The Kosciusko star. (Kosciusko, Miss.) 18??-1898, 1895-08-09
GOLD A FRAUDULENT MEASURE.
Philadelphia Item.


ers and sellers, which must of
necessity result in losses to both.
thus placing an unnecessary tax
On the exchange of products, it is
indispensable that weights and
measures should be determined
with absolute exactitude. No peo-
pie would tolerate a yard stick of
perpetually changing length, a
pound of changing weight, or a
gallon or bushel of changing ca.
pacity. Governments have taken
precautions to protect their people
against the perils and losses occas-
Toned by false weights and meas
ures, to fix them with scrupulous
care, and to place weights and
measures on such a permanent ba-
sis and bind them so firmly, hard
and fast, that they cannot vary in
any degree whatsoever.
AT an enormous amount OF work
and painstaking, and with view
to obtaining un;mpeachable exact
itude, the French government. in
inaugurating the metric system of
of weights and measures, incurred
the expense Of measuring a quad.
rant of great circle of the earth
and assumed as her unit Of length
the metre, the ten-millionth part
of the quadrant thus measured and
ascertained. the cube Of the
tenth part of the metre she adopt
ed as heI unit for the measure of
quantity, the liter, and she based
the unit of weight, the gramme, on
the thousandth part of a liter Of
water at 4 degrees centigrade.
Thus France has fixed absolutely
the measure of length, weight and
capacity.
TIE English system, which we
have adopted, is not based on such
a scientific basis; but at stated pc
RODS, in conformity with an old
custom, and with much pomp and
ceremony, the official standard of
length, which is Of bronze, is taken
from the Tower of London, where
it is kept under lock and seal, and
compared with the existing meas
ures for verifcation.
Such care and such ceremony 90
to show with what importance,
and rightly, governments look up.
on the necessity ofhaving and per-
moment measures. Yet, after all
this painstaking to secure precise
measures of weight, capacity and
area, governments have been cajol-
ed Into tampering with the most
important standard Of all, the
standard Of value, so as to double
its value.
The great recommendation Of
gold and silver as a standard with
which to compare the value of
commodities is their natural ten
dency to steadiness, for while the
total quantity Of wheat or cotton
or sugar produced IN any year is
consumed within the year, and a
crop failure may make change of
100 per cent in price, the quantity
of gold and sil;er produced in any
wear bears only small proportion
to the total stock in existence, and
therefore a total failure of produc-
ton or doubling of production in
any one year will only have agrad-
ual and small tendency, either to
raise or depress their value.
SO long as gold and silver were
used jointly fluctuations and con-
siderable fluctuations In value oc-
cured, but they were gradual and
comparatively harmless; but when
silver was discarded and the bur-
den laid on gold alone. gold huc.
trated violently and constantly up
ward. Before silver was discarded
the value of the products of labor
were measured by the tota' stock
of both gold and silver in use as
money: now they are measured by
gold alone Before 1873 the value
of products was measured hy APP.
proximately So, 100000 900 of gold
and an equal amount of silver, and
bv means of this gold and silver
the circulation of which was facil'
itated then, as now, by the use OF
checks. etc. all exchanges ofprod-
ucts. save those few made by bar.
ter, were carried on. MANY times
this gold and silver turned v'r du-
ring the year, and just so many