Birmingham age-herald., 1895-06-03
THAT MEMPHIS MEETING
HOW THE MOVEMENT HAD ITS ORIGIN
Preliminary Correspondence Due Sec retary CaFIisIe-The Harvest Is Yet
 to Be Reaped.
Special Correspondence New York Evening

convention sprang have. been spread abroad that it is of interest to go back and see what really was done.
 Tennessee. of all the states south of Mason and Dixons line, was the one which, in the judgment of every one who has studied the history of recent legislation, stood most in need of rescue from the slough of financial heresy into which this part of the country has grad ually slipped during the last dozen years. It is she who produced MeMllin and Richardson, and Enloe and Cox, and SnodgraSs and Houk and Taylor in the house. all conspicuous advocates of the freest of free coinage of silver. Her two senators are Harris and Bate. Harris will be remembered as the leader of the southern silver forces in the senate who stood out with the senators from the northwestern mining camps and flibus- stered against the repeal of the Sherman silver purchase law, till compelled, by public sentiment and the presidents grit, to succumb to the inevitable; and Bate played an obedient second to the leader ship of his abler colleague.
 And yet there was no state in the south which had greater interests at stake in the security of American credit. or better reason to understand the dependence of our nations business prosperity upon the maintenance of our relations with the rich nations of Europe. For this, her chief city, is the largest inland cotton market in the world, shipping the staple to all parts of the globe. It is also the largest hard wood lumber market in the world, and next to the largest market for lumber of any sort. It is also the worlds largest producer of cotton seed oil-a material which is entering every year more and more widely into induStr use here and abroad.
 The splendid fight made by Represent- atiVe Patterson in congress in the inter- est of sound money, and With a view to Keeping the south in line with the intel ligent financial thought of the rest of the country; the threats and efforts of the populistic democrats to compass his de- feat; their ignominious failure, and his triumphant return to congress on the strength of his anti-silver record-all these things had focused the attention of the south generally upon Tennessee, and particularly upon Memphis. and the bus mess men of Memphis resolved to take advantage of the opportunity thus of fered for making a bold stroke. On the 10th of last month, accordingly. the fol- lowing circular was sent out from Mem- phis to the officers of every conner cial organization whose title and address were known in any part of the south:
 Gentemen At joint meeting of the Memphis Cotton exchange Memphis Merchants exchange, Memphis Lumber exchange, Manufacturers association, and Young Mems Business league, held at Memphis, Tenn, on April f. 1895 the following resolutions were unanimously adopted:
 Believing that the time is ripe for the propagation of sound financial ideas, and that an interchange of opinion among southern people on the currency ques- tion would be fruitful of good results; therefore, be it
 Resolved by the Cotton, Merchants and Lumber exchanges MaDufac- turers' association and Young Mems Business league of Memphis, That a convention is hereby called to assemble at Memphis, Tenn, on Thursday May 23, 1895, to be composed of delegates chosen by the people of the southern states who believe in the necessity of sound and stable currency and better banking facilities, in order to fully re- store and in the future maintain pros perity among the people, and to this end the cooperation of all commercial. manufacturing, agricultural and lndus- trial organizations, as well as the CO., operation of all good citizens, is hereby earnestly invited.
 Resolved, That the chairman of this meeting is hereby directed to appoint a committee of fifteen to carry out the objects contemplated in calling said con vention.
 In pursuance of the above resolutions your association is respectfully and earnestly invited to send delegates to said convention, which is to be held at Memphis, Tenn, on Thursday. May 23. 1895. Reduced rates will be made by all railroad and steamboat lines. Please take prompt action and advise the sec retary how many delegates will be sent. Very respectfully,
 w. J. CRAWFORD, Chairman.
 HENRY HOTTER, Secretary.
 Another circular bearing the same date. but addressed to individual bus mess men of any standing who were be- Iieved to be in sympathy with the sound money cause, was sent out for distri- button through the country banks. This differed from the circular to organza- tions only in the superscriptions and in a single paragraph near the close in which the receiver was urgently solicited to confer with your fellow citizens who are in sympathy with the objects of the above resolutions. and unite with them in calling meeting to send delegates to said convention" etc. This was de-. signed to give popular as distinguished from strictly commercial character to the movement
 Both circulars caused a stir wherever they were received. They alarmed the silver hoodoos and the greenback vagar- ists. They put fresh backbone into some of the friends of sound money who had begun to despair of checking the great tidal wave of folly which threatened to engun the south. They gave to the fair minded but unlearned farmers and wage earners a warning that perhaps they had not yet heard both sides There was a temporary abatement of the mad rush toward the silver standard The circulars were followed up by the news that Secretary Carlisle. a man for whose personal honesty and intellectual bril- liancy the people of this part of the south have the warmest admiration, would be present at the convention and address it.
 RI OOD