Birmingham age-herald., 1895-05-21

uuu6T-NdlueQ III lHG ldW, dIu lnC COilSC- quence was that by the year 1872 gold had disappeared from the country, and from that time on until after the passage of the act of 1884 the United States had
 practically silver monometallism. In
 May ,1805 President Jefferson stopped the coinage of the silver dollar, and during a period of thirty-one years thereafter not a single stanard silver dollar was coined at the hints of the United States;
 but, under the act of 1792, the subsidiary
 coins were of full weight as compared with the dollar and were legal tender
 and these coins, with Spanish dollars,
 French crowns or 5-franc pieces, and
 bank notes, constituted our circulating medium. Gold having disappeared from circulation, congress determined, In
 1884, to bring it back by changing the ratio. The act of 1884, supplemented by
 the act of 1887, provided that the legal
 ratio should be 16 to l. that is, that SIX teen pounds of silver in the coins should
 be equal to one pound of gold Tn the coins and the effect of this was to drive
 silver out of circulation and substitute
 gold in it's place, because silver was
 under-valued and gold was over-valued in the statute. One pound of gold, coined
 or uncoined, was not, in fact, worth ln-
 trinsically or commercially sixteen pounds of silver, coined or uncoined, and, therefore, the coins of the two metals
 could not circulate together at that ra- tio The authors and supporters ot thls
 law we'll knew what the effect of such
 legal ratio would be in case It dld not conform to the commercial ratio, put the great object in view was the restoration
 of gold to the circulation, and all other
 considerations were Subordinated to
 that. Doubtless many of them stili pe-
 Iieved that the So-called double stand
 ard could be maintained, and that the coins of the two metals could be Kept III
 circulation together at the new ratio; tI.xr cf q
 out and gold came in. The gold DaslS was established in 1884, by the practical operation of the ratio, just as compietely
 and effectually as if it had been eA-
 pressly declared in the statute. Here
 then were two experiments lfS-the Tree
 coinage of the two metals in this coun-
 try, covering a period of elghty-ohe wears at legal ratios very nearly corIe- sponding to the real relative values III
 the commercial world, and they potn
 failed-in one case because shNer Ma9
 oyer-valued, and in the other case De-
 pause gold was over-valued A very
 small percentage of difference between the legal ratio and the commerclal Idlio
 has always been found suihclehi III modern times to drive the under-Valueu
 metal entirely out and supsttute tHe other or paper based upon the othef, III it's place. and no congress or parllamehs
 can repeal or alter the natural law ol
 trade by which this movement or the metals is governed. ,..4,,,,
 In 1853 congress, in order 10 nldih.airs ta.is
 the circulation of subsidiary colns-hail
 dollars quarters and dimeS-reduced the
 weight of the metal contained Tn them
 and made them legal tender only III a- 'iie payment of sums not exceeding % li amount Under this act the Nalue oL lIie bullion contained in two haf- dollars, four quarters, or ten dimes was not equal to the value of the bullion contalhea III either a gold or silver dollar and conse- ouently these small limited legal tende, coins went into circulation and remained in use until expelled by the cheaper pa
 per currency issued during the war not
 being full legal tender they could not
 drive out the gold coins.
 This was the condition or our floneo 1eo
 tary system at the time the act or lSi3
 was passed. Our legal position was pl-
 metallic, but our actual measure or value
 was gold and our actual circulating me
 dium was paper, with "a pufcheshlS
 power measured by the gold standafu.
 We had no silver and 1t had no lhllueLlce whatever on our prices, or on our apllltv to. pay debts. The act of 1S13 therefore,
 did not and could not take away lroLl
 the people of the United States any ao- vantage they then possessed, but IL dld
 nravent the coinage of full legal tender
 silver dollars thereafter, and the act ot
 1874 destroyed the debt-paying power or
 the old standard dollar coined petoIe
 1S73 except in sums not exceeding so.
 If there had been any SuCu loltdl D III SAA
 culatiou or in existence here this latter
 act would have abridged the ablllty or
 debtors to discharge their obligations,
 but as there were none it had no practi-
 cal effect at that time.
 Failure of the Free Coinage System.
 Thus we remained until 1878. We had tried to keep the legal tender coins or the two metals in circulation at the same time under a system of free coinage, but had utterly failed. In lSiS new poi icy was adopted and it was determined to restore the standard silver dollar 10 the coinage and to circulation with iuli legal tender qualities, not by opening the hints to its free and unlimited coin age on individual account as is now pro- posed, but by providing for the purchase and coinage of not more than Sf,OOO,oUo worth nor less than 900 worth or silver bullion each month by the govern ment itself Under this act and the so- called Sherman act, and the act proVid- ing for the recoinage of the trade dol lars there have been coined at the hints of the United States and put into circu- lation during seventeen years $397 ,652,67 in full legal tender standard silver, as against $S, ,030, 900 coined during the whole previous existence of the government, period of eghty-nine years. In other words there have been coined and put into circulation among the people, in coin itself or in certificates issued upon it. nearly fifty times as many full legal tender silver dollars as were produced at the hints of the United States from 1792 to 187S and yet some gentlemen are writ ing books and making speeches to con vince their fellow citizens that silver is demonetized in this country. There was never in our whole history one-third as much legal tender silver in use in the United States at one time as there is now, and it is used without depriving us of all our gold, which was never done l before Silver is not demonetized in this country hut it's coinage has been so linn