The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1895-12-18

has the government to do with it any,
how?
Nobody can say that the result of hold
ing gold and paying out silver might not
have been the bringing of foreign gold
to us instead OF draining it out. If by
our staples. wheat and cotton, could be
regained, gold would inevitably come to
us for their purchase, and the process of
returning our gold bonds, when we were
going lesolutely to gold currency, would
be reversed, if we should go in the other
direction, just as has happened in Mex
leo.
When France made her existing stock
of silver coins part a large part, of
her bank reserve, freely paying it out to
redeem her securities, she did not lose
gold by it, she gained gold; and it was
bi-metallic France that came to the re-
lief of the Bank of England, that does
not recognize silver as part of it's re-
serve. with loan of SIS, 900, 600 of gold in
crisis brought on by engagements en-
tered into OH account of the failure of
Barring.
BOARDING AND SPECULA TING.
The President justly deprecates hoard
ing and speculation as destructive of the
free movements of the circulating medi-
UNI, and injurious to legitimate trade,
but has he even considered what neces-
sally engenders boarding and speculation,
and how the financial policy he is main
tanning with, to say the least, very ques-
tlonable authority of law, is the immedi-
ate and principal, if not the sole, cause
OF the world-wid speculation in and
boarding of gold2
Why do men speculate, and in what do
they speculate? Never in properties that
are falling in price; always in those
that are rising or likely to rise in price.
When do Adventures lay in enormous
stocks of wheat, of pork, of wool, of Pc
troleum? When short crops, or the pros,
pect Of foreign famine Or war is likely
to enhance the price of these commodi-
ties. Why do they pour out all THEN
cash and exhaust all their credit to buy
unoccupied lots yielding no income and
subject to taxation, on the borders Of
western rivers? Because they expect tC
sell by the foot those lots purchased by
the acre, and SO recoup interest and taxes
with fortune besides
Why do men hoard coin, and in gold
standard countries gold coin? Because
since 1879, when the legislative and ad
ministrative characterization of silver be.
gan to show it's effects, gold has been
steadily rising in the market of the
world, as measured by the nominal de-
probation Of silver, and the nearly
equivalent depreciation of merchantable
commodities generally. Gold has been
and now is the safest thing to speculate
in. More money pr omises to be made by
boarding it for a rise, than by investing
in corner lots, in railroad securities, in
manufactures, trade or agriculture. In
fact all regular, profitable and healthy
business, as the facts l have already
cited show, has been converted into mere
speculation and gambling, by the dislo-
cation of monetary standards as old as
civilization, and the consequent fuctuat-
ing and increasing rates of exchange.
How can the farmer produce wheat, OF
the manufacturer produce cloth, or the
merchant deal In either, when before the
articles can reach their market, rise il
exchange, due solely to fall in silver,
may convert expected compensation to
actual loss? Silver will exercise this dis
turbing influence as long as 1t is the law
full money Of all the trading people of the
world except England, and of England
itself as to its largest dependency Silver
is today full half of the coin reserve Of
the banks of France and Germany, anc
so far as the statutes can make 1t, g. part
of the monetary system of the United
States though the President has deoreed
otherwise.
Silver demonstration Injuries business
two ways. first by making all business