Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1896-06-04
MIR. soWARDs OFF.
EDITOR DEMOCRAT

EDITOR DEMOCRAT:
In a recent issue of the Register, Mr..
Stewards, the sage of Homestead, says
gold has not appreciated, that silver has
deprecated, that the farmers got more
for their wheat under the last year of
republican administration than ever be-
fore, and that 1.-The price of silver has
no more to do with the price of wheat
than the length of a cows tail has to
do with the richness of her milk"
AS TO the proposition that gold has
not appreciated let US put in the evil
dence OF those who know whereof they
speak. Mr.. Balfour, the English dnan-
cier, in 1892 said:
''And can we claim that great quail
ity for the gold standard which, by the
admission even of the monometallists
themselves, has appreciated in some
fifteen years no less than 80 to IS per
cent, and of whose appreciation no
man living under the existing system
can prophecy the limits"
]. Barr Robertson, another great
writer on economics, said, in 1893:
''Gold has increased in purchasing
power to the extent of at least 43 per
cent. That while it would take too
much space to enter into details regard
ing the practical effects of this appre-
citation of gold, it would suffice to give
some indication of the enormous injury
it had inflicted. if it is stated that the
transfer of wealth from the landed and
propertied classes and from the mercan-
tile, manufacturing and producing class
es generally in England, to the holders
of securities, mortgages, annuities, ETC..
cannot be less than $40, 900, 900, 900,
due solely to the appreciation of gold"
Robert Gifin, one of the greatest of
English gold-standard men, says:
''If events are the touch.stones of
prophecies, no prophecy was ever more
certain than the increased dearness of
gold. That the fall of prices to an ex-
tent so general as we are at present ex-
periencing is to be referred to an in
crease in the purchasing power of gold
is genarallys and 1 might say almost
universally, conceded"
Alfred de Rothschild, delegate from
England to the Brussels monetary CON-
ference in 1892, said:
Gentlemen, / need hardly remind
YOU that the stock of silver in the world
is estimated at some thousands of mil
lions, and if this conference were to
break up without arriving at any def
mite result there would be a deprecia.
ton in the value of that commodity
which IT would be frightful to contem-
plate, and out of which a monetary
panic would ensue, the far.spreading
effects of which it would be impossible
to foretell.
And did ever man prophecy more
truthfully? Although a gold.standard
man, Mr.. Rothschild recognized that
gold would increase enormously in value
if silver was not treated as money, and
what was there to prevent it when law
said that gold was the only metal en-
titled to coinage? Senator Sherman,
in letter of July 18th, 1873, said:
During the monetary conference in
Paris, when silver in our country was
excluded from circulation by being un-
dervalued, l was strongly in favor of
single standard of gold. At that time
the wisest among US did not anticipate
the sudden rise Of gold that has occur.
red. This uncertainty of the relation
between the two metals is one of the
chief arguments in favor of bimetallic
system, but other arguments showing
the dangerous effect upon industry by
dropping one of the precious metals
from the standard of value outweigh in
my mind all the theoretical objections
to the bimetallic system
That gold has appreciated l do not
think any fair minded man who has
given the matter any consideration will
deny, and as gold goes up commodities
must of necessity go down. There is
not an economic writer of standing in
the world but admits that gold is be-
coming dearer all the time, that less
quantity of the yellow metal will buy
more of the prodcuts of the farm at this
day than at any time in the history of
this country. And who is benefited by
it? Will some gold standard advocate
answer?
AS to Mr. Stewards statement that