Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1895-06-19


Memphis and Covington may be said
to be the ablest presentation of the sub
ject from the standpoint of the gold
standard men. 1t is certainly a speech
that is calculated to deceive many peo-
pie. His speech indicates that there
has been a good deal of lying done
about the crime of 1873" He says
there was no crime committed; that
what Is called the demonetization act
was not passed by stealth, and that we
had at that time practically been on a
gold basis for thirty-five years. While
he was making this lat er assertion he
dld not explain why, if such was the
case, 1t was written in every one of the
htteen hundred million dollars worth
OF ponds issued as result of the fund
Ing act of 1870 that those bonds should
De paid In gold and silver coin of the
existing standard value at that time.
Senator Beck, in a speech in the United
states senate in 1885, said: Therefore
they caused the act of July IA, 1870, to
be passed, extending the time of pay
ment, reducing the interest, and ex-
empting the new bonds in express
terms from all taxation, state, federal,
or municipal; and to prevent all mis-
taxes or misapprehension as to the
character, quality, and weight of the
money In which payment Of the new
Dends should be made, they caused to
be printed on each bond as part of its
obligation that it shall be paid in coin
OF the standard value prescribed by
In 1863 successful effort was made
70 have the government recognize coin
only as lawful money" No attempt
was made at that time to show that
coin meant gold. No one claimed for
an instant that any obligation could
not at that time be discharged in sill
yer. The contention, then, on the part
Oh tne banker and bondholder, was to
secure payment for their bonds in a
dollar worth intrinsically twice as
much as the one they paid for the
bonds. They succeeded. There is no
gettlng around this fact. That is. they
secured the passage of an act which
virtually doubled the value of their
ponds, and the burden was on the peo-
pie. 1t comes with poor grace now for
them to raise the cry that it would be
dishonest for the people to do the same
thing, especially when the people have
had nothing to do with causing the ap-
probation of one kind of money at the
expense of another. The bankers
themselves are responsible for this. All
kinds of property have deprecated in
value, and why should not all kinds of
debt obligations be subjected to the
same process. Notes and bonds and
other securities are only a species of
property. Why should they not be
subjected to shrinkage in values the
same as mans farm, his factory. or
other kind of property? The men
VINO have manipulated the currency
have SO managed it that weaIth-pro-
ouclng property has been shrunk in
value to one-half of what it was when
the process of making honest dollars"
began. Now the very men who brought
about this shrinkage of values are
kicking the hardest when it is pro-
posed to apply it to their own holdings.
We say, Lay on, Macduff, and id
be he who first cries, hold, enoughp"
MIR. Carlisle admits that if we had
free coinage of silver that the bullion
in the dollar would be worth as much
as the dollar, but, says he, What
would the silver dollar itself he
worth?" He goes on to show that it
would not be worth our present
standard of value" on which point
there is no question. The real
question involved is this: Is it
right, in a readjustment of values.
to apply new standard to some classes
OF property and not apply it to others .
10 illustrate: In 1867, when this new
adjustment of values began, A owned
a farm worth $4,000. also owned n
farm, but sold it for $4,000 and loaned
the money at interest. The new ad-
justment of values (the process of maxi
Ing honest dollars") has gone on until
now. AS farm has shrunk in vaIue IN
$4,000, but BIS notes, which are but an
other class of property, are still nom
inally worth not only $4,000, but really
represent twice as much of other forms
Of property as they did in 1867 When
1t is known that B now belongs to the
class of men who are contending for
honest dollars" and Sound currency. -
the diabolism of the scheme is appar-
ent. A has all the time been a pro-
ducer of wealth and belongs to a class
that has absolutely made nothing dur-
ing all these years, although he has
labored industriously. On the other
hand, B has been a gentleman of leis-
ure, living of the interest of his
money, which represented the labor of
others-a parasite, in fact-and now his
holdings are worth double what they
were in 1867.
Anyone can see that it is to BIS in
terest to have better dollars-dollars
that will buy more of the products of
labor, and anybody ought to see that it
is not TO AS interest to have better
dollars, since he has got to exchange
the products of his labor for dollars.
The contention then, aside from paying
debts already contracted, is between
A, who wants more dollars for his prod
ucts, and B, who wants more products
for his dollars. The question of what
A pays for what he buys cuts no figure
in the case, as what he buys is the prod
ucts of some other mans labor, who
buys in turn the products of A, and
thus it is simply a fair exchange of
the products of each others toll. The
real question is, shall the people who
do not work be compelled to pay a fair
price for what they consume? This
class constitutes about one-half of the
population and what they consume
may fairly be considered as the sur
plus product of labor. The question
OF compensation is really embraced in
the disposition of this surplus-what
laborers consume of each others prod
ucts is merely in the way Of exchange.
But what the non-producer buys may
be considered as going toward the
profits OF the producer, unless through
some system of financial legerdemain.