Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1896-07-11
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greater respect for integrity than they
no class Of men have greater contemp
for dead beats and bummers thar
they; no class Of men are more will
Ing to pay their honest debts thar
they; no men more deeply resen
foreign arrogance. foreign pauperis:r
or foreign aggression: no class Of mer
would more quickly resent the imputa.
ton that their credit as borrowers i.
not as good as the credit Of foreigners
Yet there are those who attempt te
make us believe that the farmers OF
this country want free coinage Of sill.
yer at ratio Of 16 to I; that they want
to make silver dollar. the intrinsic
value OF which ID only about half as
much as that which they borrowed,
and with It pay those they owe, whether
their creditors be American, English
or German; we are told that these
farmers believe free silver will AFFECT
the price Of wheat when they might as
well be guilty Of thinking 1t affected
the weather!
We are told that these farmers want
this government. already in debt, to
pay to the men who own silver mines
every gold dollar it has in exchange
for silver that those same mine owners
can't sell either in American, or any
foreign market for more than fifty odd
cents in gold.
We don't believe any such libel on
the intelligence of the men who till the
soil in this country. OF course there
are some. who never give such matters
any thought and who jump at conclu-
sions without stopping or knowing
how to decide the matter for them
selves. who swallow anything labelled
plenty OF money" These, however.
are not confined to the farming popu
lation by any means. They don't stop
to think that the confederate govern
ment had plenty of money; in fact 1t
full to buy a months provisions for a
small family. They entirely overlook
the fact that when the credit of this
country in it's infancy-the only time
its credit was ever called in question
except by the demagogues who are
trying to destroy it by reputation in
fifty cent dOllars-was doubted by our
neighbors and our own people, our
money was plenty but it was fast ap-
preaching worthlessness. They don't
stop to consider that the methods of
farming and the amount of farming
have changed radically within a few
years and that the money question had
no more to do with it then it did with
the advent of potato bugs a few years
ago. Whatever the governments past at
titude on the silver question may have
been it did not prevent western lands be-
ing taken up and titled ,sown with wheat
planted with corn and grazed by i'm
mense herds and fiocks until our home
markets were overstocked, and, what
with increased competition from Rus
sian and South American tillers of the
soil the foreign markets became over
stocked as we'll. Do they think that
gold basis is to be blamed because
machinery was invented and made
which enabled the Western farmer to
raise double the amount on his broad
level acres with half the labor and
forced his eastern competitor from
profitable market for the staples? OF
course the price of the little eastern
farms not adapted to changed condi-
lions went down. What else could an
intelligent man expect? Do the Aroos-
took farmers attribute the low price of
last seasons potatoes to the need of
fifty-cent dollars? They might do SC
with just as much show of reason as
to say that because we haven't been
paying the mine millionaire twice what
his product is worth is because the
price of farms has fallen.
No, there isn't the slightest reason
to apprehend any epidemic Of such
nonsense among the agricultural por-
tons of the country. There are those
who exist in the country, who find II
easier to blame .ue government for
poor crops than to blame their own
shiftlessness in not hoeing them, and
not so shocking to pious people as
blaming Providence. Everyone Oh
these may be counted for free silver in
the beginning. There are a good many
of these specimens in the South. The
most energy they ever display is grub
bling for sassafras root and shooing
razor backed hogs and their wives do
most of that. Every man Jack of them
will want to go up to Washington and
get a mule load of silver, and that's
what they probably think free silver
means. OF course these individuals
are for free silver, first. last and all
the time. Then there is the fellow who
allows lit won't make no difference to
me-" and the one who says, things