Birmingham age-herald., 1895-03-21

thruSiS would carry Weignt, put the time is coming when a man Will nave to give a fall.
 A RECENT TAR FF LESION.
 Houston (lex.) Post.
 The introduction oi free raw material has been buguear to no class of meric ,n ciilzens as it has been 10 the wool grower.
 The tariff reformer has persisted In the attempt to place wool on tle free list and has succeeded, but the direiul predict ons, of the Ohi wool growers particularly, are not coming to pass. We have free wool, but the reports from BCs;o ard other eastern centers agree that lhe demand for first class American wool Is better than for some time past. In free aud fair competi- tion first class goods will always be first in demand, no matter what the price, and the home market will ii St get the benefit oi the demand. This IS the natural course of trade and recent events are practically H. luslratiug il. The Philadelphia 1lmss, published of course h Cne of the leaoing wool mar kets, says that the state ments for supply of desirable domestic wools is steadily growing scarcer under the increased demand, and the imports have been disappearing in proportion as the bome supply has been purchased. As tuning thls authority 10 be correct IL punctures another high tariff faliacy and indicates that no industry is ever hurt by removing the artificial props and the sei- fish haudicaps with hich It has been first surrounded, then rendered dependent upon the necessities and conditions of some other branch oi the industry that had 10 base all its calculations upon some un- natural development Of trade. So long as the mills were denied free competition in buying their operation was hindered to an extent that the raw ht me product failed of a steady and healthy and natural market, and was injured just so far and 50 seriously.
 1.-THE POOR MANS MONEY" Louisville Courier Journal.
 They tell us that silver is especially the money of the poor man. On the other hand, gold Is represented as the money of the rich.
 Both of these assertions need a good deal of qualification. Silver is used for small payments and for change. The rich man has more small payments to make than the poor man. But he has also large payments to make, which the poor man has not. Both make their small payments in silver if they haveit, if not they offer bills, or someames gold, and get the whole or part of the change in silver. There does not appear to be a great deal of difference in this respect. Wage workers, who are largely poor men, are mostly paid by the week. They get their pay in bills, with have small sums due them are generally paid in the same way. But when they have to receive or pay out large sums they do not usually get gold. Nearly all sucn sums are paid in checks or drafts. Only in exceptional cases is there a payment in money, and then bills are used much oftener than gold. It is a familiar fact that where banks exist from 90 to 97 per ceut of all payments are made by checks. In ex- ceptional cases the percentage of checks used reaches 9S or 99 per cent.
 But let us aamit, for the sake of argu- ment, that silver is the poor mans money. What is the obvious inference from that admission? It seems clear that if the poor man is obliged to use silver 1t ought to be made as good as any other money. If he has to take his wages in silver he is more than any one else interested in seeing that the purchasing power of a silver dollar is equal to that of the gold dollar, or any other dollar. Certainly the poor man does purchasing power of the rich man. dollar. At present the silver dollar buys as much as any other dollar. Is it to the interest of the poor man that this state of things should be changed?
 What is it that makes the silver dollars buy as much as the gold dollar? It is some- times said that there is no gold dollar in circulation, but this is a mere bubble. To meet 1t, however, we may vary the question and ask, what is it that makes dollar gold piece? 1t is known that the bullion in five silver dollars is worth less thu ahalf as much as that in a half eagle. The purchasing power of the silver dollar is kept up by the policy of the treasury. That policy is to limit the coinage and to maintain an interchangeability among the various sorts of money. It is this policy which the silverites desire to change.
 Free coinage at 16 to would put it in the power of every man who owned 50 cents' worth of silver bullion to get a silver dollar for it. Under such circumstances it would be impossible to keep the silver dollar up Silver bullion and silver coin being inter- changeable at will would be of equal value. No one would tender gold at its lace value in payment of a cebt or in making pur- chases, because he could use the gold to buy twice as many silver dollars as the number stamped on the face of the coin. xrifh g1l ha cauld hns ailxrar hnl