The Roanoke times. [volume] (Roanoke, Va.) 1890-1895, 1895-07-16
THE MONEY QUESTION.
Something Of Interest to the I'm
porters.
SENATOR JONES ON FOREIGN DEBTS

How We Infiict Injustice on the Many
For tho Benefit OF tho Few-The Lon
don Times. Quoted on the Silver and
Gold Standard Question.
1t is supposed to be decisive Of the
question to inquire how, if we have not
the gold standard, we can pay our debts
to foreigners. Let us examine this point.
An American importer buys goods in
Great Britain or Germany to be sold
here for his profit, and his alone The
query is, How is he to get the gold to
pay his bill? reply to the question by
asking another, By what means does he
pay bills in his own country? How does
any merchant obtain money? By sales
of merchandise. Very we'll
Let, then, tho American importer sell
merchandise for gold with which to pay
his gold Indebtedness. He bought in
gold standard countries the goods which
require to be paid for in gold Let him
sell i'll those countries for gold the goods
from sales of which to pay his bill.
Gold is to DO bought for commodities in
every gold standard country Of the
world. IL the range of prices in those
countries is such that he cannot make s.
profit ON the transaction, that is his
misfortune and is not one for which the
American people at large are responsible
or by reason of which they should be
mulcted in sums infinitely larger than
any possible premium that could be in
volved i'll the transactions of few i'm
portcrS
All the internal commerce Of this
country, which is 90 times greater in
amount than our foreign trade, should
not he diSjointed by reason of the neces-
slty which exists for II few men to pay
Their debts abroad. Is it ii greater act Of
justice to facilitate the payment of an
importers foreign bill at the expense of
all the people of the United States than
to maintain equity and justice in the
payment of all debts and the payments
tor all commodities and services inter
changed among the 20, 900, 900 people
of our country? Must we forever CON
tlnue to lnfiict wrong and injustice upon
all our producing classcs-upon ninety
nine one -hundredths of our people-sim-
ply TO save an occasional importer or
foreign business house some inconven-
fence? for i'll any case it could bc moth
ing more than an Inconvenience. 1t
could under no circumstances result in
loss to any importer to have to pay "A
premium.
Suppose failure of the crops To occur
IN Europe and an abundant harvest in
this country. There will be a CONSEQUENT
boom here. Numbers of contracts will
be made on high range of prices Then
this country becomes a poor country to
buy Ill, because prices are high, but for
the same reason it becomes good coun-
try to sell i'll. Other countries at such a
time Will be poor countries to sell in
because prices there are low, and they
Will for the same reason be good coun-
tries to buy in.
On such occasions our importers strain
every nerve to buy to the utmost. Hav-
ing therefore large payments to make to
foreign countries, they find that owing
to the low prices prevailing abroad they
are unable to send out our wheat or cot
ton to advantage. Hence they gather ND
the money Of the country and send il
away.
Making the Many Suffer For the Few.
Instead of assuming the responsibility
for the exercise of bad Judgment or over
weening cupidity on their part in max
ing more purchases than the country
makes sales, they make everybody in the
country suffer-those who have not had
anything whatever to do with foreign
goods as well as those whose business it
is to deal in such goods. AS everybody
knows, the number Of persons who deal
In foreign goods is utterly insignificant
compared with the enormous number
who deal in domestic articles
The premium which in any event the
importers would pay is bagatelle in
comparison with the unseen and unob-
served premium which for many years
has been paid by the toiling millions
Money is bought by every man with the
products Of his labor The masses of the
people are not digging gold out Of the
mines. The gold they dig is the amount
that can be bought by their labor exert
Ell i'll fields of wheat and cotton, il
seams Of iron and coal and in the CITY
shops, foundries and factories. The
amount OF money which the products of
such labor will command is therefore
the measure of the value of gold
With the present system all the PEG
pie of this country are made to pay a
premium on gold in order that a few
importers may he saved some imaginary
inconvenience in the payment of bal
anceS.
An adverse balance of trade whereby
500, 900, 900 of the money of the coun-
try might be shipped out would so re-
duce the debt paying power of the PEG
pie and the prices of the commodities
with which in the last analysis they