Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1896-10-01

ment to avail itself of arbitrary power to
oepase the coin which it had once issued
and which you have earned by hard days
work and laid away for a rainy day. That
is the robbery. 1t was called robbery in
the Fifteenth century. 1t is robbery IN
the Nineteenth century, isn't it? 1t Is
worse robbery now, because we ought to
De great deal better in this century than
we We're in that. Here is the other-thiS
Is the Gresham law that he announced
that 1t is impossible for good full weighted
coins and debased coins to circulate to-
gether. Why? II you owe me $40 and
you nave In one pocket $40 gold piece
and In the other pocket ten silver dollars.
and you thought there was a particle OF
danger, which there isn't, of Bryan's being
elected president Of the United States,
which would you give me. Laughter and
applause.l You would give me the money
which you suspected. You would say to
yourself, have the right to do either. l will
solve the problem in my own favor. will
[Cries of Good. good.] That is what you
would do. You would keep the good and
give me the cheaper"
A voice-So would anybody.
''That is human nature. Why, If you
knew man had to eat an egg for break
fast and you gave him fresh egg and a
bad egg, you wouldn't have any doubt
about which he would eat would you? IRE
newed laughter] It is precisely the same
principle. It is the seltishness Of human
nature and it is right because 1t is inn
planted by the God who made us. in every
human heart. 1t is that selfishness that
makes you, as you have alright to do, pre-
fer your interest and the interest of those
who are dependent upon you, to the in
terest of anybody else [Applause.] $50
Perhaps this will get into the news
paper and some of our friends on the other
side will read it down in North Carolina
and learn something about the original
principles of finance. 8
Ratio of Gold and Silver.
Fifth, that the coins of gold and silver
must bear the same ratio to each other as
the metals in bullion do in the market.
France in a single century had to change
her ratio some say 113 times, others $50.
Everybody admits, vast number of times
of the laws of trade, supply and demand,
in the commercial value of the coins. Now
little further and l am through
A voice-Is coal supply and demand or
combine and trust?
II am not talking about coal. I am talk
ing about money. 1 don't think myself
that the Democratic party Is in a very
good position to-day to say much about
trusts. The meanest, vilest fraud which
ever was embodied in the legislation Of
any land was put into the Wilson tariff
by them for the benefit of the Sugar
trust [Cheers.]
A voice-Put that in your pipe and
smoke it.
'.I am not through with that subject yet.
And while the Democratic party declares
against trusts it demands that that infa-
nous trust in the Wilson law shall be per-
mitted to stay there and to fitch the money
from the labor Of this land until the coun-
fraA r;>
plause.1 I am not speaking upon the as
sumption that my friend is in any wise
hostile to the position which I am taking
here tonight. He asks me about the eff
feet of the law of supply and demand on
the price of coal. Sometimes a combine
will defeat the operation OF that just as
the Sugar trust has defeated the operation
of the laws of trade with the assistance
of the Democratic free trade congress.
'Now let me go along moment. After
wards in the time of Henry VIII. Sir
Thomas Gresham, proceeding under the
direction of the king Of England investi-
gated the disturbance to the coins of Eng
land and came to the same conclusion as
had been reached and promulgated long
years before his day. The law which he
formulated was this: When two coins of
the same denomination, but differing in
commercial value, are current in the same
nation that which has the least value will
drawn from it as much as possible and
boarded, melted down or exported. In
short, that bad money always drives out
good money. Don't you think Alexander
Hamilton knew that? Don't you think
Thomas Jefferson knew that? What a pity
it was that Bryan did not live in that day
and generation to instruct Hamilton and
Jefferson in finance [Applause.] And so
they fixed the ratio of gold and silver
based upon the commercial ratio, and
when it was found that there was diff
ference of LIZ cents only between gold and
silver, the silver being that much less val
liable, owing to mistake which they had
made In ascertaining the bullion value, and
when Mr.. Jefferson found that under the
operation of this law of finance to which
have called your attention and which
never yet has failed, gold was being driven
out of circulation, he suspended the coin
age of that dollar. And yet these men
talk about restoring by free and unlimited
coinage of silver at a ratio of 16 to /, the
money of the constitution.
"Mr. Sawyer, addressing Senator Saw
yer], if Alexander Hamilton and Thomas
Jefferson could not permit gold and silver
to be 11s cents apart do you suppose they
bullion difference is 80 to l, restoration
of the money of the constitution?
One Solution of the Problem.
"But, gentlemen, you must recollect that
up to 1S34-for / cannot take the time to
go in detail into this further, although it
is of vital consequence to our people and
Of great interest to men who think-it in
wolves everything to our people, the ques-
tion whether our money shall be honest
money, whether it shall be stable money,
whether our credit individual and national,
shall be maintained, or whether it shall
be overthrown; it is everything to our
people, as much as good blood is to the
body and essential to the life of mankind.
Men cannot think too much about it or
study it too carefully. In 1884, you recol-
lect, to show you how complete the opera
ton and how delicate in finance this Gres-
ham law was, that when our newly coined
silver dollars were circulating alongside
of the Spanish milled dollar, which was
abraided and worn, that even that differ
ence drove out of circulation and led to
export the silver dollar. In 1884 my recol-
lection was they changed the ratio to 16
to L. Now England, Notwithstanding all
these investigations, as well as other coun-
tries, found they could not keep gold ana
silver at parity, and another investiga-
ton was made into that subject
II wish to call your attention, IL you
will permit me, to the result Of it. because
it Is what we have in the United States
to-day, and there is immense philosophy
in it. The variations and partings Of the
metals, the breakdown Of parity Of coin
in circulation, which were universal in diff