The Jersey City news. (Jersey City [N.J.]) 1889-1906, 1896-06-25


Horace Rofes as an Anarchist.
In the Sworld' of yesterday, Horace
Boies made a vigorous plea for free
silver. It was a characteristic utterarce,
ana in 1T. there seemed to be embodied
about all the strength and all the weak
ness Of the silver cause.
The strength consists in a number OF
catchy appeals to the ears of the un-
thinking. The weakness was, of course,
the total absence of appreciation of
truth, the total lack of logical sequence,
the total abandonment of reflection as
to Consequences a word the utter
elimination of common sense from the
consideration of the subject.
Looking over Mr.. Boies' expressions,
We believe the strength is all to be found
IN, the following sentences, which we
select from it,
Shall we lie down, submit for all time
to a gold standard, with it's consequent
effect of ruinous prices upon the pro-
duets of labor, its practical destruction
of the great agricultural industries of
the sections in which we live, its certain
p~erpetuation of an enormous national.
corporate and individual Indebtedness
that can never be paid in money so
greatly appreciated in purchasing power
as our own has become through the de-
monetizatfon of silver?
Mr. Whitney evidently fails to appreci-
ate the fact that all he fears will come
about by reason of the characterization
of silver (or. as he would state it, the
tdebasement' of the currency will bring
little or no real suffering to the class
who win be injuriously affected thereby,
for they will stfl be abundantly supplied
with mean to meet all the actual neces-
sites of life.
Neither does he CMr. whitney, seem to
give weight to the fact that there is no
silver to avoid q scrupulous performance
OF both the letter and spirit Of every con-
tract that has heretofore been made,
dividual. What. they do object to, and
TiEhtfully, Is the proposition that these
Obligations shall be changed by law and
made payable in a currency that requires
double the human effort to obtain that
would be required to obtain the currency
in which. by their own express terms or
by the terms OF he law in force when
able.
We do net think there is anything I'M
fair in summing these assertions of pur-
pese UP under two headings, trus:-
1.-The plumber of the rich.
1.-The Reputation of debts.
The "morals, defence for the programme
is that the poor, viz, the Iabering ele-
nent and the farmers would be benefited
by It. ana they are the majority of the
people.
To a man who can gravely put forward
such q policy of National finance in a
Sarb 50 nearly approaching absolute
nakedness, it is perhaps useless to point
out that it is immoral. Clothed in the
sophistries of COINS Financial School.
tricked out in the innammatory rhetoric
OF Altgeld or Tillman, concealed beneath
the lachrymSse absurdity of Teller, these
IDEAS are deprived of some portion of their
cynical and socialistic truculency. There
Is always a feeble attempt to argue that
the plumber and reputation would not
really result, but, by some marvellous
hecus pecus, the rich and the poor, the
debtor and the creditor would profit
equally by the debasement of the coinage.
But Mn. Boies has the courage OF his con-
victions. He sees clearly what he wants
and he does not hesitate to ask for it. He
preclaims the gospel of confiscation and
population with e~ffrontery, confident that
nothing else will appeal SO effectively to
the passions which he desires to arouse
IN the peor and ignorant.
There is still reason to hope, however,
that the standard of morals Of the Amer
lean people is higher than Mr.. Boies
chooses to imagine. The average citizen
VIII not view the cataclysmic effects of
free silver with equanimity for no other
reason than because 1t will still leave
rich men the necessaries of life. Perhaps
some Of them will perceive the confession
in this that it will wipe out an enormous
proportion Of all existing property in
terests. lei some of them may ask
whsre the spoliation will stop. Where is
the line between poor and rich? How
Is the poor man to be saved from losing
half Of what he may have accumulated,
II half of the rich mans store is to be
n ped out? This Is a view of the case
which will appeal in particular to those
Of the humbler grades who are depositors in
savings banks, policy holders in insurance
companies, or holders of shares in build
ing n loan associations.
It would take too much space here to
prove the fallacy Of the claim that debts
are now payable in money embodying
double the intrinsic value Of that in which
the loans were made. A study Of the
currency conditions previous to the re-
sumption of specie payments. fhe period
generally selected by the author of
COINS Financial School" viii suffice to
answer flhtzA he assertion. tn only thing
worth cohzidefipg IN reality, is whether
fuctuatioas IN ttds currency value oc-
at the peril Of The debtor or the crsdi-
tor. Tn code Of morals and the code
u commerce have ~assuredly placed this
risk, like All other secondary risks. upon
the borrower. and ali the loans new out-
atanding have been made upon the faith
of this law. The immortality Of repeating
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