Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1896-08-14
To tho Laboring Men.

The following article is from an
Iowa manufacturer of agricultural
implements living in this COMPRESSION
al district and its facts and logic is in
the interest of the producers and
shodld be carefully read and it's
reasoning we'll understood.
You no doubt have read what
Banker Williams has to say. 1t is
true you are about to be called on to
vote for your country's good, and it
is to correct the false impressions of
men whose interests are to increase
their wealth at your expense that
write. 1t is necessary to have a
yardstick to measure the length we
call yard, but the stick is not the
yard; the yard is the distance be-
tween the two points at the two ends
of the stick.
The stick can be made of pine or
it may be made of steel. A steel
yardstick will not measure any bet
ter than one of wood. Now, our
government has stated what shall be
the value of our dollar. Originally
this dollar was the value of 4124
grains of silver, nine tenths fine.
Everything was bought and sold by
this standard of value; we made very
few silver dollars, but, like the yard
stick, we made money the parts of a
dollar and the multiples of dollar
OF various things; we used gold and
we used silver, nickel and copper to
make money of. The half-dollars,
quarter-dollars and dimes are not
full weight. For years we have used
only enough silver in two half-dollars
to weigh 1868 grains. Yet all this
time those half-dollars represented
half of 4l2t grams OF silver. We made
money of gold and it was changed at
various times to try and keep it even
with our unit of value 412. grains OF
silver. In the year 1878 a bill was
passed that changed this standard of
value from 4124 grains of silver to
25.S grains of gold. The same name
was used for this new unit-the word
dollar. From that time until now
our measure of value has been 25S
grains of gold, AT the same time
this change was made silver was re-
stricted to payments less than SIS and
silver was refused free coinage.
Whatever silver coinage has been
done since that time the silver bull
lion has been bought by the govern
ment for that purpose. Since 1878
millions of dollars of silver has been
coined by our government at the
same standard weight, every dollar
representing 1858 grains of gold, and
a law was made that silver dollars
shall be full legal tender for all debts
public and private, unless a contract
is made to the contrary. Every time
you receive silver dollar in payment
for labor it represented the value of
25 $40 grains of gold; because our
government will take it in payment
of debts due them-such as taxes,
revenue and duties on imports
in value with gold dollars. The full
legal-tender law is what fixes their
value. The statement that our gov
eminent will redeem silver in gold,
and that our government keeps the
value of silver dollars up in that way
is false. don't propose to have you
take my word for this. I have here
o letter from the treasurer which
reads as follows:
| Treasury Department, Office of Sec
rotary, Washington, d. G. Aug. %,
1895. A. w. WEEKS, Winterset, Iowa
Sir: In reply to your letter of the
18th inst. you are informed that there
is no law or regulation of this depart
ment which provides for the re-
} denption of silver dollars or silver
certificates in gold. Silver certifi-
Gates are, according to their terms,
redeemed by the government in sill
, yer dollars only, while the silver dol
lar, being a standard coin of the
United States, is not redeemable in
any other form of money. 1t has
never been the practice of the gov
7 eminent to redeem silver dollars or
S silver certificates in gold. United
States notes (greenbacks) and treas
ury notes of 1890 are redeemed in
gold when that is demanded. Both
] silver dollars and silver certificate s
! are received by the government the
same as gold in payment of oil debts
due the United states.
Respectfully yours
w. E. CURTIS.
3 "Acting Secretary of the Treasury
r For years past money has been get
S ting scarce and things which you pro
duce have been going down in price
y Machinery has increased your ability
J, to produce, and for that reason the
d price of labor has not gone down a.
t much as goods, Had the price O
|, goods remained where it had beer
g you would now get twice as many
dollars for months work. If money
J. had increased in quantity equal will
: your productions prices would hav'
It kept uniform. Manufacturers Dor
n row money and employ labor. Whel
it takes more of the products of you
labor to get the money to pay bacl
IS the debt we have less profit, ant
r whenever profits are cut down SO VIZ
. do business at q loss we are obliged
q to stop our factories and you go I'm
:, employed. That is the situation
q now.
since 1904 whom tho hapkS of thi