Iowa state bystander. [volume] (Des Moines, Iowa) 1894-1916, 1896-10-09
in A SILVER COUNTRY
Condition Of the Laborer and
Business in a Land Where
Free Coinage Exists.
WHAT THE MExlCANs SAY.
A Representative Of the ST Louis
Globe Democrat Tells What
He Saw

+ bNllGC LIE iISC-oiANCA VGOplC DSSuA w
point to Mexico as an ideal country
where the free coinage Of silver had
made everyone happy, contented and pros
porous, there has been much written by
men who had lived there and others.
The reports, which were not dattering
to the country, were denied by tho sill
yer advocates and branded as lies. The
silverites stoutly maintained that If la-
Dor was as well employed here as in
Mexico the great question of what to do
with the poor would be solved as there
would be no poor. They claimed that
in that country there was no Wall street;
that food, clothing and the necessities
of life were cheaper; that the nation
was prospecting as it never had before,
and all on account of the free coinage
of silver.
The st. Louis Globe Democrat. wish
Ing to be just in the matter, decided
to send a representative there who would
report what he saw and learned, with
cut regard MS to how the reports would
fleet the political situation. The man
rs; was one on whom the paper could de-
pend to tell the truth.
Extracts from some of the letters
N which throw some light on the subject
Of free silver and its effects are printed
below:
Prices Depend on Foreign Exchange.
Pirates on the high seas could hard
~ be a moro dangerous menace to COM
incrcc between nations than this fluctua-
ton of exchange between countries on
different standards. Outside of a few
inoncy-changers at coast ports, business
men of the states hardly notice from
week to week the variations in exchange
between their country and Europe. But
s IN the business relations between the
United States and Mexico the changing
difference between the standards is a
matter of hourly concern.
What's exchange today!" goes with
every mornings salutation between mer-
chants in Monterey.
"Silvcr's up" or "silver's down. is the
commercial news of first Importance.
The shrewd representative of San
!, Antonio tTex.l jobbing house on his way
& back to the states from his midsummer
round of the cities of Mexico said:
Here's variation of Sc between the
gold standard of the states and the silver
standard of Mexico within two weeks.
How is man going to sell goods or do
Sany business between the countries when
he has got to make allowances for such
fluctuations. When sell bill Of goods
TO Mexican merchant on six months
time I've got to figure the prices high
enough TO save my house in the event
that silver drops by one of those violent
fluctuations before the day of settlement
B comes. The merchant has got to mark
the retail prices on a margin sufficient
to protect him against possible change.
And so American goods must be sold in
Mexico at two margins above legitimate
profits in order to protect the American
and the Mexican storekeeper
magainst these rapid up and down move-
nj ments OF the standards. The condition
= simply ruinOus to trade. People will
y not buy when prices are raised on them.
4 AIy house may make a tremendous profit
u or barely save itself in Il sale of goods on
six mon.Gs' time. That isn't the way to
do business. You might as well have a
Chinese wall between two countries as
these fluctuations. And this is what we
4 the United States goes to a silver stand.
ard and Great Britain and the European
h nntions continue the gold standard. I
Know what this thing Of two standards
means between Mexico and the States,
1 ard l don't want to see it in our trade
With Great Britain and Europe"
A Dollars Worth OF Labor.
dollar worth 30 cents commands the
4 same labor in Mexico now that a dollar
worth a dollar did ten or twenty years
ago, Right there is the cornerstone on
which prosperity In this silver country is
4 building. That is what makes it now
profitable to work mines with ores worth
Il Ss and IS, Mexican money, a ton. That
condition of labor brings .he cost of min
Ing and carrying out the ore down to ST.
\ ~ ton. That kind of labor built and
i operates the cables, which take the place
Of thousands of burro trains, at a frac-
\ ton Of the cost for like construction and
operatio in the States. Gables have re-
duced the cost Of conveying ore from the
mine to the railroad, two miles down the
mountain, to 20 cents and 80 cents a ton,
This labor enables railroads to haul ores
at from 90 cents to 81 a ton. 1t figures
I In the cost of the TRANSFORMATION Of the
coke from the gulf and the coal from the
border. And, finally, it enables the
Riheiters to make an unprecedentedly low
= rate of 81 ton for treatment of ore.
y the pick in the mine to the landing Of the
lr4sase bullion into molds at the furnace,
.ythiss> hxity Of wages on the basis of a
ssdolla1s deprecated to one-half its value is
the chIsf factor hich insures the profit.
What ynatters it if silver goes down if it
& conmands just as much labor as ever,
md It the lead in the bullion can still
I be sold for gold? The shelters of Next
/ 20 buy orc from the mine owners and
+ pay a Mexican dollar an ounce for the
silver they get out of it. They paid this
i several years ago, when silver was worth
\ more than it is now. They still pay it.
Recently, under the importation of com
II tSNsNoAt tCl was uIOpplUk SO
: rapidly in the United States, some of
the smelters Of Mexico advanced the
Il price they allowed the mine owners for
silver. They are now paying under some
contracts $1.06 in Mexican money for
every ounce of silver found in the ore.
Today the brick-making plant few
miles out of Monterey, on the Mineral
railroad, is shipping 10000 paving brick
& TO San Antonio in Texas. 1t does this
sand pays the nd valorem duty of % per
i cent. which the Wilson tariff leyies on
3 brick impurtations. The contract for
4 this brick shipment was obtained at
San Antonio because this company nut
leill the lowest and best of twenty-eight
4 bids. The Monterey company enjoys
the possession of excellent clay, but That
Isn't what enables it to send brick to the
United States at profit. 1t outbid the
.xwenty seven American brick-making
u coii,panies because it sells brick for
american money, worth 100 cents in
Eold, and hires good labor for Mexican
money, worth 80 cents in gold. This
Fcompany is paving three miles of Monte
zSrey streets with brick, displacing the
srobbIestones of time immemorial. 1t
Z nut down block of the brick paving as
An object lesson, and the governor, Gen
Bernardo Reyes, with keen perception
FOR good thing, ordered three miles of
4 The same to begin with. The brick man
'S31factured on the basis of unchanging