Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1896-08-20

ElectsSclty feeds on coruWoou, coal
and gasolene: while bicycles feed on
wind. Has gold or silver anything to
do with the low price of horses and
oats?
Your oracle may sheer at the above
and say, 30 pshaw! there are just as
many horses now as there ever were
and the assessment rolls will show it"
To which we answer that the
error, if it exists, is with the tax rolls.
In the years prior to 1885 the HERALD
printed thirty-five different sets of
posters advertising that many horses
which were kept for breedingpurposes.
At that time there were six other
printing offices in Grant county. If
they also printed the same number
and it is fair to presume they did
then there were in the county 245
advertised stations. Following out
the thought, you can figure large
number of colts bred in this section
alone. In the spring of 1896 there
were not over five horse bills printed
in all Grant county Scarcity of
money had nothing whatever TO do
with the lessened number of horses
and the large piles of uneaten oats.
The knowledge of money is not so
difficult to arrive at as many of us
imagine. Once you have cleared away
the tangled mass of creepers with
hard names attached that surround
the tree. but that are not part of it,
the naked truth rises before you plain
ly enough.
Some of our people think that if the
government would only do certain
things. such as to issue note and
call it money. all would be well. Who
is the government? Bill Jones and
you and l constitute government.
Not having the time to 60 to Wash
ington each one for himself we Jointly
send Jim Brown there to meet with
other men who have been sent there
in like manner to make laws govern
ing all the people. You and Bill Jones
would rot take my note for fifty thou
sand dollars and call it money and
buy and sell with it until worn out.
Bill Jones and | would not take your
token of money and give you potatoes,
clothing. cattle, gold watches, plows,
wheat, newspapers, hogs, shoes. tin,
wagons, and the like, unless we were
sure of getting their full value in re-
turn. You might die, you know; then
your money token would only be val
liable as an ornament to grace some
old coin collection, and would be worth
16 thousand dead dollars to l live
cent; just as jeff Davis and his gov
eminent pals died and their money
tokens are now displayed in cheap
curiosity shops. Jones and l might
have famine in our country and be
forced to send to Germany for lIraut
and sausage to prevent starvation, in
which event they might refuse to take
our note or token money, because they
in turn could not trade it to Russia
for dynamite bombs, because Russia
could not trade it to Italy for stilettos
and harpstrings, because Italy could
not buy with it ice from Norway.
The word money is obnoxious to
some of our citizens who claim to be
the more advanced in financial mat
tiers. They prefer the word token =
"A token of our governments indebt-
edness," is the way they word it. So
besides Mr.. Vanderbilt having about
all the token money there is to make
merry on, you owe him all the money
he already owns? You certainly are
in debt to him for all the millions he
possesses, because if every body in the
United States were to die excepting
you and Vanderbilt, then you two
constitute the government, and he
holds the token money of your in
debtedness and if you cannot redeem
it he is ruined man.
There are at least three kinds oil
money or tokens.
One is gold, claiming to have its Il
value within itself because it will p
anywhere on the globe in exchange
for anything that is grown or pro-
duced in any way. You can melt il
and pound it into any shape you
choose, or puncture it with holes, OF
bury it in the ground for thousand
years, and whatever it weighs upon