The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1896-07-19

st. Louis 80 1873 W.
Note-Barometer corrected for temperature
p. F. LYONS. Observer.
AS THE WORKINGMAN SEES TT.
Before the campaign of education
now going forward on the financial
question is ended it will be found that
each man makes up his mind largely
according to what he believes will be
the practical effect of silver monomet-
allism upon his own fortunes and the
circumstances of his daily life. A
large part Of the people. 1t is true.
probably the determining element, will
yield all this to considerations Of
honor. For them it is enough that
they believe the proposed measure to
be virtually an act of partial repudia-
Whether it be for their gain or loss,
they are not prepared to give serious
consideration to a proposition which
involves, in their minds, the cancella-
ton Of promise voluntarily made and
to be willingly kept.
The concrete side, however, is no less
powerful an argument for true bimet-
allism and against the9free coinage of
silver than the abstract Here, as
almost everywhere else, it is true that
seIf-interest and honesty go hand sins
hand. Put the matter to- the Working
man concretely. You are. getting a.
certain wage per day, per week or
per month. That wage has been fixed
by the competition of the market, and
you know better than any one else how
difficult fits to make any addition to it.
You have doubtless attempted on more
than one occasion to open the subject
with your employer. You have found
that no increase of compensation is
possible without a long and costly
trial of strength The employer says,
and the condition of the times bears~it
out, that he is now paying all that the
receipts from his business will war
rant. You know, as a matter Of fact.
that there are men out of employment
who would take your place if it were
vacant. sYou know that the most diff
fcult wsrk which could possibly be
set for you to do would not raise youp
salary bgsas much as even 10 per cent.
Now, consider what is going to hap
pen If we should have free coinage
according to the theory of the advo-
Gates of that doctrine themselves
They tell us that the stock Of money
In the country will be increased, and,
partly owing to that and partly owing
to the deprecated value of the silver
coin, the prices of commodities in gen
eral will rise. Whatever be the al
legged causes, that proposition is fun
damental with the free silver party.
They assert, first and last, that the
great benefit to come from their scheme
Is a general rise of prices. Now. the
situation that confronts our friend,
the workingman, seems tolerably clear
There is to be rise of prices You
will have to pay more for everything
that you eat and drink and wear. You
will have to pay more for rent and for
fuel The price of everything, if the
IL,
is correct, will continually and pro-
gressively rise. The gentlemen on
that side do not tell us where this pro-
cess is to stop. Inasmuch as their bug
bear is the arrest Of rise of prices.
we suppose that they intend to so ma
nipulate the quantity and quality of
the circulating medium that the price
of everything shall continue to in
crease forever. However that may be.
IT is going to increase, they say, for a
long time to come.
Now, again, see how this situates
our friend who is working for a fixed
wage. You will get no more dollars
or cents for days work than you do
now until you fight for it. You will
have to. pay more for everything you
buy. There will be, therefore an i'm
mediate difficulty, and presently an
impossibility. in making both ends
meet. You know perfectly well that,
except in the rarest instances, the
rise in general prices will not be ac-
companied with a voluntary increase
IN your compensation. You know
that a general rise in the wage
scale ins any country is the re-
suit only of a long continued series of
struggles between labor and capital.
in which the former has to expend in
advance almost all the benefits that it
gets from increased remuneration. in
order to overcome the resistance df
the latter. Upon you, therefore, Tfg
whole burden and cost of this sftpa-
ton must fall. For series of years.