The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-04-27
THE CURRENCY QUESTION.

Sir: Your kindness IN tnroWiHb oPeh
your columns to all shades of opinion on
the silver question ought to be productive
of the best results. I'm the multitude Of
councillors there Is safety as the
proyerb states. 1t says nothing about wis
dom. but we have an excess of that and 1t
seems to me that what we need is more
safety at O. time when American thought
seems to be progressing toward silver
basis-a point from which no road leads
back. The fundamental historic fact or
the discussion that this has always been
a gold basis country seems to be over
looked or denied. From 1904, when Jetfer-
son forbade the further coinage of silver
dollars, up to 1873, less than $S,0O0,OOO We're
coined, and these being worth from l0S 10
lU7 cents went principally to the melting
pot This experience seems to show that
the fiat of the United States could not
make 100 cents in gold equal 103 cents In
silver and ought to discourage the present
effort to make As cents in silver equal 100
cents in gold.
The argument that a person has bor-
rowed a thousand dollars at a time when
1t would purchase 1000 bushels Of wheat
and now must pay for It with 1000 bushels
Is q very striking one and leads the aver
age, simple-minded citizen to inquire why
he pays 1t in wheat? Why does he not
pay it in hay, corn, potatoes, beans,
onions, etc, in which there has been no
decline, especially as the product of either
hay or corn in this country Is two or three
times the value annually of that Of
wheat. Is it not possible that we over
rate the Importance of the amount of
our currency, as well as undertake the
Importance of its quality? The clear
ings in 1892 were over $G2, ,00O, 000, 900,
representing one-third, or perhaps, a half
of actual checks drawn, thus leaving $780,
900, 600 more unreported. Add to this
all the cash transactions, perhaps another
$50 900 900, ,0O0 equals $3.50, 900, 600 900 annual
business This work is apparently done
by about 1000, 100000 of free currency at
least quarter of which is boarded, leav-
ing for actual work some $S0O.OO0O 900. OBJ
viously there is some other factor besides
cold cash required to do this amount Of
business. If we should turn to the s4,500,
100000 of bank deposits in the United
States and consider them as additional
currency, pure and simple, exchanging
goods and lands often for immense
amounts without using single cash dol
lar, 1t becomes at once Ineligible how the
mighty exchanges Of this country are
made. 1t also become clear why the in
crease of cash from SIS to $25 per capita
by the purchase of silver under the Bland
and Window acts did not raise the values
of products in the slightest.
Now, considering these bank deposits as
in effect currency, equal to eight times
the gold and six times the silver in use,
and also remembering that we may in
crease them in a good year $500. 900 or
$4OO, 900, 900 against a possible coinage Of
Of oil bar ba
any profit to this country in the halving Of
the yard stick of values by the free coin
age of silver? 1t appears almost beyond
debate that opening our mints to silver
would annihilate IS per cent. of the pur-
chasing value of our bank deposits. Our
people have refused to repeal the national
bank law because 1t would destroy $780,
100000 of good currency. They have re-
fused President Cleveland's solicitations
to redeem in bonds $500, 900 900 of United
States notes, because both were meas
ures of contraction and wise men dread
currency contraction--and yet 1t is seri-
ously advocated to go to a silver basis,
which would contract bank deposits
which are also currency-s2, 1866, 900, 900 in
an instant But this would not be the
limit of the catastrophe for this currency
loss of billions. Every salaried man and
buy in tea and coffee, wheat, wool and
silk, and all other goods whose price is
fixed beyond the borders Of the United
States, but As cents worth. And further
"the value of all property is Its cost of re-
production. II wages shrink one-half will
not all the houses and products except farm
land shrink in the same ratio? Is 1t worth
while to organize parties and carry on
government to attain such q result? And
is people capable of doing such an act
capable of free government?
The effort of the United States to raise
the price Of silver under the Window act
by purchasing the total American product
was a total failure. 1t was a bold effort
but its results should convince all of the
impossibility of America alone upholding
the price of silver. Yet / think Colonel
Hitchcock wrong in assuming the impos-
sibilty of doing this by combination Of
civilized nations. The success of the
Latin union In doing this for long term
of years at the ratio of 1914 to 1 and the
earlier example of Rome and the eastern
empire maintaining the parity for 1900
years at the ratio Of 13 to / would seem to
assure success, but I do not believe the
intense conservatism and the boundless
greed of England will allow the experi-
ment to be tried. Hence the true policy Of
this country would seem to be to raise its
tariff sufficiently to keep its trade bal
ances in our favor and to steadily increase
our currency of bank deposits based on
gold until silver again reaches par, which
will come when the protective tariff ef-
feet of deprecated silver shall have made
the silver-using countries great manufac-
turing nations, and when European coun-
tries and the United States are buying
their silks, cottons, woolens and iron and
are hunting for the silver to pay the BILL
wild as the statement may seem. this Is
likely to happen In much less than a gen.
Grafton. But that Is another story.
c. f. Chittenden.
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