Birmingham age-herald., 1895-05-21

coined at the public expense, into dol lars each containing 412h grains of stand ard silver, the dollars when coined to be delivered to the owner of the bullion, and all the people of the United States to be compelled by law to receive them as dol lars in the payment of debts, although not fntrinsically worth more than 50 cents each. The 25 8-10 grains of stand ard gold contained in a gold dollar is worth 100 cents, or the equivalent of 100 cents, all over the world, in silver-stand- ard countries as well as gold-Standard countries, and it is worth just as much be- fore 1t is coined as afterwards; but the 41215 grains of standard silver contained in a silver dollar are not worth anywhere in the world more than about 50 cents. Or, to put the statement in different form sixteen pounds of silver cannot be exchanged for one pound of gold any where in the world, but it requires abouS thlrty-two pounds of silver to procure one pound of gold everywhere. But some one may say this is not a fair statement, because 1t measures the value of silver by gold. The answer to this objection is that the statement does not attempt to menasure the value ofeither of the metals, but simply to compare them, one with the other and that for the purpose of making the comparison the value of gold is determined by it's purchasing power in the markets of the world, and the value of silver is determined in the same
 
 will purchase only about one-half the quantity of commodities anywhere that one pound of gold bullion will purchase, and this purchasing power is the true test of their actual and relative values. In the United States sixteen pounds of sil- yer, coined into dollars will now pur- chase as much as one pound of gold coins, but this would not be the case under a system of free and unlimited coinage on individual account. The coinage of silver .1.1ID the purpose of preventing an excessive issue, and they have been coined by the government on its own account and paid out for public purposes as dollars of full value, and consequently the government is bound by every consideration of good faith, to say nothing of the positive declarations contained in the statutes, to keep them asl good as gold, or, in other words, to maintain the parity of the two metals; and this it has done and will con- tinue to do as long as the present system exists. But if the present system is to be abolished and a new one established, so that private individuals and corpora- tionS can have their own bullion coined at the public expense and have the coins delivered to them for their private use, the government would be under no ob- ligation whatever. legal or equitable, to keep them as good as gold, and, in fact, it would be impossible for it to do so, be1 cause the coinage would be unlimited and the volume of silver in circulation would become so great in proportion to the gold the government could procure that the at tempt would necessarily fail The most extreme advocates of free coinage have not yet Ventured to suggest that the gov ernment would be under any obligation to guarantee or maintain the value of silver dollars coined without charge for private parties. and without such guar 'antee it is clear the dollar would be worth no more than the commercial value of the bullion contained in it, just as the Mexican dollar is now.
 l admit that if the United States could coin without charge to the owners all the silver in the world available for coinage purposes, 41215 grains of standard silver, in bullion, would be worth as much in this country as silver dollar; but the real question is, What would the silver dollar itself be worth? That it will not be equal to our present unit and stand ard of value is not only admitted but open ly urged as one of the chief arguments in favor of its free coinage. Everywhere the people are being told that under free coinage 1t will require twice as many dol lars to procure any given quantity of commodities as are required now, and this means, of course, that the money will be only one-half as valuable as 1t is now. When the public judgment is final ly passed upon this subject 1 think it will be found that the people of the Uni ted States are determined not to have a Appreciated dollar, whether it be gold sill yer or paper. They are undoubtedly en- titled to have for use in their business just as good money as any other people in the world have, and no political party that attempts to deprive them of 1t will ever enjoy their confidence or receive their suffrages.
 Do Not Propose to Discontinue Silver.
 Those of us who oppose the free coin age of silver at the ratio of 16 to are proposing no change in the measure or standard of value now existing, nor are we proposing to discontinue the use of silver as money. l have never been, and am not now, unfriendly to silver in the sense of desiring to see it excluded from the monetary system of the United States. or of any other country, but know that it cannot be kept in circula- ton along with gold by means of any ra- tio the law of any one country may at tempt to establish between the two met als, and that the only way to secure the use of both metals at the same time is to make one of them the standard Of value and so limit the coinage of the other that the government which issues them and receives them for public dues may be able at all times to maintain their eXchangeab ability, either directly or indirectly through the operation of it's fiscal system. I am, therefore, in favor of the preservation of the existing standard of value with such use of full legal tender silver coins, and pa per convertible into coin on demand. as can be maintained without impairing or endangering the credit of the government or diminishing the purchasing or debt paying power of the money in the hands of the people. This is what 1 mean by the terms sound money" and, in my opinion, it is what is meant by an over whelming majority of the opponents of free coinage at the ratio of 16 to 1. This is neither gold monometallism nor silver monometallism, but it means that one standard or measure of value shall be