The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1896-05-15
THE GREAT DEBATE.
CRISP AND SMITH DISCUSS THE
CURRENCY QUESTION.
Tom Watson Also Takes His Pen In
Hand to Make q Few Remarks which
Are Very Pointed Indeed-His Logical
Conclusions.

are very Pointed 1nd0ed-His Logical
Conclusions.
Peoples Party Paper: The Au-
gusta Tribune describes Mr.. Crisp as
an old gentleman with a bald head,
adorned by a short-cropped fringe of
hair on the outer edges"
Correct.
The same authority photographs
Mr.. Smith as "a smooth shaven, we'll
kept looking gentleman, with a face as
round as the full moon"
Correct.
The old gentleman with the bald
mead opened the debate with a pal
metto fan and a misstatement.
He said that the decline in values
commenced Immediately after the
demonstration of silver in 1873. This
Is not true for two reasons:
LIST. Silver was not "demonetized"
till 1894,
End. Because the decline in values
commenced several years previous to
l873-as several middle-aged men in
America ought to know.
the moon faced gentleman" how
ever, did not seem to be posted upon
this point, and he let the misstatement
pass unchallenged.
1t is a strange thing to us that Free
Silver debaters will base their discus
s1ons upon so false a foundation. I'm
less they are willing to commit them
selves to the principle of Fiat money
they nave no case at all.
The only sound and unanswerable
portions OF Mr.. Crisp's argument are
those which sustain the Populists in
theory of money.
once you say that the Governments
mandate can arbitrarily make the ratio
1t to l, you might as we'll say it can
make it 20 to l, or 10 to 1. MI. Smith
puts this with great force and Mr.. Crisp
did not even try to answer.
1t the Commercial value of silver
cuts no figure in deciding coinage ratio,
then it is the Governments say-so
which fixes it. And if the Govern
ment's say-so can fix it, Independent CT
Commercial value, the "16 to /" stand
ard becomes a mere matter of conven-
fence. It involves no principle at all.
1t is true that Mr.. Crisp can Justly
claim that our past experience proves
that u government can make a sue
cess of the 16 to 1 ratio. It did it prior
to 1873, and could do it again.
Certainly; but the success was due
to the Fiat money principle, and not
to the commercial value of the silver
out of which the dollar was made. This
was shown by the fact that the trade
dollar, which contained more pure
silver than the standard dollar, was at
a heavy discount, while the standard
silver dollar was at par. The trade
dollar was not a full legal tender-did
not have behind it the fat of the law.
It had to go mainly upon it's value as
mere silver. It had little worth ex-
cept it's commodity or commercial
value.
The smaller standard silver dollar,
on the contrary, had behind it the
mandate Of the law; it was full! legal
tender. 1t cancelled all debts dollar for
dollar, not because the creditor wanted
it to do so, but because the Government
said it must do so.
Therefore everybody took as a dollar
the smaller amount of silver which was
in the standard dollar, while nobody
would take, as a dollar, the larger
amount of silver which was in the trade
dollar. Nobody would accept it for
more than e%ighty-fve cents.
By act of congress the large trade
dollar had to be melted up and coined
into smaller legal tender dollars before
they would circulate.
Mr.. Smith must know all this. vet
he did not dare to use it. Why? Be-
cause it proves too much for a demo-
crat-no matter whether he be gold
bug or free-silverite. 1t proves that the
populists are right in saying that the
legal tender quality is that which lifts
silver and gold and copper and paper
into the dignity and power of money!.
The u~nanswerable portion of Mr..
Crisp's speech is that in which he
argues the case for More Money" On
that point Mr.. Smith fails entirely to
meet the argument.
But the reply lies right upon the
surface, and the average Populist will
see it at a glance.
Mr.. Smith could have replied that
to issue more Money" does not neces-
sarily mean more silver. If commercial
values cut no figure, the argument for
"More Money" would rest as firmly up-
on copper as upon silver. Every rea-
son which Mr.. Crisp urged for the