The herald., 1896-08-30

liberately put the new dollar into the
subsidiary coin list by refusing it the
right of legal tender for any amount ex-
ceeding S. This he tells us on Saturday
was wise measure of public policy,
carefully discussed and considered dur
ing three years"
How could he have struck a more
deadly blow at silver than to have placed
SO much of it in the dollar that it would
sink, and officially declare to the world
the United States proposed henceforth
to put enough silver in a dollar to dis
credit it. Does any intelligent person
believe that Sherman did not know that
that act would so discredit silver as TO
demoralize and destroy it as one of the
money metals Of the world. That France
would be compelled to abandon silver.
when the United States, the greatest
silver producer of the world, had not
only repudiated 1t by refusing TO coin
any silver money having an unlimited
tender quality. but had discredited it
as well by adding more silver to the
dollar.
This in my judgment is what Sherman
should have said at that time to the
world:
You have been scrambling for our
silver so long that we are unable to
keep 1t with us because there is so much
silver in our dollar that in the open mar
ket of the world it is worth more than
gold. We hereby announce a different
policy. We will put ~ more grains of
silver in the dollar than there is in the
standard dollar, and then take this new
dollar from the standard money class
and put it in the subsidiary coinage, with
nickel, copper, zinc and tin-take from
1t its character as money-make a base
metal out of it and we will coin it on gov
ernment account only. as that appears
to be the only way we can get silver to
go to our mints at all; the owner don't
want to lose per cent by taking it
there. Deprive it Of the unite of value
and give to gold the power to measure
all things, silver included, the same as
it does potatoes and corn, and that will
cure France of the 151a to Silver craze
We will now give you 420 grains of stand
ard silver for every one of your gold
franc dollar. You needn't exchange this
amount of gold for 3S4 grains of our sill
yer for our governmentwills supply you
with 420 grains of silver for every dollar
you can send us. 1t is true that the
United States are principal producers
of silver and we are obliged to you for
maintaining the price so long, but the
price has been too high. We want to
lower it and destroy it as a precious
metal, and to show you we are in earn
est in the matter we will now give you
~
have been anxiuos to get it. and If that
is not enough to discredit and destroy
silver we will give you more silver in
the dollar still. All civilized nations are
going on to a gold basis, and gold shall
measure the property Of the world.
We are going to emerge from the age
of silver barbarism. Don't delay the
progress of civilization by preventing
the establishment of the universal gold
standard. Advance the price of gold.
The silver dollar which 1 told the sena-
tor would float all over the world did
not materialize, but we have provided
one with so much of this base metal that
it will sink, and in future when the
United States treasury is full of this
base metal that won't float (there were
1914, $40, 146 silver coin and silver bull
lion in the treasury August 1, 1880 the
American people may know what is the
matter with the monetary system, but
1t will be too late to remedy it then.
And If an attempt is made J. will call the
attention of the wage Garner to the SO
cent dollar and that will forever es-
tablish the gold standard. Silver Is
doomed
That was the proclamat ton issued to
the world by the United States govern
ment in 1873 through John Sherman.
who was the officiating statesman, and
today he tells us he is the friend of sill
yer! "And Caesar was an honorable
mani"
France had maintained ratio of 151A
to 1 since 1903. and maintained there
by during that time a value for silver
greater than we gave 1t, and resulted