The Providence news. (Providence [R.I.]) 1891-1906, 1896-10-05

| less he received In exchange two silver
dollars for 1t instead of one.
But, oil the same, UNCLE SAM could
hold. no gold, haye.no way OF getting it
except by paying big prsmiura on it.
And now UNCLE SAM is down on
silver basis, what then? WHATS the dill
erence? Can't tho country get along oil
rightY How will it effect our inquiring
reader and everybody else, keeping in
view the part that other nations have in
our affairs.
"Foreign Exchange''-that's another
| glittering generality, but that is just the
| thing that would raise the deuce with us
| in the circumstance of silver basis for
| our money-in the circumstance whereby
We should call co cents dollar, while
other nations persist in making dollar
mean 100 cents.
"Foreign Exchange - the rascal -
| would say to us: "You may call 90
cents O dollar all you please, or 70 cents a
dollar IL you choose, l insist that 100
cents is dollar and nothing short of
that, Mexico, Japan and China with
their untold hun 1reds Of millions of peo-
pie. have been using so cent dollar, put
get 100 cents for my dollar every time,
and Mexico, Japan and China get none
of my dollars unless they give me 100
cents In value for very one OF them. And
you, UNCLE SAM, with your 7O,OOJ,O 900
pc pie, will have to do the same. You
can pass your 50-cent dollars among your
own people oil you ilease. IL they like
them can stand it. But when you come
to pay me shall exchange dollars only
for 100 cents worth OF value. ;"
What of it? Just this: AS BILLY
BRYAN tells us truly, no one would sell
In q half-price market when he could sell
In full-price market. Every kind OF
commodity, every thing that we needed
to have or wanted 10 have would
promptly go up IN price TO the value that
| Foreign Exchange would be willing TO pay
for il. II Foreign Exchange declared
that food and clio hing wero worth SO
many I00-cent dollars that is what we
would have to pay for them. Or not
being possessed of eny such dollars,
| sircs none would be in circulation, we
would have TO put up two of the 5O-cent
| dollars that the government called a dol
lar to get the things. That's very plain.
1t appears TO US. Indeed, BILLY BRYAN
tells us that prices would SO rise--aI-
Though he WON'T hear TO II that Foreign
Exchange has any influence in the mat
| ter.
II Is not Impossible, but, according to
experience, entirely improbable that our
| incomes, our wages, our salaries. would
be put up in proportion. Foreign Ex-
change would. not bother Its head about
| that. We know that pensions and life
insurance policies and savings banks
deposits would be paid to us in the kind
| of money that the free coinage govern
ment would declare to lie "legal tender
for all debts, public and private" Very
! likely, however, good many salaries
and wages would be increased in the
new and cheap money. But no act of
Congress could compel any employer to
make that increase. And no employer
wo1ld make any increase until he was
able to discover by experience just how
many more cheap dollars he could make
than hc had made of good full value dollars
| lie could never &c sure Of the permanent
value of such an increase, because his
profits would be represented by money OF
I a fluctuatIng value-higher or lower, per-
haps, tomorrow than today. II he was a
Manufacturer he could not tell what his
product would be actually S&~th few
months ahead from any knowledge Of
what It might be worth today; that is,
he might estimate on how many dollars
he would get for II, but he would be quite
unable TO he sure of what the dollars
would be worth. For that wickcdly dis.
posed Foreign Exchange would be hav-
ing great sport gambling on the velne OF
those dollsrs. And so he would ngure
his wages with large percentages Of
safety In tho figuring.
Follow the thing round the cycle with
the man who stumped you, inquriug
reader, and see II there is any way that
he can make the silver proposition APP
pear favorable.
|
Tt,e Vrnng ScwaIr