The times. (Owosso, Mich.) 1882-1897, 1895-08-09
MoRToN BURNS A HOTEL.
The Secretary of Agriculture Gives 10
to L Object Lesson.


to Object Lesson.
Secretary of Agriculture J. Sterling
Morton not only has clear ideas about
money, but he is ever ready with some
striking illustration or pat parable to
make his thoughts clear to others. On
July 23 he wrote the following letter:
DEAR sm--Returning from small furlough,
j find your letter. In IL you state: money,
whether made Of metals or paper, Is merely
a fiction of the law. The commodity value or
the material out of which money is coined or
created is OF no consequence In currency.
In Wyoming Otoe county, Neb., there lives
a good citizen who on the field and in the
United States senate has been q conspicuous
figure He has in his time advocated nearly
all kinds of money, including of course the
"poor mans money" meaning silver at 10 to
l. And now no advertises for sale for cash In
hand TO the highest bidder q half mile square
Of his large domains. Many thrifty citizens OF
Otoe county arrive at the Hotel Wyoming the
night before the sale to be on hand when the
bidding begins at o'clock next morning.
During the night the hotel is burned TO the
ground Sixteen Of the would be purchasers,
each having 1000 silver dollars melted In the
confederation so that the Goddess OF Liberty
and ''In God we trust" are erased and swal-
lowed up in ragged chunks of bullion awake
to find that the commodity value OF money Is
of consequence For placing their bullion or
silver on the market, they find 1t worth only
SO cents, whereas they bought 1t at mint
value, with labor and labor's products, at SlD
an ounce. Sixteen thousand dollars or silver
coin accidentally melted into bullion brings
its owners less than So, 900.
But there was also one would be purchaser
who had melted in that same fire 81, 900 of gold
coin, so that the goddess and "In God we
trust were lost to view in lump of yellow
bullion without single sign Of governmental
stamp thereupon.
And this one who held gold finds that the
commodity value of his bullion is nearly IL
not quite equal to that stamped upon 10 as
coin by the United States mint He has learn
ed at least that the bullion value and the mint
value of gold are very much the same, and
there therefore gold is by far the best metallic
money.
1t is safe to wager 10 to that the gold coin
owner feels 10 times as much consolation when
selling in bullion his gold thousand dollars as
does any one OF the other selling his thousand
dollars Of silver reduced to bullion. And the
poor man best money is that which loses
least in value when by fire or otherwise 1t
loses the stamp of the government.
And if at that fire some fiat money advocate
| lost few thousand paper promises to pay dol
| lars he also will rise up and dispute the pop
| ular fallacy that "money is a moro fiction of
| the law" and vehemently denounce the vagary
| that ga commodity value in money is unnec-
| essary and useless"
Gold and silver were money before any law
| made them so-before any government coined
| them or any mint stamped them And then
| each was valued by the demand for each, and
now also the relation Of the supply of gold to
tho demand for gold regulates its value. And
| the relation of the supply OF silver to the de-
| mand for silver regulates its value.
| But yon further say that the government,
not taking silver for coinage at 16 to /, has de-
| stroyed the demand for silver.
In government like ours, which as an en-
| tity is simply "all Of u.s. there can be no de-
| mand created either for silver or anything else
| except the integral parts of the composite
| evolve that demand Only the people of the
| United States by their generally expressed de-
| sire for u thing can create demand for it.
| Yours faithfully, J. STERLING MORTON.