The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1896-08-31
Senator Stewart of Nevada,
Writes a Long Letter.
Accuses Him of Misrepresenta.
ton and FaIsehOod.
WAS NOT FOR GOLD.
Shows Congress DemOnetized
Silver UnknowingIy.
Sherman Knew 1t and Favored
1t PurpOSely.

art mas replied to the charges of John
sherman that he was for gold in 1874
in the following letter:
United States Senate, Washington. D.
e, Aug "a, 1S96.-John Sherman, Mans
Held, O.: Dear Sir-In your speech of
August Is, 1896, delivered at Colunn bus.
o., you grossly misrepresent me You
quote garbled extracts from a speech 1
made IN the senate on the 18th of June,
1874, when was advocating a return to
specie payment and inadvertently used
the term gold for specie - which
was very common in those days. If
you had printed the context it would
have refuted the inference you drew
from the extracts you did print. The
speech is quite lengthy, and your quo
tat1On is made by selecting at various
places sentences or parts of sentences
and Stringing them together to make
them mean what you desire, and not
what they really did mean when ut
tered.
The eighth section of the bill under
consideration provided for the redennp-
reissuance of greenbacks, a scheme I
commended, to increase the bonded in
debtedness, and for no other purpose,
WhereupOn 1 remarked:
One of two things is true: either the
senate is in favor of resumption of spe-
Gle payments at some future day alb
soIutely, or it is not. If that be the
question, why cannot it be plainly put
that on a day fxed-let US fix such a
day as the majority can agree upon
the government will pay in coin all
its debts and will demand coin for
taxes? Why not fix 1t right out man
fully? You say that it will not have
the coin; that we have not got the coin
to do IT. We have the coin for all the
demands we make for coin. We de-
mand that the duties on imports shall
be paid in coin, and $500, OCO 600 of coin
per annum is found to do that. There
is no difficulty about it. The larger
part of our revenue is now paid in coin.
Because you use it for that purpose
it comes in. II you said the duties
should be paid in greenbacks there
would hardly be any coin in the coun-
try in a month It would all go out
if you did not use it. When the de-
m2nd coin, when you make a use for
coin, there is no difficulty in getting it,
Congressional Record, Vol. 2 part s.
Forty-third congress, first session, page
49O7.)
Further on in speaking of coin I fell
into a common error and used the term
o. gold as many others did in that and
other debates. I will quote a para
graph from which you garbled a por-
ton of your extract:
Sir, the labOring man, the producer,
is entitled to have his product and his
labor measured by the same standard
of the world that measures your ma
tional debt. Give him the money di-
rectly; let him have it. The cOnsti-
tuition provides that the United States
shall coin the money. Give him such
a standard; give him such money as
you require from him. You require
1t from the consumer and the producer;
you require from the Iaboring man gold
to pay the interest on your national
debt, which IS right, which cannot be
avoided, if we mean to save the ma
tionaI honor; but then give him the
same money with which you pay that
debt. Do not take 81 from him and
reduce it to 81 before you apply it to
the payment of the debt. What better
off is the laborer?
He has to produce a dollar, and in
order to get dollar to pay interest on
the debt you tax him one dollar and
fourteen cents, because you have to re-
duce it to gold. All these manipula-
lions he does not understand. Let him
know the exact measure. Why do
you want so much abstraction, so much
mystification, so much printing, so
much figuring, so much manipulation
between the honest man who tolls
ceives his interest? On every turn the
producer loses, because you resort to
an India rubber scale, crooked devices,
which are q cheat and a fraud. Ibid.
page 4907)
From the foregoing the country will
see that you misrepreSented me in pre-
tending that I advocated the gold
standard instead of the "cOin' stand
ard of both gold and silver.
On the Goth of August, 1898, you made
a similar attack on me and quoted from
a speech I delivered in the senate on
the 18th of February, 1874, in which
was opposing an increase of national
bank circulation. I then said:
The only way to relieve the country
is to move right back to specie pay
ment; let every man in the country
know what the value of his money is;
leave no margin to put up gold or put.
down gold, to put up greenbacks or to
put down greenbacks as compared with
gold: leave no specula ton of that kind
Congressional Record, Vol. 2. part 2,
Forty third congress- first session, page
1929
In the course of my remarks on that
occasion I used the word gold for
specie" The context Of that speech
also shows that I was not advocating
the gold standard as against the dOu-
BILE standard, or anything of the kind;
that I simply used the word gold for
specie or coin, a common error often
committed while the gold board was in
operation in New York. The silver in
the dollar at that time was worth more
than the gold in the gold dollar, and
the term gold" was frequently used
to indicate specie or coin. The con-
text of both these speeches and the sub
jeet matter under consideration show
plainly what was intended, and that
they had no reference to the gold
standard No man knows this fact
better than yourself. At the time these
speeches were made I did not know
that YOU had demOnetized silver in the
mint act nor did your colleague, Sen
ator Thurman. know it, nor did any
leading member of either house who
had spoken upon the subject know It
IF vo11 still insist that President
Grant knew that you demOnetiZed sill
Yer in the mint act, I desire to call your
particular attention to what your col
leagues in the senate and mousse al the
time said when it became known that
silver had been demonetized. and par
ticularly to the statement of your col
league, Judge Thurman: 100
~ lFeafDr q nv
when the bill CH. R. 10s3) to authorize