The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-11-12
WHAT 1T ALL INDICATES.

Mckinley was elected but because the
process, out of which our present
monetary hotch-potch has been
evolved. refused to be turned back
ward because men refused to discard
the latest and best implement to take
up again a cumbrous one displaced by
the better one. When stage coaches
take the place Of railways and farmers
discard their selfbinders for the cradle
then will people agree to accept as
their chief money metal one that car
ries the least value in the greater bulk
When men generally recognize the
truth that, as they have developed un-
der that law of evolution that it is the
fitteSt that survives, so have the meth
DDS and implements they used in aid
of these energies been developed,
the money question will lose much
of its mystery and they will be able to
perceive tendencies of further move
ment whose Importance they do not
now grasp. That we have reached the
end in finance is to say that men have
reached their highest development.
Silver superseded brass, and gold has
mastered silver, while credit, based on
commodity, has silently but irresistibly
crowded gold into the background, un-
til it is used to make less than 10
per cent of the exchanges of commod-
tiles. These evolutions are matters of
..1o
feet. Before the world is fairly alive
to their presence they have established
themselves. Then comes resistance
from the interests overthrown. Change,
displacement mean loss; and resistance
is proportional to the extent, the wealth
and influence of the interests made to
take a subordinate place. No money
metal has yet yielded to it's superior
tamely. Brass fought stubbornly
against the inroad of silver, as silver
is now resisting the supremacy of gold.
and as gold will in its turn resist it's
conqueror.
There are many signs to indicate
that we have advanced far on the way
towards the substitution of something
more economical and utile than metal
lie commodities as money, except, pos
sibly, for use as tokens. Not the least
of these is this rush to the sub-treas-
ury for paper that serves all the pur-
poses of money. Why do these bank
ers and business men want paper in
stead of gold? Why, in the marts Of
trade, is silver in its dollar form alto
gether discarded and bills used in
stead? 1t is simply due to that law of
human action that seeks to accomplish
its end with the least expenditure Of
effort. Paper money is less cumber-
some, carries larger values in less
space and suffers nothing from abra-
sion. Gold wears away with use and
becomes uncurrent as coin when one
fourth of 1 per cent of it's weight is
worn off and lost. 1t becomes, what
it always really is, commodity form
ing the base of the paper that does it's
work
One can see even in this wild demand
for a SiXteen-to-one silver coinage in
dications of the force that is moving
our monetary system onto a higher
and truer plane, for it's motive was a
desire for cheaper" money, however
clouded and mistaken was the form
in which it clothed itself. Had it sue
ceeded, the act embodying it would
have provided for the storage of the
coins and the substitution of certifi-
Gates Of deposit, just as the Allison
and Sherman acts did. Even the
Jones bill for coinage at what was
practically the commercial ratio was
changed to provide for paper repre-
sentatives This general movement to-
wards cheap money includes, when
analysed, a more economical money.
Trade and commerce have already
gone far on the way to the evolution
of the money Of the future. They have
found that currency based on two
commodities is insufficient for their
needs, and have substituted, in 90 per
cent of their transactions, a money
and drafts and bills of exchange are
nothing but commodity money Back
of the credit a man establishes in
bank and against which he draws
are the commodities he has accumulat-
ed by his labor. Back of the promis-
sorry note given on a purchase or
loan is reliance upon the same means
of satisfaction. Land, when pledged
for a loan becomes commodity money,
and the credit a man establishes by
his honesty, his thrift and ability is
money of the same nature. One merit.
one compensation of this tumult for
the restoration Of an outgrown metal
is that the crust is broken that per-
mits a larger growth, and men begin
to see that, unconsciously, we have
already arrived at a point where the
question is not a retention Of one or
another metal as money, but the study
of methods by which all commodities
may have their paper representatives
acting as money in exchanging.
"STRONGER THAN EVER"
ha to,