Alexandria gazette. [volume] (Alexandria, D.C.) 1834-1974, 1895-06-18
THE FALLACIEs oFFREE SILVER

What does unlimited coinage of gold
and silver mean? 1t means that by
law the United States Treasury shall
coin into dollars all the gold and silver
brought to it. But this is not enough.
You must vote the coinage at the ratio
of 16 to l. This means that for every
23.2 grains of gold that you bring to the
Treasury the government is forced to
give you back one gold dollar, and for
every 371i grains of silver you bring it
must give you back one silver dollar.
But 371i grains ofsilver, uncoined, will
buy only about 12.S grains of gold, un-
coined, whereas at the present day a
silver dollar buys gold dollar any
where.
AS soon as the silverites have gotten
the 16 to forced coinage laws passed
just take q lump of silver, say 371l
grains, to the Treasury and receive
back one silver dollar for it. Now go
to the banker or the money broker and
get one gold dollar for your silver dol
lar. For the gold in your gold dollar
any mine owner, money broker or jew
eller will give you 1922 grains of silver.
Again take this silver to the Treas
ury and you get two silver dollars
for it. Again so to the broker
and get two gold dollars. Again go
to the mine owner and get l 1,4S5 grains
Of silver. Now 60 on TO the Treasury
and get four silver dollars. By repeat
ing the process often enough you can
become as wealthy as you please.
But if everybody tries to get 1922
grains of raw silver for one gold dollar,
what will be the result? The whole
country wants to get gold dollars with
which to buy silver. Every man, wo-
man and child goes around trying to
exchange one silver dollar for one gold
dollar. The poor man must pay out
his dollars of all kinds for food; the rich
corporations pay out the silver ones
and keep the gold. The result is that
gold disappears; it is shipped to other
countries to buy silver or to buy goods
to be sold for silver. In foreign coun-
tries you can buy (as soon as the
United States coins unlimited silver at
16 to y twice as much for gold dollar
as for silver dollar.
Here's another way to become rich.
Send your gold dollars, as bullion, to
Europe to buy goods and then sell them
for twice as many silver dollars at
home, for which you can get au equal
number of gold dollars at the Treasury.
If everybody can get silver coined
into twice what it is worth, will any
body bring gold to be coined? All the
gold in the Treasury will be pumped
out, melted down and sent to Europe.
Flat silver-that is, unlimited coinage
at 16 to lis circulating gold pump.
Nothing but silver comes in, and our
money system becomes silver mono
metallism.
These silverites are made up of two
classes. First, men who have silver to
sell and want to create market for it
at a price far in excess of what it is
actually worth. And, second, those
who have contracted obligations upon
the gold basis and who want an oppor-
tunity to liquidate them on the basis OF
deprecated silver currency, and thus
cheat their creditors out of so per cent.
of all that they owe. If they were BIZ
metallists, in the proper sense of that
word, if they desired to secure the CO.
equal and coincident use of both metals
in our money, then they would not ask
for coinage on the ratio of sixteen to
one, but rather on ratio of thirty-two
to one, which is about what would be
needed in order to secure that kind of
bimetallism.-Prot. Parish in Ne,O York
World.