The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-08-17
MONEY.

recognizing that the money question Is par
amount to all others at this time, we invite
attention to the fact that the constitution
named silver and gold together as the money
metals of the United States, and that the first
coinage law passed by congress under the
constitution made the silver dollar the money
unit and admitted gold to free coinage at a
ratio based upon the silver dollar unit.
We declare that the act of 1873 demonetiZ-
ing silver without the knowledge or approval
of the American people has resulted in the
appreciation of gold and corresponding fall
in the prices of commodities produced by the
people; a heavy increase in the burden of
taxation and of all debts, public and private;
the enrichment of the money-lending class at
home and abroad; the prostration of industry
and impoverishment of the people.
We are unalterably opposed to monometal-
lism which has locked fast the prosperity of
an industrial people in the paralysis of hard
times. Gold monometallism is British
policy, and its adoption has brought other
nations into financial servitude to London.
1t is not only un-American, but anti-Amer-
Jean, and 1t can be fastened on the United
States only by the sitting of that spirit and
love of liberty which proclaimed our politi-
cal independence in 17T6 and won it in the
War of the Revolution.
We demand the free and unlimited coinage
OF both silver and gold at the present legal
ratio OF 16 to | without waiting for the aid
or consent of any other nation. We demand
that the standard silver dollar shall be a
full legal tender equally with gold for all
debts, public and private, and we favor such
legislation as will prevent for the future the
recommendation or any kind Of legal-tender
money by private contract.
we are opposed to the policy and practice
of surrendering to the holders of the obli-
cations of the United States the option re-
served by law to the government of redeem
ing such obligations in either silver coin or
gold coin.
TARIFF.
We hold that tariff duties should be levied
for purposes of revenue, such duties to be so
adjusted as to operate equally throughout the
country and not discriminate between class
or section, and that taxation should be linn
tied by the needs of the government honestly
and economically administered. We de-
nounce as disturbing to business the Re-
publican threat to restore the Mckinley law,
which has twice been condemned by the PEG
pie in national elections, and which, enacted
under the false plea of protection to home
monopolies, enriched the few at the expense
of the many, restricted trade and deprived
the producers of the great American staples
OF access to their natural markets.
Until the money question is settled we are
opposed to any agitation for further changes
in our tariff laws, except such as are neces-
sary to meet the deficit in revenue caused
by the adverse decision Of the supreme court
on the income tax. But for this decision by
the supreme court, there would be no deficit
in the revenue under the law passed by
Democratic congress in strict pursuance of
the uniform decisions of that court for near
iy 100 years, that court having in that decis-
Ion sustained constitutional objections to Its
enactment which had previously been over
ruled by the ablest judges who have ever sat
on that bench. We declare that it is the
duty OF congress to use all the constitutional
power which remains after that decision, or
which may come from its reversal by the
court as 1t may hereafter be constituted SO
that the burdens Of taxation may be equally
and impartially laid, to the end that wealth
may Dear Its due proportion Of the expenses
of the government.