Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1896-10-22
ADAMS . ARTHUR. Proprietors
RIGHT OF CONTRACT.
TO BE ABRIDGED BY BRYAN AND HIS
PARTY.

~
PARTY.
Attempt to Make Illegal Contracts Pay
able + Gold an AsaacE Uron Freedom
of Gaatract-would Hamper business
and commerce and Compel a Resort to
Antique Methods OF Barter.
The Cordage Trade Journal Of Oct. !
discusses a part Of the CAicago platform
which has not thus far received the at.
tention which it nlerits-that part
which proposes to take away the right
of private contract. The Journal says
chat mo industry of any size can exist
without the use of contracts, agreements
1or the purchase, sale, delivery OF and
payment for goods. 1t is hardly neGes-
ssary to point out what this means in
the cordage business"
1t then explains how rope maIiufac-
turers make contracts with brokers, and
brokers with foreign frowers of MANILA
or sisal, for their raw materials. Hay
ing made these contr acts, they are III a
position to make contracts with large
jobbers and rope dealers. Continuing,
The Journal says:
CONTRACTS are necessary to,the sue
cessful transaction of business upon any
scale above that OF the very small retail
trade, where goods and money pass be-
tween buyer and seller simultaneously.
Mr.. Bryan would, if president, give his
approval to law 8 which would prohibit
business men fir om specifyingwhat they
aball sell goods for or what they shall
pay for goods, thus MISUNDERSTANDING
the rightsof contract. His first nomina-
tion-inE hica go-wa based upon his
acceptance of a platform which con
tanned the following plank:
"we demand that the standard silver dollar
shall be a full ] egal tender, equally with gold,
for all debts, p ablic and private, and we favor
such Legislation o as viii prevention tho future
the demonetiz ition Of any kind ef legal tender
money by private contract.
ssHis Po'pulistic nomination in ST.
Louis carried with it this plank:
eve de1nan j such Legislation as win prevent
the demoneti Eation OF the lawful money of the
United States by private contract.
POSSIBLY the United States supreme
court will uphold such legislation-it
sustained he validity of the legal ten
der act-and-whats Mr.. Bryan does
not tell the people whom he addresses
tridaily. When he gets near the sub
ject, it is only 10 say something like
this:
4swhen al ~ one tries to give you an object
lesson with u Mexican dollar, ten him that the
Mexican dc liar isnotlegal tender in this coun-
try. and th at our silver dollar iA, anu under
free roinas =, will continue to be, and no one
will BE allowed TO contract against it.-W. j.
Bryan in Newark. Sept. %.
'&oThis ,,ot only shows the pu-pose of
thexnan, but also gives an intelligent
man a very clear conception OF Mr..
Bryan's fkill ms a logician. If he knew
auyShing at all ah0nt cenlmerce-the
~lifetlood of which he SO glibly talks OF
interfering with-he would know that
tho execution OF his plan would cause
tivity, which would beN followed by a
resnmpi ion upon a restricted and an
tiqne basis. Methods which the COM
mercial world discarded generations ago
wOnld have TO se ibrnught int use for
carrying on business under. the condi-
tiOns which the adoption ofMr Bryan's
twc absurd propositions wonld impose.
~Nhere would the hemp come from
fow next years binder fwinesto tie the
tanners wheat2 The United States,
where silver dnEars worth less than 100
cents would be aegal tender, could not
furnish the material. ALI prices now
quoted are for gold. No matter how
much farmers wanted Irvine. when it
wassno longer possibleftD make o con-
tract to pay gold @ its equivalent for
hemp, they wonld havesto go without it
until some cumbersome smethod Of bar
teriug was devised TO rget around the
law OF course. IN time-the hemp would
be secured and the farmers supplied,
butf tho new way of doing business
w0nE be more costly. TIN the end the
consumer pays all costs. Hence the
farmers would have tesuhmit to higher
prices for binder Irvine, as for every
thing else they hug. And yet Mr..
Rryan claims to hetheipartcular friend
Of agriculturistsi
..Itjs to be hoped that ati,e business
men c6 the country willcarcfully con-
aider what tne proposed interference
with tho right to enter into n contEact
TO pay,any kind Of m0ney xvsuld resclt
In. sndtthen vote for ~AccNndidate kr
president who win p~resaEvetha freed0Gi
sof commerce.
.Arharo Ara che nanaatar