The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1895-03-27
LESSONS FROM HISTORY,
Continued from First are.

field OF battle. That paper money ~
the South was rudely executed and
easily countcrfeited. This, of course.
made it practically impossible to limii
the amount in circulation.
In the north there were two kind,
or paper currency. The first sixty mil.
lions were receivable in the public
revenues. the same as coin, and legal
tender TO individuals. That money
was preferred to coin during the war.
and as Ion . as it circulated. Another
class or iaper money issued during
the war, known as greenbacks. was
not receivable for duties on Imports
nor for interest on the public debt.
1t was like any other useful machine
with {; number Of important parts left
out. 1t went below par as
compared with coin, or as compared
with paper without these legal dis
abilities. Il sometimes went below
so ccGtS Oh the dollar because Of its
legal disabilities, and from no other
cause. Yet. such as it was, ali the
Shyiock> and the armies of the South
were beaten by it at one and the same
time. All agree that the Greenback
saved TIC life OF the nation. VITA
gold, Only. The armies would have been
paraiyZcd icr want Of money, and an
archy would have prevailed. 1t would
nave beci 4 contest Of swords after
the manner of savages, with little
union or cohesion on either side.
AS the strain Of war is the most SUI
premC test that money is eve called
on to meet, | beg to call attention to
n more notable example.
In 1896 the French monarchy had
been CyclthroWn, the revolutionary
money had failed and the revolution
itself had fallen into the arms of Ma
poleon, who was the sworn foe Of all
forms Of paper money. He often said
he never would issue paper money. But
when il came to the test he was com
PEELED to do SO, until by his victories
he was allie to live entirely off his
enemies. Alison's History of Europe,
vol. VII, page 100, tells us how Ma
poleon supplied himself with coin as
follows:
THE victories of Ulm and Austen
litZ provid d the means of solving the
|(financil) difficulty. From the mo
ment the grand army crossed the
Rhine. it was fed, clothed, lodged and
paid at the expense Of Germany. On
the 18th Of November, an edict of the
emperor directed the transmission Of
all funds TO the army Of the north to
cease, and on the 18th Of December a
similar order was given in regard to
the army of lily. Thus the three
principal armies of the empire ceased
to be any longer a charge upon it's
finances, and the tributary and CON
qucrcd states bore the burden of the
greater part Of that enormous mill
tary force by which they were over
awcd or retained in subsection. This
system continued without intermis-
sion curing the whole remainder of
the reign Of Napoleon"
Now comes another viewof the case,
Napoleon came into power as a pro-
nounccd hard money man. After he
got fairly started and became able to
live upon the enemy, he issued no
moro paper of any sort. He carried
on war on the coin basis entirely, get
ting his coin by all leans whatever,
both fair and unfair. On the other
hand the English government was
compelled to adopt paper.
The proper requisite conditions for
the success of a paper money existed
in England, as they did not in France
during the revolutionary govern
ments. England was an organized
and responsible governments; it col
lected and disbursed revenues; it
could give to it's money the quality of
legal tender: and the British paper
money was q success.
Now let us mark the results of a
struggle between intrinsic and nom
intrinsic money in time of war. 1t
began in 1878. The contest closed
in June, 1915, at Waterloo. Napoleon
was sent to st. Helena as an exile.
England and her paper money trium-
phed. England became mistress of
the ocean,: she acquired an emDire
which encircled the globe, and dicta-
ted the policies Of the continent of
Europe.
After the fall and Punishment of
Napoleon, when paper money had
completed its triumph over metal, Sir
Archibald Alison describes the situa-
tion and the cause Of national success
as follows:
ut would be to little purpose that
the mighty drama of the French revo-
%lutiOnary wars was recorded in history
if the handspring of all the European
efforts, tho British finances, were not
fully explained. 1t was in their
~boundlcss extent that freedom found
a nevcr-failing stay; in their elastic
power that independence obtained a
permanent support. When surround
ed by the wreck of other states, when
surviving alone the fall Of so many
confederacieS, it was in their mex
hauStiblc reSourceS that England
found the means of reSOlutely main
tanning the contest and waiting calm
ly, in her citadel amid the waves, the
return Of a right spirit in the sur
rounding nations"
Glow, then, did it happen that this
inconsiderable island, SO small a part
of the Roman empire, was enabled to
eXpend wealth greater than ever had
been amasSed by the ancient mis-
tress of the world; to maintain a con-
test of ~uneXampled magnitude for %
years, TO uphold a fleet which con
querCd the united navies of Europe,
and an army which carried victory in
to every corner of the globe; to &C.
quire a colonial empire that encircled
the earth, and subdue the vast CONT
nent of HindoStan, at the very time
that it struggled in Spain with the
land forces of Napoleon, and equipped
all the armies of the north, on the
Elbe and the Rhine, for the liberation
of Germany?
"The solution Of the phenomenon,
unexampled in the history Of the
world, is without doubt to be in part
found in the ~persevering industry of
the British people, and the extent of
the commerce which they maintained
in the new quarter Of the globe. But
the thus Afforded would
have been inadequate to so vast an