Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1896-04-10
THE MONEY FAMINE.
The VOLUME OF MONEY MADE
QUATE FOR BUSINESS.
The Suicidal Policy of EnthrOning
the Yellow Metal tm Debtor
Country - A Flexible Currency
Obtained Hy the RlmetaIlic Sys.
ten.
n. Y. Financial News

Country A Flexible Currency
Obtained Ry the BlmetaIlic Sys-
ten.
n. Y. Financial News
The money in the rural sections oi
the country has been gradually de-
creasing for years) with the e1cep-
tions of brief intervals), until now
there is money famine in all the
rural sections of the United States.
And as the dwellers in those Sec
tions of the country are receiving very
low prices for their products, they
have little or nothing with which
to purchase manufactured goods -
whether domestic or foreign-while
their payments for what they do buy
are made slowly and in some cases
not at all. We quote from a contem-
porary:
"The question is how long can the
manufacturers, importers and jobbers
hold out without borrowing money.
The large majority of them now
simply cannot borrow, because the
market for their paper does not exist.
1t is difficult to see how conditions
are likely to arise which will permit
OF their borrowing with any freedom,
unless trade, which is not good Just
| now, should take turn for the better
and enable the moving of merchan-
disc. An improvement, in collections,
is urgently needed to prevent what
might be rather serious trouble in the
commercial community"
At this juncture the Secretary of
the Treasury Cess power to him y calls
upon those New York city national
banks which hold deposits of the gov
ernment's money to pay over to the
government a part of their deposits,
and doubtless the balance of these de-
posits will also be drawn into the
treasury. OF course, this will in
crease the money stringency, curtail
the ability of the banks to accommo.
date the mercantile and commercial
communities and increase the num-
ber of business failures.
But what is a poor administration
to do, if it has pinned its faith, or sold
it's faith, to the policy of keeping the
yellow metal called gold in a debtor
country, where the price level is too
high to admit of COLDS voluntarily re-
naming? A poor administration
finds itself in a distressful dilemma
distressful to the public, which does
not, perhaps, worry this administra-
tion, and distresslul to the admins
tration, which the public would en-
dure with equanimity were not the
public suffering. For what can
poor administration do when gold
threatens to 60 abroad, unless the
stringency of money is made greater?
Yet to make the stringency greater
means lower prices and duller business
and greater depression, and alas alas
more thinking Con the part of the
sufferers at least) as to the cause of
their suffe.ings.
Yet if the people in the northeast
ern section of the land get to think
ing on this money subject, where
shall we be at, politically speaking?
How long will we be able to keep the
rank and file of the voters squbbling
with one another over the tariff, if
they find out the truth-that protec.
ton does not protect without bimetal-
lismy Would there not be danger of
the masses joining together into one
party. and, in spite of the prejudices
of their fathers (who were Democrats
and Republicans). getting some finan.
cial legislation passed for the general
welfare. Softly, softly, say the wiser
administrationists; do not make suffer-
ing greater by causing more money
stringency and therefore more think
ing. Peradventure the geld 60, we
can sell bonds for more. But that
will be greater proof than ever, and
clearer, of the desperation we are in
to keep gold in the country. Alacka-
day, but why did we commit our
selves to the gold monometallic folly?
Why, indeed, but to please my lord
creditors?
And that is, then, the prospect be-
fore us: To 60 on running the na-
tional government into debt to get
gold, that it may be put in the most
handy place for the exporters to get
it when they need to send it abroad,
or to contract the currency and SO
lower prices for things in general, ex-
cept gold. that by making that metal
worth more here thau elsewhere, our
creditors will let it stay here, to be
borrowed and used by us at rates not
the pleasantest.
Now, we are far from blaming any
gold exporter, whose business renders
it necessary to ship gold, if he gets
the yellow stuff and sends it away.
The: persons we blame are those in
high places who have helped to ag.
grandise gold and aided to give it its
present money monopoly. Yet more
than all we blame free people who
permit such servants to remain in
powerful places when they can vote