The herald., 1896-08-05
ABRAHAM LINCOLN AND
THE ISL YER PERIL
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The goldbugs who have found in the
Increased output of American silver an
occasion for alarm, who deemed 1t so
great menace to the country's pros
perity' that they deprived silver of the
right of coinage, and who now denounce
all who advocate the restoration of that
right as "consprators. "repudiators,"
anarchists" and the like. will not rel
ish reproduction of the following utter
ances Of Abraham Lincoln, given verb
ally to Schuyler Colfax on the fatal 14th
OF April, 1865, only a few hours before
the bullet of Wilkes Booth ended the
career Of "the first American" In a
speech delivered in Colorado Mr.. Col
fax quoted Lincolns words, as follows:
Mr. ColfaA I want you to take a
message from NE to the miners whom
you visit. l have said he, very large
ideas of the mineral wealth of our ma
ton. / believe it practically inexhaust-
ible. 1t abounds all over the western
country, from the Rocky mountains to
the Pacific, and its development has
scarcely commenced. During the war,
when we were adding a couple of million
dollars every day to our national debt,
l did not care about encouraging the in
crease in the volume of our precious
metals. We had the country to save
first. But now that the rebellion is
overthroWn, and we know pretty nearly
the amount of our national debt the
more gold and silver we mine makes the
payment Of that debt so much the cas-
Ter. Now" said he, speaking with much
emphasis, II am going to encourage that
in very possible way. We shall have
hundreds of thousands of disbanded
soldiers and many have feared that
their return hone in such great num-
beers might paralyZe industry by fur
nishing suddenly a greater supply of
la Dor than there would be demand for
| am going to try and attract them to
the hidden wealth Of our mountain
ranges, where there Is room enough for
all. immigration, which even the war
has not stopped will land upon our
shores hundreds of thousands more per
year from over-croWded Europe. l in
tend to point them to the gold and sill
Yer that awaits them in the west Tell
the miners for me that I shall promote
their interests to the utmost Of my abb
ity, because their prosperity is the pros
perity of the nation" said he. his eye
kindling with enthusiasm. Eve shall
prove. in very few years that we are,
indeed, the treasury of the world"
with what amazement would Lincoln
have listened to one Of our mod IN gold
bugs proclaiming that in using the
abundant wealth of our mines (seem-
ingly stored up by providence for that
very purpose) in paying off our debts
we would be paying only 80 cents on
the dollar;"that we would become re
pudia tionists;" that in order to ''main
tain the national honor" and remain
in the company of civilized nations" we
must refuse to use half the wealth be-
slowed upon us by providence, refuse to
coin the deposits of silver into money,
and must. at the behest of our creditors,
pay all our obligations in gold.
Our country was becoming. as he pre-
dicted, "the treasury of the world,
when the goldbug conspiracy was
Matched to deprive silver of it's place as
a money metal. to rob the miner of his
reward. to make the payment of our
debts difficult and to concentrate the
remaining wealth of the country in the
hands of a few, regardless of the suffer-
ing of the many.-5t Louis Post-Dis-
patch.