The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1896-05-30
QUAY on the Financial Problem

1t has remained for the Hon. Chris.
Magee to discover that Senator Quay
is an ''unsound money" man. The gen.
tleman from Allegheny recently in
structed his leutenants in Washing
ton to peruse Quay's celebrated tariff
speech delivered in the spring of 1894;
and they have discovered what gives
to the Honorable Christopher twinge
of exceeding joy. The passage in ques-
tion is as follows:
SHOULD the pending measure (the Will
son bilD become law, u. grave monetary
question will Immediately confront the
American people. We may. with occa-
sional distress, accept the foreign money
standard, be harnessed to the chariot of
the old lady of Threadneedle street. and
driven hither and thither by capricious
Juggling with imports and exports of our
gold, provided we can at the same time
maintain an American commercial policy.
But foreign commercial policy cannot
fia fae DCey OF or without aa,ondmy PrSe''a and sac,
return to colonial dependence upon Great
Britain. The progress of thought and
events has been such in this country that
II Is welded to the gold standard, though
by a long and dreary nuptial ceremony
and not without privilege of divorce The
state of Pennsylvania is essentially hard
money and honest money state. But silver
Is hard and silver Is honest, despite con-
tant and insidious effort to degrade 1t to
the plane of fiat currency. And under the
pending legisla ton 1t will be the duty
of Pennsylvania and of the country tn
advance to the silver standard. If our
hcme market Is to be surrendered to for.
cigu manufacturers and importers by
radical reductions of customs duties, II
to thn int .,ff ha
that our obligations should be met In our
own money. II we cannot have a tariff of
customs we may have tariff of eX-
change, which at the present price of sill
YER would exceed 100 per cent. ad va!orem.
This would amount to second declaration
of American independence which would
overthrow the combined power of the deal
ers in sold in our great commercial metro
polls and the foreign importers of gold,
and isolate us IN the production of all
articles which this country Is capable Of
manufacturing or producing.
"The contemplation of such a proba-
bilty leads to the suggestion Of bimefai-
lism. But bimetallism would not meet the
monetary exigcncy which would confront
the country upon an abolition of the Gus
toms tariff. Bimetallism can be sustained
by no one nation. 1t is only possible by
agreement between all the leading gov
ernments of the world In armed conven.
ton. No nation can be induced to enter
such II convention so long as its bal
ances are all upon the creditor side and Sd
long as 1t can continue to hold despotic
and solitary control of the machinery of
the worlds exchange. If protection by
customs must fall, | apprehend that sill
yer monoihetallism In the New World is
necessarily precedent to bimetallism in the
Old World"
But where Is the unsoundness in
these remarks? That is what Mr.. Ma
gees newspaper fails to locate. Every
word quoted above is literally and un-
alterably true. The gold standard
very clearly benefits Europe more than
us. We would soon be bankrupted by
the appreciation in the value of money
which is taking place under the present
single standard if 1t were not for our
protective tariff, which compels the
creditor nations Of Europe to pay back,
in the form of customs duties, some of