Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1895-12-10
Official Paper of County.
Money, the Creation Of Law-No
Natural Law Of Exchange.

worth only fifty cents in gold under the natural
law Of exchange. Charles City Citizen.
So, then, the statement persistently
made by the Citizen and other gold
standard papers, that the government
is making SO cent dollars is false
hood? And, good sir, no silver man
proposes to coin silver except ''under
present conditions" 16 to 1, and full
legal tender.
1t is not silver money the rich bank
ing and fund holding class object to-
they all know that a silver dollar is as
good as a gold one, they know too
that the silver OUT of the dollar-a
commodity-is worth less than the
silver IN the dollar, yet they cry out
against "cheap silver dollars, land the
Citizen is an echo of the rich bankers
cry.
The value of money is regulated by
its quantity, while the law simply
gives the quality, and it does not
matter whether the silver made into
dollar is worth a few cents, more or
less, as commodity. The United
States minis are running full time,
turning out copper cents, to their full
capacity to supply the public demand
for this coin, and yet the demand for
silver dollars which are not permitted
the privilege of the minis, is vastly
more. A few years more of the gold
standard for the wealthy and pennies
for the common people, and the des-
cending scale of civilization will bring
the common people to the level OF
the rat-eating Chinaman.
The truth is there is all through
the teachings of good standard class
preconcentrated effort to promul.
gate false impressions of money and
its functions. ''Sound currency" OF
which the Citizen is a disciple, issued
in the interests of the fund-holding
class-the coupon clippers-asks:
''Shall we give up 81 worth of
property or labor for anything SO
easily obtained as 37l4 grains of sill
ver?"
Note the cunning in the wording of
that interrogatory. 1t does not ask
Shall we give dollars worth of
property or labor for dollar but
cvades that question. Gold or silver
bullion are not money but commodity
until coined by the government
and the fiat of law declares it to be
money. People would not exchange
labor or property for gold bullion if
the law did not provide that-it could
be taken to the I,iHattss- AID made into
money, and that free of charge. They
would just as readily exchange labor
or property for silver bullion as for
gold bullion If it had the same mint
ing privilege and the same legal ten
der when coined into money as given
by law to gold. The masses every
where stand ready to exchange their
labor or property for dollars-for
money created and sustained by law
They are not only willing but eager
to do SO. The farmers and laborers
OF the country have no gold and but
very little silver or greenbacks and
are just as willing to exchange labor
or property for the one as for the
other.
The country remembers that during
the sixties the class which now poses
before it at SO Williams street were in
Wall street, and as now the advocates
of sound currency" Their efforts
in that behalf procured from congress
legislation, which made one of the
dollars the government paid to their
class worth SO IS in the dollars pro.
vided for the soldier, the farmer, the
laborer. the merchant. The money
the government paid out at its face
for arms, ammunition, army supplies
and government expenditures OF
every description, through this legis.
lation, the government refused to re.
ceive for dues to it from its cilizens.
During this period A. T. Stewart, a
large importer in New York, received
cargo of merchandise, the import
duty upon which was 100000, paya-
BILE ut the custom house in coin. His
sales TO the country merchants and at
his retail counters had been paid in
the dollars discredited by the govern
ment, the greenbacks or treasury
notes. With these he went to brok-
er's Office, one of the Williams street
sound money men, to procure the
needed coin. The first one offered to
exchange with the dollar of the full
legal tender for $1.75 of the money
provided for the public. This Stew
art declined and started for another
broker, when the first dispatched this
message to his brother brokers, all
sound money advocates: "Put it up,
old Stewart is coming" It was ac-
cordingly put up" to $1.s5, which
Stewart declined to pay, and return
ed to the one who had offered it at
$1.75. but who informed him thatgold
bad gone up, and the price is S1.s5.
This offer Stewart accepted, and the
broker of the money paid to Stew
art, gave him $4,000, of the first $780,
100000 issued and made full legal ten
der, against which Stewart protested,
but the broker assured him it was as
good as gold, and so Stewart found it
at the custom house. This ,nonau