The Sauk Centre herald. (Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minn.) 1886-current, 1895-09-05
CENTRE. MINI.
BY CHAS. F. HENDRIX.
SUBSCRIPTION $1.5O PER YEAR.
NIX. TONNES POSITION.

W N. p @(ttt4NLS > 12OoIi IO4N.
1t is with sincere regret that the
HERAI.ne feels constrained to dissent
from andadverselv criticize the expressed
opinion and The attitude of Hon. Charles
A. Towne, its representative in con-
gress, ON the silver question. That he is
honest in his views, able and fearless il
expressing them. but intensi6es this re-
grettul feeling. 1t was Mr.. Towne him
self who so magnaminously spoke of his
competitor in the political canvas last
fall as being dangerous representative
because honest, aggressive, able-but
wrong. So it is now with Mr.. Towne.
His recent speech in Duluth before the
so-called gold and silver club, be it said
in recognition ofhis ability and honesty,
is by far the ablest and fairest presenta-
ton of the sixteen-to-one fallacy OF the
many so far brought to the writer's at
tention. The objections have been fairly
stated, and doubtless, to the speakers
mind satisfactorily met. At any rate,
no effort has been made at concealmenr.
The strange feature OF it all is that the
entire argument rests upon false premises,
and while the methods OF treatment are.
in the main, logical, the conclusions are
OF necessity failacious. Mr.. Towne
seems to have no adequate conception
OF the functions of money, and of the re-
lations of organized government thereto.
He treats money as comm odlty-a
something as possessing intrinsic value,
and asserts, by indirection at least, that
government has creative power relative
thereto. To be sure he denies in explicit
terms that legislation can create value,
but he immediately attempts to show
that legislation can create opportunities
which enhance intrinsic value-practi-
cally refutation OF the first premise.
The function of money he defines clear
ly in declaring it to be two fold: A
measure of value, as also a medium OF
exchange and Immediately loses sight
of his own definition Ill his discussion OF
the money itself He contuses the idea
of measure OF value, losing sight OF the
fact that money does not determine
value, it only expresses it" In this
function money is an abstraction, and
would express relative values OF COM
modit1es lust as accurately and Efficient
" If there were not an actual, tangible
piece OF coined money in existence. 1t
does not require a set OF scales to ex-
press the fact that a ton is 1000 pounds,
or that car is of forty tons capacity.
AS a medium OF exchange, however.
money is quite another tning-lt is
concretion, and can only effect the ex-
change by its actual hand to
hand traflsier-elther as coin, or as
representative of coin reducible to it on
demand. In this function, or capacity,
money is a tool for effecting exchange of
commodities, and that exchange is not
perfected until the transaction is COM
pleted by the selling of the one and the
buying Of the other. If, therefore, tang
ible money be q mere tool, a vehicle for
exchanging and distributing commodi-
ties, laithough it is admitted that the
figure is not perfect in that in this case
the vehicle must have the exact value OF
the commodities eXchanged.) then It
follows that when there is sufficiency
OF tools or vehicles, 1t whould he folly to
increase the number, not only because
not needed, but it would he All extrava-
GAUGE, or waste, to provide more. and
the surplus would III no measure serve
to increase the value OF the commodities
so exchanged, Or i'll any way facilitate
such exchange.
Mr. Towne proceeds upon the theory
that the greater the amount of the
medium, the higher the price of the COM
modities-and it is the tallacy of the en-
tire school OF free coinage as it was of
the old-rime greenback theorists. Free
silver is but therecrudescence Of he Thur
man idea OF fiat money. which was adj
vanced rs q political panacca nearly
twenty years ago.
The HERALD has no disposition. how
ever. even had it the ability and the
space, to follow the extended and bril-
liant argument OF MIR. Towne, which
was carried through an equivalent of a
broad side Of this paper. 1t merely de-
sires to say that the republican idea, as
it understands it, is that the government
cannot make money. 1t can define it in
terms, and certify to the quantity and
quality of what enters into it, thereby
regulating its value, nothing more. and
that is what the constitution OF the
United States means when it says: "The
congress shall have power to coin money,
regulate the value thereof and of foreign
coin. and fix the standard of weights
and measures"
1t is here that the party is pledged to
give to the nation Gun rency OF gold
and silver, but. only on such basis as
will preserve their parity i'll the CON-
mercial and industrial world. so that
every dollar bearing the stamp of the
government shall be equal to every other
dollar hearing that stamp. That it has
done, and may be depended upon to do
in the future. 1t is the present condi-
ton. Gold aid silver coins an equal
legal tenders to the last dollar of both