Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1896-09-22
PROF. +. S. CARLSON
Editor WILLMAR TRIBUNE:-

rapid and fluent speaker and is
supposed to be we'll informed on
political matters. He began by
saying that he was not one of
those for whom it was all:import-
ant to be on the victorious side,
but that he was one who would
stand on the side of justice and
truth. He further more tried to
impress upon.his hearers that no
one should undertake to discuss
any subject unless he had an ade-
quate knowledge of it. Since
DR.. Carlson did undertake to dis
cuss the money question it may
be safely assumed that he
thought he understood it. This
is very significant, since during
the discussion he made several
statements which one would
otherwise have attributed to the
most woeful ignorance.
Money, says DR.. Carlson, has
two uses: 1st. It is a measure
of value. End. It is a medium
of exchange. Over and above
this, according to DR.. Carlson,
money has no further use. On
this point the Doctor differs from
our leading economists who hold
that money is also a store Of value
and standard of deferred pay
ments. But like most of the gold
standard advocates, DR.. Carlson
wisely avoided even mentioning
these last named uses of money.
Why? Because if he had, he
would at the same time have
knocked the underpinnings from
under his own argument. If
money is not a store of value and
a standard of deferred payments
it matters but very little whether
it is stable in value or not. But
we all know that it has these
uses. We know that all transac-
tions are not settled in Ccash at
the time they are made. We
know that debts contracted in
the past are paid to-day. and that
debts contracted to-day are to be
paid at same future time: It is
therefore necessary that the
money in which the debts are to
be settled should vary as little as
possible in value from time to
time. The advocates of the free
coinage of silver claim, and can
prove beyond any reasonable
doubt, that the present gold
standard is continually growing
dearer, that the things measured
sy it are continually growing
cheaper. But this, the most vi
tai point of the whole controver-
sy, Dr.. Carlson not as much as al
luded to. He simply assumed
that the price of gold had not
materially changed, and on this
assumption he based his whole
The Doctor next went on to
show, and very ably, that a meas
ure of value must itself, contain
value, just as measure Of length
must possess the property of
length. This led him on to show
that gold and silver were super
ior as standards of.value, as they
contain a great value, in a com
paratively small volume. In this
he made the startling
announcement that the popucra-
tic party claims that the govern.
ment can legislate value into
things. This is enormous. No
we'll informed populist or demo
GRAFT claims anything of the kind /
But DR. Carlson said in effect,
when he started out to discuss
The question, that he knew what
he was talking about. Hence We
cannot attribute this erroneous
statement to ignorance.
The Doctor then proceeded to
show the disa advantage Of the
loub1e stand ard Unlike Con
gresham TaWney he neglec ted
q say that he was IL favor Of al
pine tallie stands but on the1
,ontrar practic call y admi tiled
hat he eferred 9 gold stand
lrd This is an5ad mission which
lery few repnb lean speakersI
are Is makein this part Of theI
'onntry
B Colo, said the speake Is sui