New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1896-06-03

rassed to the last degree, and but foa
''free WOOL in your last tariff bill, thu
situation of Australia must by this time
have become desperate. These sever
debtor Australian colonies are financial
| " in the same strained condition, Because
of the fall of prices, that any seven d
your once prosperous debtor states arr
now in; their prospects and yours arr
equally engulfed by the increasing bur
den of fixed debts.
I believe that not much later the mos
bigoted gold-monometallist will be OBJ.
liged to recognize the disease. Sine,
| 1878 we have so legislated to dep1es.
the price of silver that 80O,OOO,OOO O
Asiatics are able to buy silver--their sill
yer money-at about half price; thes,
/ hordes of Orientals selling their produc
in Europe for the gold sovereign, tina
sovereign now senis them back, wher
exchanged into silver, twice as many ru.
pees or taels or yens or dollars, as wa!
the case twenty years ago; and mean.
while, all the evidence shows conclusive
ly, that the value, the purchasing power
of the Indian rupee, of the Chinese tael
of the Japanese yen, of the dollar of the
Malay peninsula is no whit reduced
This is, I believe, the burden too griev.
Gus to be borne by the industries of com
peting white men, although the press OF
the great s'creditor nation" England, and
equally of the great creditor State, New
York, revels IN objection to this, the ev-
ident and rational explanation of your
present troubles.
AS to whether by going to free coin
age, your great community can main
tain steady exchanges everywhere at 1
to 16 between gold and silver, am not
going to dogmatize. At Brussels found
much difference of opinion. Mr.. Her.
man Schmidt, whose knowledge of ex-
change problems entities his opinion to
respect, believes that you can. Mr..
Grenfell, on the other hand, thought
some small gold premium in New York
probable. M. Raffalovitch and M. Fou-
girel, two eminent Economists, inclined
to the view that such moderate gold
premium, acting as protective tariff,
the premium falling when you had a
bountiful harvest and large exports, and
rising in the event of harvest scarcity
and reduction of exports-that such an
automatic tariff as this premium would
create is likely to be welcome both to
your Protectionists and to your Free
Traders, and, if so, will obviate the ne
cessity in future for frequent changes in
your tariff, a contamination much to be
desired. For my own part, I have al
ways believed that Lold Aldenham-
then Mr.. Gibbs-was light when he ae-
clared in his evidence before our Curren-
~ Commission in 1886, that any "first-
class nation," but especially America
could go safely to free coinage. Mr.
Gibbs is, as you are aware, one of GU,
"merchant princess" man whose whole
life has been spent in trading with every
part of the world, and to whom ex.
change complications are as familiar as
the points of the compass to a mariner
Who is in position to ridicule such ar
authority as this? Certainly not the Or
| binary editors of daily papers, who ye'
| continue to call that "free silver" which
Lord Alderman declared practicable {
"craze.''
| A word IN conclusion. On certain
Monday in June, 1898, the ratio OF sill
yer to gold was as to "a; on the Fri
day of the same week it was i to 80
your ''seventy dollar" had in fou
days become ''fitty-cent dollar
why?. Because the minis of single for
eign country, India, mot 'stirst-rate'
country in point of trade) had beer
closed. Presumably, then, had the In
dian minis reopened on that Friday, the
ratio would have reverted from to &c
to to "a before the following Wednes
day. Now let me ask those who objec1
to free coinage in the United States, wha
would have been the effect if, on thai
same Wednesday, you had opened your
minis to the free coinage of silver? L
India single handed Lad been able t.
raise the ratio twenty per cent.-that is
from 1 to 80 to to 24-by free coinage
would not the additional support Of the
| United States have carried the ratio to ]
to ia rise Of 33 per cent. more; and
if the United States could not have &C.
complished this though free coinage
will somebody explain why? T.
The great difficulty, I am aware. as K