Little Falls weekly transcript. (Little Falls, Morrison Co., Minn.) 1894-19??, 1896-09-04

What, asks the farmer, are we to do
with our votes to remedy this wrong?
The plausible reply Of the silver
miners and their retainers Is this: We
will supply you with plenty OF money.
Delegates to us who can now mine and
smelt silver bullion to almost any ex-
tent at cost of sixty 600 to seventy
GO) cents an ounce, or about. 90 cents
on a. dollar the power to have silver
ingots or bars made into round pieces
of silver or coins in the mint at your
expense; also give us the power to
force you to take these round pieces OF
silver or coins which are named dol
lars, for your crops, at one hundred
and twenty-nine cents ($1.29) an ounce,
or at. one dollar for what costs us %
cents, and by this course we will ut
once advance your prices and perhaps
enable you to get as much in 5O-cent
silver dollars as you secured In gold
dollars in 1891 or even in 1881. That
course, they say, will profit us in fact
at the rate of thirty million dollars
($3O,OOO,OOO a year or more for three
or four years in our mining operations,
and will profit you in appearance at
somewhat similar ratio.
Undoubtedly the inside talk of these
silver barons and their confederates Is
something like this: ''These farmers
are slow, stupid fellows; a third OF
them are in debt, the rest want better
prices, and before they find out the
trick we shall get three or four years
of pickings and can pull out hundred
million dollars ($1OO,OOOOOO) for our
selves. In the meantime we will LEND
our profits on gold mortgages las Sena-
tor Stewart dOes) and keep the. re-
serves of all our own banks IN gold
coin las the banks in Representative
Newlands. state dog. We have done
this all along while we were making
our profits out of Uncle Sam under the
Bland anG Sherman acts
In reply to this plausible statement
by which the advocates Of free coinage
have attempted to mislead the farm
ers, the simple facts may be cited:
Under the Bland act silver bullion
had been bought at the rate of S2OOO,-
600 per month from 1873 to 1870 IN
der the Sherman act OF 1880 4,oOO,ooO
ounces had been bought month by
month until 1893. Under those two
acts the national debt due on demand
has been increased nearly $oOO,OOO,-
600.
At the end Of 1892 and in the begin
ming Of 1893 it became apparent that
this compulsory purchase of silver
bullion by means OF forced loan was
DESTROYING the credit Of the nation, and
with it the credit of every man III the
community. There are no crimes Ill
history which have ever inflicted so
much misery as the debasement OF the
coin of the realm. That was in part
accomplished by the Bland and Sher-
man acts, and that Is the avowed OBJ
iect of the silver miners and their con-
federates in the proposal for the ull.
limited coinage of silver dollars OF full
legal tender at 100 cents costing about
so cents on a dollar in gold. =,
What happened between 1891 ana
1895 was that the evil effect Of this do
basement of coin came to light. Inc
beginning of the remedy in the repeal
of the Sherman act came too latc 10
prevent the disaster of 1899 and the
even worse conditions of 1896.
The greenback craze preceded ana
brought on the panic of 1873. Inc
Greenback party was, crushed out OF
existence in. 1874, when the Who!e
West sustained President Grants veto
of further imitation.
The silver craze will be crushed out
by the uprising Of the farmers OF the
ten grain growing states in November
IN support of the present standard ana
only lawful unit of value, dollar
made of gold. This gold standard al.
ready existed, but was establlshed
more fully by Andrew Jackson ana
Thomas Hart Benton in 1884. 1t was
re-established by almost unanimous
consent of congress in 1873, after an
exhaustive debate beginning in lS'o
Again re-established in the resumption
act of 1875. Restored in its full in
tegrity Jan. 1, 1879, when specie pay
ment was resumed, it has been main
tanned throughout the wonderful Pc
riod of progress in the ten gram
growing states until 1892. Then the
subtle poison of national discred1t un,
der the threat Of deDasement exposed
the cause and brought the true remedy
into view.
That remedy consists in banding to-
gether the farmers, manufacturers,
business men and Notwithstanding
and Republicans alike-in a great
union party for the maintenance OF the
honor and integrity Of the nation and
the restoration of general prosperity
by crushing out the fraud to which
thousands upon thousands of honest
hut MISGUIDED men have lent their aid
under the specious sophistry Of the
silver miners, their attorney In con-
cress and their confederates in the
public agitation of their dishonest ef-
tort edward Atkinson.