The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1896-08-15
STATEMENTS THAT CONFLICT.

The silver propagandists should get
together, agree upon a story and then
stick to it. The way they are contra
dieting one another now is very destruc-
tive to their theory. One set tells the
people that as soon as silver is admitted
to free coinage it will advance to pari-
ty with gold-that is to say, that it's pur-
chasing power will be equal to that of
the gold dollar. They hurl back the
charge that they ere plotting for 53
cent dollar with scorn and defiance.
They say their dollar will be equal to
the gold dollar. Another set ID arguing
with great solemnity and much feeling
that free coinage will be great boon
to the debtor, since it will enable him to
pay of his debts with less products. The
apparent dishonesty of such transao-
tion they dispose of by saying that the
gold dollar has appreciated in purohas-
ing power, and the amount of products
needed to pay debts havin G thus been In
creased, 1t is no more than fair that they
should be scaled down by means of the
silver dollar. Once in a while the same
orauor uses both of these arguments in
the same speech, either not discerning
himself how one kills the other, or trust
ing that his audience will not discover it.
lf the silver dollar after tree coinage re-
mains on a parity with gold 1t will cor
respond precisely to the silver dollar we
now have which everybody knows will
buy just as much as the gold dollar.
Such q dollar will be just as
hard to get as the present dollar-that
is to say, man will have to, give just
as much wheat or corn or labor to get 1t.
Manifestly suoh dollar as that can
bring no advantage to the debtor class.
A debt cannot be paid any more easily
with that than with gold dollar, since
its price in products and labor will be
just as much. If silver then advan ces
to parity the debtor class will got no
relief from it whatever, unless it takes
wheat and corn and every thing
esle that men sell along with it. But
this it cannot do. Supply and de-
mand regulate price. There will be no
greater demand for wheat or anything
else but silver under free coinage than
there is now. and there will be no less
supply. Silver will be- lifted, if lifted at
all, by the increased demand, but there
will be no increased demand to lift wheat
and corn. There Is such thing as an
apparent rise of the price of products con-
sequent on oheapening the value of the
dollar, but in this case what really happens
is a fall in thesprioe of money and not a
rise in the price of products This kind of
a rise may happen under free silver COIN
age If the value of the dollar falls, but
only on that condition. If it's value
remains stationary the price of products
will remain stationary, unless there is
some variation of the supply and de-
mand to affect them. If prices go up
under free silver it will be because the
value of the dollar goes down. But the
value of the dollar cannot go down if 1T
is to remain at parity with gold. If,
therefore, the silver dollar of free ooin-
age is at a parity with gold prices can
not generally go up. Hence
the claim that free coinage will
keep the silver dollar at par with gold
is utterly inconsistent with the otho
claim e that free coinage will bring
about general rise of prices, which
will benefit the debtor class. Either one
of these things may como to pass-though
the first Is very remote possibility-but
both of them cannot