Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1896-10-16

young, folds Of waving grain and or
chards OF luscious fruit would grow
and ripen, towns and cities would be
built and the channels of trade would
teem with industry and Shylock would
seek some other commodity with
which to corner and control prices and
enslave mankind. Gold and silver
have been established as metals out
OF which to make circulating med
ium OF exchange. That is all there
is to it. The money is not wanted by
the great mass of American people be-
cause it is money. They only want it
because it is convenient and safe
medium of exchange. If the volume
of money is limited, it consequent,
must be hard to get. If thing is
hard to get, it costs more to get it. If
1t costs more to get it, that means
more labor and products OF labor. If
money is scarce, products and labor
must necessarily be low, because peo-
pie are willing to give more labor and
more products to get that which they
must have. Mr.. Reed says that more
hay-racks would not create more hay.
| Applause. If, in certain COM
munity, there are 900 tons OF hay to
move, and only hay-racks to move 500
tons, some one who has hay to move
will offer increased prices for the hay
racks, and increased prices for
hay-racks means cheaper hay And
so with money. When money is
scarce and products are plentiful, as
they are now and have been, people
demand medium of exchange to
move their crops and products. That
medium is now not half of what it
should be and to save crops from
spelling people offer products cheap
to get the medium which they must
have to pay taxes, interest and many
| other fixed charges that cannot be
settled by barter and trade. If you
sift it right down to bedrock it is the
best silver argument in the world and
it is their own proposition too.
J. Lawrence Laughlin, of the Chi
cago University, says that money is
like bridget helps to convey the
products from one side of the stream
to the other and that building more
bridges across the stream would not
cause more products to be produced.
II money is bridge, and l will agree
with him, then if there is little mar
row bridge across a stream and there
are lots OF products on one side and
thousands OF people on the other side
and you cannot get the products
across fast enough, somebody is going
to get pushed into the stream. There
are millions of cattle upon the hills
| and all kinds of live stock and farm
ing products in unlimited quantities,
and yet the bridge is so narrow that
the products cannot get over and the
people are starving. Money is merely
n means OF conveying produce from
one man to another so that you can
dispose OF what You have that you
don't want and buy that which you
don't have and you do want. Take
any OF their arguments as to the ne
cessity OF money, and they demon
strate at once the necessity of having
more hay-racks and more bridges.
THE EASIEST THING IN THE WORLD TO
GET SCARED is GOLD.
DO any OF you gentlemen recollect
the time when the country really
needed assistance that there was ever
q dollar in gold in sight? Where did
the gold go2 1t was like the goldbug:
it all got out of sight and it stayed
there for fourteen years after the war.
How did We fight the battles? Why
with the poor, miserable, despised,
rag-baby money-paper money. With
paper money, not gold or silver, we
equipped the army and navy, and we
fought the greatest battle in the his
tory OF the human race and we paid
the soldiers in paper money and the
bond-holders in gold. Now l want
to ask this question: What does the
silver party propose to do about this
money question? Our plank is
simply this: AS we need more money
we propose to secure it by the free and
unlimited coinage of gold and silver at
the ratio OF 16 to l, without waiting
for the consent OF any other nation.
Applause. That is the financial
policy of the silver party. Free and
unlimited coinage of both gold and
silver. Whatever money may be
needed in addition to that must come
in direct issue from the government of
the United States, without the inter-
ventiOn OF any bank, corporation, Shy
lock, syndicate or anybody else. Ap.
plause.
We are going to run this govern
ment as a government of the people.
[Applause.] 1t will be run by the
people, for the people, and not gov.
ernment of syndicstes by syndicates
and for syndicates. Now, what does
the gold party promise? That is a
pretty hard question to answer. They
say that until we can get international
agreement we will continue the pres
ent gold standard. But they condemn
the present gold standard before they
say that and promise and pledge their
own party to international bimetal-
lism. Why? Because the gold stand
ard is bad thing. And if it is not a
bad thing why get international agree
ment? What do they propose to-day?
We must judge them by what has been
uouo ny tue hepuOllCaH party III tue
past-by various bills which have
come up in Congress and out OF Con-
gress - by the straws which show
which way the stream runs. 1t has
been recommended by Cleveland and
his friends that all the treasury notes
and greenbacks be redeemed by issuing
five hundred million dollars iu bonds
the greenbacks and treasury notes
amount to about five hundred million
dollars. 1t is q debt of the govern
ment. 1t circulates as money and the
government pays no interest on it.
They propose to take that up. Why?
Because these patriotic gentlemen are
afraid we will Use it and we must keep
these patriotic gentlemen from wreck
ing the credit of this country. These
gentlemen are so patriotic that they
cannot withstand the temptation OF
drawing all the gold out of the treas
ury. We must issue bonds and take
up the currency. Five hundred mil
lion dollars at three per cent. would