one standard only, and that the gold standard. I am willing for all the silver in the world to be coined at any ratio so long as the parity of the two dollars can be maintained. Like Attorney General Harmon, every Ameri- can ought to say: T want our dollar as good as anybodys dollar, whether it be silver or gold" I beilve that the best thoughts and profoundest views stand squarely with the gold standard. I have