The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-04-28
WILDCAT MONEY NOT WANTED.
WHEN PUT TO THE TEST MOST MEN
PREFER GOLD.

money IN sc ana LeEtsintton Can't
Change Their Opinion-The Value
OF Coin and Everything Else Regu-
lated by the Law OF supply and
Demand and Not by the Enactments
of Legislators.
Chicago. ILL.,. April 27.-wIlliam G.
Cornwell OF Buffalo. president OF the
New York State Bankers Association.
delivered the principal address at the
Bankers Club monthly dinner at Kins-
ley's tonight. He spoke on What Ought
Bankers to DO About legislation"
In substance he spoke as follows: There
was a time not many years ago wnen
the banker was content to keep still. and
under the ban of curses or obiurgations
to pursue his quiet course. The silence
Of the banker on the important questions
of the day, for the solution Of which the
public looked TO him, has been one of the
most potent reasons for the present unsat-
isfactory condition of our national hnan-
ces and the existence of our currency
| troubles. If in lS75-6-7-S the bankers had
been organized as they are organized now.
the greenback would long ago have been
wiped out, the silver lunacy, before II
had wrought incalculable damage, would
have been confined to the asylums where
1t belongs, and populism would have
promptly been swept back into the holes
of its native prairie.
What ought bankers to do about legis-
lation? This question supersedes all
questions of internal management and
mOney-making. / do not believe that any
but the most superficial demagOguo will
deny that the trouble at the base is
trouble of the currency. What is wrong
with the currency? In a few words the
redemption of our entire volume of paper
money falls upon the treasury-a thousand
millions of dollars depending for redemp-
tion in gold upon an institution which has
no means of getting gold in a legitimate
way to redeem with, which has none OF
the machinery necessary for carrying on
the note-issuing business no automatic
way for getting information as 10 how
much money is needed In trade, no pos
sible way of getting more money out when
needed, and no way of getting Il back II
by clumsy chance some gets out.
"On this silver question the people are
beginning to discard the old delusion that
law can regulate the value of coin or of
anything else; that law, covered with
some vague power can decree that twice
one are one, whether 1t be standard met
ais, base balls or grains of wheat They
have asked themselves what must be the
standard of value and they have wrought
out TINS question; What would everybody
rather have than anything else? But the
question TO thousand average people
and they will answer money.
ASK them what kind of money and they
VIII tell you gold Why gold? Why not
| silver? because silver is In dispute Silver
Is In doubt This Is no doubt about gold
gold Is the best. DO you think You can
snanss act mat GRlni2e aonsPess y DO aE VIII VIII
the combined efforts OF all the
nations on earth do it7 And yet that
Is what the International bi-metallfsts
propose to do. These men It seems to me
are assuming the functions of the al
1T Is the bankers duty to use the large
influence which is at his command and
make his clients fully understand the is
sue at stake. The bankers should organ
ize sound money clubs in every cOmmuni-
ty and carry on the education by pam
| phlet and speech. Once created the clubs
could unite under "a central head similar
! to the one just formed In Germany, A
union for the defense of the gold stand
ard admitting representatives from all
the leading chambers Of commerce. This
action would soon make itself felt in the
| political tide and warn the politician that
! the sentiment of the great intelligent ma
! jority Is for sound money.
These are the things the banker should
/ accomplish, and no one could more widely
/ disseminate sound doctrine than he. A
new sentiment would blaze from one end
| of the land to the other; a sentiment
which once established would mean quick
| legislation in the right direction and a
| satisfactory settlement of the currency
! question in the United States for all time.
! And the sentiment which would be thus
| crystalzed by the organized work of the
| bankers and the fact which would be
| demonstrated, and which is true to-day
! would be this: The political party that
| panders to free silver, or that with a rep
| utation for being a sound party, endeav-
ors to take the middle course on the
money question between sound and un-
sound money, is doomed and deserves to
! be, and this other; the politician, high or
! low, who to-day turns from the straight
course of sound money and the gold
| standard, stabs dead once for all his
| every chance for political success, espec-
| tally IL he wants to be President"