Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1895-05-31
IL Was Not Passed.
A subscriber recently wrote to the
New York World, as follows:

A subscriber recently wrote to the
New York World, rs follows:
want to get the names and ad-
dresses Of the members of the Senate
and the House who voted in favor of the
bill to demonetize silver; also the names
OF the chairman of the committees that
recommended it, and the date OF the pas
sage Of the bill. +. \. NJ.
MARQUETTE, Mich.
No bill was ever passed "to demone-
tie silver" Silver was demonetized by
trick, and not more than three men
in the city of Washington knew when
it was done or within a year thereafter,
even, that it had been done. This de-
monetization was the result of a conf
bination among half dozen of the
leading gamblers of the Gold Board,
which had its ramification abroad. The
Coinage Committee of the House re-
ported " bill to codify the mint laws"
The necessity ior that codifcation was
we'll known, and the chairman ex-
planned that no change had been made
in any of the law, but that the different
acts bearing upon the mint had been
brought together under one section.
The bill was not even read except by
title. 1t was passed without one dis
senting vote. In the section enumer-
ating the different lawful silver coins
OF the United States the word dollar"
was omitted, beginning " the hall dol
lar" etc. No one noticed the omis-
sion. Even careful reading. OF the
bill by every member OF Congress
would not have revealed the trick to
any one of them. No one was think
ing of the demonetization of silver.
No human being on the face of the
earth had ever suggested such thing.
The silver dollar was at three cents
premium over the gold dollar, and
when the gold dollar was quoted at
116 the silver dollar was quoted at
119. The word had been stricken out
by some member OF the committee
without the knowledge Of his unsus-
pecting colleagues; but who did it has
never been discovered. In after
years each member Of the coinage
committee expressly disclaimed any
knowledge OF the trick or that he
knew or had heard that the word
" dollar" had been omitted. The bill
went to the Senate, was referred to it's
Committee on coinage, examined per-
functorily, reported by Mr.. Sherman
(the committee) to the Senate, and
passed by the Senate on Mr.. Sherman's
assurance that it made no change in
the law, only bringing all the differ
ent laws together. After the bill was
passed the secret that silver had been
demonetized was carefully kept. No
member of the government knew it.
Six months after, and again a year
after, President Grant, not knowing
that silver had been demonetized,
advocated the coinage of more silver
dollars. At that time there were some
in the country. The Secretary of the
Treasury also advocated the same
thing. To their intense astonishment
they were shown the report of the d.
rector OF the German mint, in which
he stated that America had demone.
tized its silver coinage. The state
ment had been laughed at as the
blunder of q foreigner, but upon the
examination of the mint laws as codi-
fed under the act of the year before,
it was discovered that silver had been
demonetized for year. Every effort
from that moment to this to take the
back track has been defeated.