The herald., 1895-06-10
A Practical Phase Of the Silver Question


stand why "the silver question" has SC
long engrossed the attention of the peo
pie of this and other countries, nor es
pecially why in the United States, in
terest in this burning question becomes
more and more intense, threatening tc
overshadow all other issues in the nexi
presidential and congressional election.
Perhaps little illustration will help to
make the matter plain.
Suppose that, under the pretense oil
adopting new and better system OF
weights and measures, all old scales and
steelyards shouil be done away with
and in their place scales having adjust
able or movable fulcrums should by law
be adopted, and that these fulcrums By
some hidden or invisible mechanism,
should be made to creep gradually but
impeIceptibly towards the things
weighed, so that the short arm OF the
scales or steelvards should be made
shorter and the long arm be made longer
and that this process should go on for
series OF years till finally 200 pounds
would be required by these improved
scales to weigh hundred weight or
legal GENITAL; or, in other words, that all
the prod ucts of hun labor sold by
weight, should, during all the years since
the adoption of the new tangled system,
pers,stently shrink till what. under the
good old fashiond method, weighed 100
pounds, should now only weigh 80
pounds. Although the farmer or the
planter, or the manufacturer or the mer-
chant might, year after year, see his
property gradually shrink in weight,
without knowing the hidden cause, there
is one thing he would know with terrible
certainty, and that is that his m cans OF
paying his debts and carrying on his
business and paving his taxes and sup
h tc TO mi ily- tIV
decreasing and that if no remedy could
be found he must face bankruptcy and
ruin, or hopeless poverty.
Now these results are precisely anal
ogous to what has actually happened, be-
cause of the fundamental change or at
tempted change of our money system in
1873. Prior to that year the legal none
tary system OF this country was based on
the two commodities, gold ana silver,
though there had been temporary aber-
ration from that basis growing out of the
exgencIes of the grest civil war.
1t is universally conceded. | believe, by
political economists OF every school. that
all money. except fiat money, is based
on one or more commodities, usually
silver or gold, or both these metals. And
no proposition in the whole range of
economic science is more certain than
that all metals, all commodities whatso-
ever, these two included, are subject to
WIG law VI ouPPis
As we have practically been on the gold
standard ice 1873 it is only necessary
to inquire how supply and demand have
operated on the commodity. gold, since
that date, in order to determine whether
that metal ought TO have risen or fallen,
as CONF pared with other things. and then
see if the facts agree with our lnferences
as to what ought to have happened
Now. as the worlds production OF gold
for say thirty years prior to 1891 was com
paratively steady, averaging annually a
little over $100, 900, 600. it would appear
that the value of gold as comm odity
could not have been affected by any very
serious change in the annual supply. But
how has it been with ''demand?" Here
we see that there have been enormous
changes within the last twenty two years.
Germany went bodily over from the sill
yer to the gold standard, to accomplish
which she required several hundred mill
ion dollars worth of this metal: the
United States absorbed about $780, 900, 900
more gold than she had in 1878 before
she could resume specie payments on a
gold basis other nations of Europe
changed from either paper or silver to
gold requiring of the latter metal several
hundred million dollars more; and only
short time ago Austria had agents in
the market seeking to puy for her $780,
600, 000 in gold. to enable her to resume
specie payments on gold basis. Within
q year our own country has borrowed over
$3.50. 900. 900. Here, then we see there
has been new and unusual demand. as
COMPARED with any other period in the
history of the world, for one OF the sta
pie com modities OF commerce, amounting
to at least one thousand five hundred
millions of dollars. How could it be
| possible that such an enormously in.
| creased demand could be made for any ar
| ticle having an exchange or market value
| with opnrmnuslv inprpQs q th a II o
| Such result would violate every law of
| economies. Therefore we are entitled to
deduce that gold. purely as sGaple COM
| modify OF commerce, ought to have risen
| in relative value, as pared with the
| average value of all other mark eta BILE
| find that it actually has risen in relative
value enormously; that, in fact. it has
very nearly doubled in purchasing power
within the last twenty-five years.
| Now, as gold as merchandise which
| regulates the value of gold as con-has
| been our measure OF all values
| since resumption, and constructively tor
| six years PRIOR thereto; and as, during
that time, it has doubled in purchasing
power, wherein is there any difference in
| principle or in practical results, between
| dollar that has doubled in value and q
[ GENITAL that has doubled in weight?
| We all very well know that the people
of these United States would not toler-
ate any such juggling with their stand
ard of weight, AS / have suggested by
| way of illustration, If they knew it; and
| if any such scheme were secretly carried
| into successful operation. or were serious
| ly attempted, it would cause revolution.
! Why should they any more tolerate Jug
| Cling with their standard of value, which
has caused their dollar to double, where
| by all their property is made to fall one
| half, because measured by 200 cent dol
| lar, just as "a BOO pound Genital would
make the products of their labor arbi-
| trarlly shrivel to one-half their true
weight? AS money gauges the value of
all classes OF property the doubling of the
! value OF the dollar IS equivalent to
doubling the hundred weight and the
| yard and gallon measures, and all units
OF extension; and if the changing sur.
reptitiously OF any one of these would be
revolutionary, who can estimate t he
gravity OF a change in the value of the
dollar or of the value of the
material of which the dollar is made?
That change has been and will continue
to be SO serious, so far-reachng in its
effects on the welfare of the people of
this and other countries. that every other
economic issue must be dwarfed and be-
| come of secondary Importance until this
great question is finally and effectually
settled. H. D. BARROWS.
The Muddy Rivor
Editor Herald In your paper of May
26th, under head of The Salt Lake Route,
the article states that the Muddy river
affords hetween 600 and SO0 n,ipar' a