The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1895-05-22

Der Of yards of Astor. The absurdity
Of the men supposing that much money
Is required in order to have something
with which to measure goods is as alb
surd as to suppose that community must
nave hearses in number equal to the
hearses may do the work Of burying all
the community, because they may not
lnconveniently all die at the same time.
So with gold. All goods are neither ex-
changed at the same time nor are they
onered in comparison with the standard
at the same time.
What is important to point out is that
goods when expressed in terms of a COM
mon denomination of value are today ex-
changed in enormous Quantities mainly
without the use Of any money. For the
exchange of these goods. therefore.
money is not needed in proportion to the
transaction, This function is that of
the medium of exchange.
The necessity of an increasing guam
tity of money is growing less important
with the development of the system Of
exchange. From 80 per cent to IS per
cent of the transactions are performed
by this machinery without the use OF
money, and recent Investigations by the
comptroller of the currency show that SO
per cent of retail transactions are sim
iiarly performed without the use of
money.
But some one might say. this vast
system of currency must be liquidated
in actual coin and money, and so our
business system rests like an inverted
pyramid on the vortex of small reserve
of COIN
This is wholly untrue. We express
the value of goods in terms of money,
but then we really exchange them almost
entirely by means of the deposit-cur-
rency. The transactions expressed in
terms of money are based, not upon coin,
but upon the goods bought and sold. No
business man waits until checks and
money reach a certain level before he
thinks the circulating medium of the
country is large enough for the needs of
trade before he sells his carload of wheat
or bale Of cotton. He first sells his grain
or cotton and draws check afterwards.
This new currency product is the conse-
quence and result of transactions. The
system, therefore, is as broad as the
transactions and is ultimately resolved
into goods and is based on goods. 1t is
not true therefore, that this system is
unsta BILE like an inverted pyramid. The
transactions in goods are the reason for
the existence of the checks and deposits.
The checks and deposits are not the rea-
son for the existence of the transaction.
The redemption is ultimately in goods
and not in coin. Coin is only a means of
going from one set of goods to another.
prices since 1873 have not fallen be-
cause of the lack of money. Silver has
Idllen ABOUT 0U per cent dS compared
with a very modest fall in the price of
commodities. Silver does not have the
same purchasing price in 1894 as it had
in 1873. Hence, free coinage cannot be
urged as a just means of paying debt.
More so-called redemption money, by the
amount of $1,O92, 10000 is in existence
today as compared with 1873, and yet
prices have fallen and silver has fallen
still more. Prices Enthusiastically have
fallen because of the cheapened cost of
production. Since we undertook the pur
chase of silver in 1873 it has fallen about
purchased about $600,000,O00. 1t is per-
fectly evident that there is no use in the
United States acting alone to bolster up
the price Of silver when we have failed.
even in concert with the Latin Union.
Free coinage of silver at 16 to means
the single silver standard or silver mon
ometallism. Today the market ratio be-
tween gold and silver is nearly "a to 1.
if we had the free coinage of silver at 16
to there would be the premium of about
81 ounces of silver as premium on with
drawing every ounce of gold in circula-
ton. The free coinage of silver under
such conditions as exist today would not
mean the concurrent circulation of both
gold and silver. It would mean the i'm
mediate adoption of the single silver
would not increase the quantity of
money. Since gold must be inevitably
driven out the free coinage of silver
would result in a diminution of the
quantity of money. May l, 1896, the of
fetal estimate of the gold circulation
was $56S, ZOO, 900. To adopt free coinage
of silver at 16 to / when the market ratio
is about "a to l would mean the instant
retirement of the circulation of nearly
$500, 900, 900 of gold circulation. It could
increasing the amount of the medium Of
coinage. The way it would act, there
fore, would be to change the prices of
everything, because reckoned in a cheap
err method than that of gold. For ex-
ample, a pair of gloves now worth 100
cents in gold would exchange for about
21O cents in silver. A dozen of eggs now
selling at Is cents would sell for about
80 cents and everything we buy would
rise in proportion. Free coinage of sill
yer would inevitably result in rise of
prices so it would Immediately result in
a fall of wages.
Its first effect would be to diminish
the purchasing power of all our wages.
The man who gets $500 or 100000 a year
as a fixed rate of wages or salary
will find he can buy just half as much as
now It has been one of the undisputed
facts of history that when prices rise the
wages Of labor are the last to advance,
and when prices fall the wages of labor
are the first to decline.
Free coinage of silver. would make all
d
cost him 100 per cent more unless he can
get rise in his wages by dint of strikes
and quarrels and all the consequent dis
satisfaction arising from friction be-
tween the employer and employee. Are
we willing to sacrifice the interests Of
the laboring class to the demands of GER
tain owners Of silver mines who are try
ing to hoodwink the people with the cry
of more money?
"The proposition to adopt a depreciat-
ed standard of value is simply an at
tempt to transfer from the great mass
of the community who have been provi-
dent, Industrious an d successful, por-
ton of their savings and gains into the
pockets of those who have been either
idle extravagant or unfortunate. The
provision which has been made for old
age, for sickness, for death, for widows
and orphans, or by insurance, will be
deprecated in the same ratio. No in
vasion of hostile armies, burning and
destroying as they advance, could by any
possibility equal the desolation and ruin
which would thus be forced upon the
great mass of the people. Such desola-
ton, moreover, does not fall alike upon
shrewd Ones the bankers and the like,
will be easily able to take care of them
selves, while the plain people will be rob-
bed of their hard earnings without any
hope of compensation.
1T is usually supposed that free coin
age of silver is in the interest of the deb
tors. think it will be found quite the
contrary. Not only will it prevent a per-
son in distres from being able to borrow
conditions which will make it impossible
for the debtors to meet their indebted
mes.
but, gerater than all objections is