The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1896-09-10

thcy De aDle 10 CONVINCE SUu tHut thu'
was an honest dollar? No, my friends
Yet that would be an honest dollar, ac
cording to the definition of the man who
thinks the melting part is the only test
of money.
There is another thing which l wish
to call your attention to, and that Is the
very characteristic which they speak of
and praise in gold is characteristic be,
slowed by law Why is it hat Il gold
dollar loses nothing by melting? 1t is
because the law says you can take the
gold to the mint and have it stamped
without charge. That is the reason for
it. Suppose the law said any man who
wanted piece of gold coined should pay
five cents for the coming of every dol
lar what, then; would be the bullion
value of the gold in Il dollar? Ninety
five cents would be its value and upon
no other theory would any gold ever be
coined. because if Il man had % pay hvc
cents before single dollar of gold bull
| lion could be converted into Il dollar
worth 100 cents he would never have the
bullion converted into dollar, for he
could sell that bullion to anybody for
more than % cents. Therefore, when
ever you fix the charge for mintage you
| make Il distance between the coinage and
| the bullion value of the metal. You
have bullion coined and if you want bul-
lion you may melt the coin and you have
the right to melt one into the other at
any time without charge. | say the
man who talks about gold being honest,
| because when you melt it it loses moth
ing. forgcts that characteristic is given
| by law, and yet they do not recognize it.
| | remember there was Il discussion out
in Nebraska between an advocate of the
gold standard and IN advocate of hi
mctallism. and the gold standard man
! said: Gold is the only good money
He said: IF you put your dollars in
gold and put thousand dollars in paper
in the house and the house burns down,
your pacr is destroyed, your silver is
melted and only worth one-half, your
| gold is melted and is worth the same as
| before His opponent said: That
would be true under the present law,
but everybody does not put his money
into house and every house does not
| burn down. Suppose you put 1t i'll Il
| boat and the boat turns over: the gold
| and silver go to the bottom and are lost,
the paper floats and is saved; therefore
| paper is the only good money There
| is Just as much sense in the last PROPOSE
ton as in the first. 'Applause.) Peo-
pie who tell you that silver is not good
money because when melted it loses
half its value, are the people advocat-
ing the national currency. which, when
melted. loses everything"
MIR. Bryan then told about the man
who proposed to go around and buy up
| silver at 80 cents on the dollar and have
it coined into 100 cents. making the diff
ference, adding that II fit companion for
him was the man who feared Il flood of
silver under bimctallism.
He continued: I'VE do not believe
the free coinage of silver would drive
gold out of circulation. We believe that
the free coinage of silver would drive
gold into circulation; those who have
been boarding il in order to get the rise
in the value of dollars would turn it
loose. (Applause) Stop the rise in
value of money and let the rise com
mence in the value of property and the
men who are locking up their money in
their vaults will be wanting to spend it
before money comes down and before
property goes up. Great applause.) |
believe that free coinage will put money
into circulation instead of taking money
out of circulation. / had this question
brought before me in Il southern state in
joint debate about Il year ago. My OPP
pOnent said to me: DO you know that
if we have free coinage of silver and il
drives gold out of circulation that it will
take fifteen years to coin enough to take
the place of god?' ] had no answer, sc
just blurtcd out that we would make
more minis. He never thought of the
possibility of making more mints Men
counting upon fifteen years of suffering
Why, my friends, it seems to me that the
smallest child would say that rather
than suffer fifteen years we would MAKE
more minis and coin more money if the
people needed it. (Appause) But there
is another part of the proposition. The
man who made this statement wound VI
by saying that during these fifteen years
money would be so scarce that silver
dollar would he harder to get and high
or priced dollar measured by property
than gold dollar is now. That is the
worst of all absurdties. Think of q
flood and n drought contending for mas
terry. speak of this. my friends, 10 show
you the confusion of ideas that prevail
among those who think they are the only
people who can think on the question.
"a gentleman told me the other day
that he wanted a dollar that was goot
all the world over. | told him that We
had a dollar that had been going over
the world so rapidly that we had to ISSUE
bonds to bring it back. | would rather
have Il dollar that would stay at home
awhile.
when thcy tel you thov can borrow
money if you have good security you tel
them that security that used to he GOOD
is not good now. Things that You could
borrow money on then you could moi
now, because you have made dollar
high and property cheap"
W\TSON'S PROGRAM