Santa Fe daily New Mexican. [volume] (Santa Fe, N.M.) 1885-1897, 1896-09-26
PRESS COMMENT.
An Honest Republican View.

We are all working for common end,
no doubt; all sincerely convinced of the
virtue of the cause we advocate; but it
seems to US that good many-too many
of our gold standard orators and writers
are confusing and befogging the contro-
versy with statements that are silly and
propositions that are irrational Instead
of sticking to the one point of conse.
quence, the preservation of the public
credit and the equilibrium of our financial
system, they wander off in foolish and
irrelevant digressions-the wages paid in
Mexico, the condition of labor in japan
and Patagonia, and such things that are
without significance of any kind in this
discussion. They are doing harm. They
divert the thoughts of the voter from the
essential questions involved in the cam
paign. They give the other side thou
sand opportunities for putting them to
sad confusion.
Perhaps there could be no more forci-
BILE illustration of this mlschievous non
sense than the talk about the "intrinsic
value" of gold. You will hear spouters
like Bourke COCHRAN declaiming upon
this intrinsic value, resorting to the
cheap argument of the man who had
gold dollar and silver dollar melted in
the fire, and who could take the molten
gold to the mint and get it remade into
100 cents, where in open market he could
get only SO cents for his molten silver.
OF course he does not explain that the
gold can be restored to 100 cents, be-
cause the minis are open to the coinage
of gold, while the silver declines to it's
mere commercial value because the mints
are closed to that metal. But Mr.. Cook
ran i'm presses only the very ignorant by
this so-called argument, and he leads the
iudicious to fear that he himself needs
"education" quite as sadly as do those to
whom be speaks. Webster defines Gin
trinsic'' as meaning "inward, internal,
real, essential, not accidentally or merely
apparent" The value of gold is confer
red by legislation. 1t is useful as money
more useful because more compact
than any other metal and hence the
civilized nations of the world have adopt
cd it as their medium of exchange and
their standard and measure of value. And
in our opinion the nations have acted with
conspicuous wisdom in this respect. But
suppose the nations were to close their
mlnts simultaneously to gold and to de-
clare that for the future no more gold
should be coined or made. receivable for
public and private deb.s-what then
would be the value of Mr.. Cockran's
melted dollar? That il where intrinsic
worth comes in. Gold, considered inde-
pendently of the Legislation which makes
it money, has very narrow field of use
fulness. 1t is good for filing teeth. 1t
works up very prettily into rings,
watches, spoons, etc, but what would 1t
be worth on it's merits as more commo.
dityf Let US suppose hundred persons
cast away upon desert island and left
there to make their own homes and pro.
vide for the necessities of life-which
would be the more desirable to them, q
bar of gold or a bar of ironf Which
metal would then be the moro potent fac.
tor in the equation of their destines--
which the more effective instrument in
lifting them from barbarian into civili-
zationf Here is the standard by which
to measure intrinsic value.
II would greatly sim pity the problem
now before the country If the gold talk
ers and writer's we're to keep to the path
of fact and reason. The question 10
whether We shall adhere to to the money
metal which the legislation Of the civil
lied world has made the standard, or, de-
parting from that, adopt a metal which
those nations have repudiated. All other
q uestions are WEAKNESS and vexation of
spirit Washington Post.