The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-05-18


his campaign for reelection as govern
or OF Minnesota, ex-Congressman Knute
Nelson made q speech in which he In
cidentally touched upon the silver ques-
tion advocating single gold standard,
supplemented by the use Of silver as q
representative money. He said:
Senator Nelson's Speech.
BY the phrase a ratio Of sixteen to one,
Is meant that 16 ounces or parts Of silver
coined into money shall be equal to one
ounce or part of gold coined into money.
This is the coin or statutory ratio, as dis
tinguished from the intrinsic or CONNER
cial ratio of the metals. Carefully COM
piled statistics from original sources show
that the commercial value of silver be-
tween the year 1857 and the year 1872 fiuc-
tuated from ratio Of H.A to a ratio Of
15S2, and that in the last named year the
commercial ratio Of silver was E.l7. At
this time the first coinage act Of the
United States was passed, providing for
the free coinage Of both silver and gold on
a ratio of Is to /. And here l ask you to
note how near the coin ratio approxlmated
to the commercial ratio. Had the trainers
Of that law steered as wide from the COM
mercial ratio as the Populist reformers
do today, the ratio would not have been
10 10 Dut . 10 j. bul tHe Ilell VI tloSc
days We're imbued with hard common
sense and business integrity, and had no
silver mines or silver bullion to buy OF in
fate.
To understand the effect Of this and the
subsequent coinage laws of the United
States, 1t Is necessary to call your atten-
tion to the universal and inexorable rule
governing the circulation Of money, known
as the Gresham rule, that where two
kinds Of money Of equal coin value, but Of
unequal commercial value, circulate side
by side. and are not by law inconvertible
with each other. that money which IL In
trinsically and commercially the cheapest
will drive the dearest out Of circulation
The debtor will always pay with the cheap
er dollar, and the buyer always buy with
the cheaper dollar, while the dearer dollar
will be withdrawn from circulation and
disposed Of as bullion or at it's bullion
value. The element Of ints-corvertibility
being wanting under the act Of 1892 silver
gradually depreciating In value, until
reaching nearly the ratio Of 16 to l, by 1884,
through the force Of the rule I have de-
scribed, had driven all our gold money
out Of the country. To remedy this evil
and bring back the gold into circulation
the coinage act Of 1884. fixing the ratio at
IL to l, as II is today. was passed. This
was slight generalization Of gold, and
hence under the rule Of circulation de-
scribed to you, gold drove our silver out
Of circulation. the act Of 1853 providing for
greatly debased coinage Of small sub
sidiary silver coins was passed. Save and
except these debased subsidiary coins
gold was the only money Of the national
government in circulation from, 1s48 down
to 1852, at which time our national govern
ment first acquired a paper currency, and
this currency remained the only circula-
ting medium from that time until specie
payment was resumed in 1879
Silver's Technical Demonstration.
From these facts It Is apparent that
when silver was demonetized in 1873 1t was
not In circulation and had not been since
1S4O, and that We then were, and ever since
1862 had been, on an exclusive paper basis,
30 that the demonstration WAS, as i mat
ter Of fact, technical rather than practical.
In 1878, one year before specie payment was
resumed silver, under the Bland law, was
remonetized and a true state of bimetal-
lism inaugurated by adopting, for the first
time, and. as a matter of fact, the prin-
ciple Of interconvertibility, without which
no real practical bimetallism can exist,
outside of International bimetallism. The
Bland law provided for the purchase and
coinage Of from $1,000, 900 to 81, OOO, 900 worth
OF silver bullion per month and for the
issuance Of silver certificates upon such
coinage. Under this law over 500, ,0OO 900
OF silver dollars have been coined.
Owing to the almost universal demone-
tization Of silver in Europe since 1872, and
the greatly increased production thereof
throughout the world, In spite Of the Bland
law, and in spite of the Sherman law of 1890
under which the government was re-
quired to purchase silver bullion at the
rate of 54,0OO,000 ounces per year and issue
paper currency thereon, silver has, ever
since 1872, gradually deprecated in value,
until today Its commercial ratio Is less
than 81 to ]. and before the repeal Of the
purchasing clause of the Sherman law It
had reached a ratio Of less than 2S to /.
In all these years. aside from India, the
United States has been the best friend
that silver has had. Until the repeal of
the purchasing clause of the Sherman law
and the suspension Of coinage in India,
both occurring In 1893, these countries
consumed upwards of two-thirds of the
worlds entire supply Of silver. And yet,
in spite of the efforts of these two coun-
tries to sustain silver, 1t kept on, from the
causes already described, to decline in
price so rapidly that 1t became evident
that India and the United States COM
b!ned could not sustain the burden alone.
On the first day Of June, 1894, the United
States carried in circulation s647. .6O0. 900 of
silver. as against $685. 200, 900 of gold, of
which s1oO, 0OO 900 is kept in the treasury as
q redemption fund for $346, ,0OO, 900 Of green
backs. France has a silver circulation of
800 100000, as against gold circulation
OF $500, 100000; while India, with It's popu-
laton of 225, ,0ee, 900, has a silver circula ton
Of $500. 100000, as against no gold, and $685.
100000 OF uncovered paper; and China,
with Its 400,000000 Of people, has 500, 00O, 90
of silver, passing on Its bullion value, In
circulation, as against no gold and no
paper currency.
Our Friendship for Silver.
These statistics indicate, If we take into
account our population, our whole field OF
currency, and our mode Of doing business,
that silver has not been stricken down,
as some reformers alege, but that on the
whole 1t is as much In favor here, for use
as money, as anywhere in the commercial
world, and that our country Is today in a
sound state of local-as distinguished from
Observation-Disclosures Our own COIN
age history, from 1892 to 1884, and from the
later dAte until the Bland act of 1878 has
demonstrated that the free coinage of both
metals, on a ratio almost approximating
the commercial ratio, failed to give us real
bimetallism-the uninterrupted circulation
Of both metals side by side. There being
no complete system of international b.
metallism, and there being no act iai Of
legal interconvertibility between the two
metals, under the inex: rable operation of
the Gresnen law, silver. g. the CHI per
metal, during the first period, drove gold
out OF circulation, and gold, as the cheaper