Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1896-03-08
SOME SILVER HISTORY.
The Congressional Record Of the Last
 Eighteen Years.

E The Congressional Record Of the Last
 Eighteen Years
 Richard r. Bland, of Missouri, from the committee on coinage, moved, on November 5, 1877, in the first extra ses- sion of congress called by President Hayes, to suspend the rules in the house and pass a bill directing the unrestrict- ed coinage, on the same terms as gold, of dollars of 412h grains of standard silver The motion was agreed to by vote of 163 to 34. The next day the bill went to the senate, and on November .1 it was reported to that body by Wil- liam B. Allison, from tie committee on finance The bill was changed, how ever, in several important particulars It was free coinage bill when it left the house, but when it was reported to the senate it provided for the coinage of not less than $2,o0o,00o of bullion each Eaontb and not more than $4,000, 000, the gain arising from the purchase to go to the treasury, and not to the owners of the bullion, as in the Bland plan The bill in this form passed the senate January %, 1878, by 48 to 21, was accepted by the house February q by 203 to 72, was vetoed by President Hayes February 2s, and was passed over the veto by a vote of more than the required twe-thirds in each branch.
 That was the record which congress made Is years ago on it's first de- cisive vote on silver since the demoneti- r T,.4 tbn4 record with the one just made in congress on the same issue. We will take up the senate first, as the free coinage measure originated in the sen ate in 1896, taking the form of a sub- stitute for the house bond bill Eight cen years ago the limited coinage bill, the measure which became the Bland- Allison law, passed the senate by majority of 27, while this year free silver obtained only seven majority ill the senate. Eighteen years ago ma iority of 129 was cast in the house in favor of free silver, while this year the same body rolled up a majority of 125 against free silver. This change by congress in the direction of financial sanity has been accomplished ill comparatively few years. Free coin age received a majority of 1T in the senate in 1890, or more than twice as great as that obtained recently, while the division between the sound and un- sound money men was so close in the house that the bullion deposit law known as the Sherman act was forced as q compromise to head off free coin age.
 Here are comparisons which ought to give encouragementto to the people. Not withstanding the creation of seven new states, all in the silver region, since the l Bland=Allison act was passed in 1878, the silver cause is distinctively weaker than it was at that time. The honest money hosts have gained immensely in numbers and confidence even since the summer of 1890, when q congress In which the republicans were in a slight preponderance was stanpeded by the fear of free coinage and made the con eession to silver which the party took the leading part in reyelIing in the fall of 1893 in the extra session called by 1 Cleveland. These comparisons are of the highest significance. In the early stages of the dishonest-money craze the senate was the conservative branch of congress, but now it is the radical and destructive body. But even in the sen- ate the days of silyerite supremacy are probably near an end. In the next senate a sound=money man will take the seat of Cameron, and probably Black burn and Vest will be similarly dis placed. The present house and the president will guard the country against attack from the infationists and fiatists until 1897, and the house and president which take up the work at that time are likely to have a senate on their side.-St. Louis Globe-Demo- crat.