The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1896-09-11
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connection are wrong as to their Ian
guage, but right as to their facts. If |
am farmer and borrow $4,000 when
wheat is 81 per bushel; if legislation
alters the relation between money and
wheat so that when the time comes for
repayment, have TO pay 10000 bushels
of wheat, ! am exactly as much impov-
erished as if forgery, or fraud, or vIo-
lence had taken from me 10000 bushels
of my laboriously raised wheat. That
it happens to be mems thick-headedness
or legislators carelesSness that has put
this extra burden on me, does not light
en- my burden or ease my labors one
bit. Part of the national debt Of the
United States has been repaid in appre
ciated money, which has given the
holders twice, and more than twice, the
amount that was borrowed, and in so
far as economic causes alone or the inn
proved credit of your government ac-
counts for this extra payment, it is a
legitimate profit due to the lender, but
in so far as it consists in an artificial
alteration in the purchasing power of
the currency, it is an injustice to the
debtor. Some people talk as If there
was nothing wrong in increasing debt
or's burdens, so long as the nominal
amount of the debt is unchanged. | am
not afraid to tell you that whilst think
4
plus or minus, yet, of the two it is a
worse crime to rob debtors, who are
usually poor men, than to rob creditors,
who are presumably well-to-do. Now,
it is undoubted that the appreciation of
gold has robbed debtors and producers
for many years past, and (although you
do not expressly admit rs much) yet l
understand your argument to be this:
Even If Injustice has been done; if
/ 1ob ho. haa,, IafranAn1. IL
men have been made poorer by artifi-
ciai means, yet, as we cannot right the
past wrongs, and as another alteration
of the standard will injure some Of to-
| days creditors, il is better to let the
| gold standard remain; to let prices
stand at their present low level and to
let them fall still further ii they Will"
In reply to which l have to say that a
sprat cannot fairly be compared on
| equal terms with whale That there
are few creditors who will be preiudiced
by the proposed alteration, that most of
| them have largely benefited for years
past by appreciated currency aud that
| they are usually bankers or money
| lenders, who know how TO protect them
selves and against that possible, and
in any case, intinitesimal injustice, we
are bound to rememb ber that the consid-
erations to be taken into account on the
| OIncI sue are NdSl anu ONtI
and multitudinous. Throughout the
| length and breadth of the whole of the
| the United States there is not n house, a
barn, factory, mill, steamboat, n
| railroad or any other article or symbol
of wealth which existed ten yea& ago
which has not Injustly and improperly
deprecated in selling price owing TO
this artificial change in the currency.
Not one of them that would be valued
IL. l..
but for the change in the value of
money. Not a farm is worth so much,
or anything like so much as it ought to
be worth, and there is not crop which
| is being grown this summer in America
which will fetch its proper price.
Think what the last statement means !;
it means that American farmers and
planters are losing nearly Sl,0O0,OOQOOO
per annum on the selling price of their
crops. Can one wonder that farmers
are Impoverished or that they wish for
Bryan's success? If they knew the
facts as well as do there would be no
bounds To their enthusiasm on his be-
half. But it is not only farmers; all
producers would get better prices if sill
yer were restored to its ancient and its
rightful place as the principal money
of the world.
As locker on, ] am much amused to
observe that, whilst American public
men eulogize the Liberal party in Eng
land and look upon the Liberals as the
party of progress and OF justice, il is
precisely that Liberal party which has
allied itself with Lombard street to pre-
vent England from joining in the
movement for the restoration of silver
They openly rejoice that England is
able to buy American products at half
price and that we save flOO,OOOOOO per
annum in that way. If Americans
knew the facts of the case they would
abandon their admiration for the
Liberal party as it is at present con
stituted. ALE NEWTON.