The herald., 1896-07-11
The Evolution Of Indirection

JQlLOT dGIdlQs 4nC AASAeA0 ~ 49,
Goth published an article by myself call
ed Landless and Moneyless, that con-
tained an expression for which wish to
apologize.
In the spirit of David II said In my
haste" certain unfair words concerning
the late Republican convention In St.
Louis that l now retract. And DO this
without any prompting save inward re-
proof 1 wrote the article somewhat
hastily and contrary to my usual GUS
tom, enclosed and mailed 1t without cor
recting or even reading. I have many
friends on the single gold standard side
of the currency question. who are as
honest in their advocacy as am In my
denunciation of what deem a great
overshadowing crime against humanity
And 1 respect these friends too highly
to apply to them, even by implication,
ungracious epithets.
have reached my conclusions through
more than 20 years of careful study
and observations OF all sides of ques-
ton. whose affirmative side only has
been generally voiced and revealed by
the party press, while essential facts
have been carefully and persistently
suppressed.
l doubt not that II my friends and
others who now imagine that they be-
lieve in a single gold standard could
once get hold of these facts, as have,
through liberal contact with the reform
press, their verdict would more gener-
ally agree with mine. For this reason, If
for no other. say with my friend Rev.
r. M. Webster Let us be sweet"
But. aside from motives of courtesy
and generous liberation that should al
ways govern in a discussion that has
m a W 0ed las tc ton, fpv. a,
namenting this debate with epithets
forcible or otherwise. The bare facts
when once known, are amply sufficient
And what do these facts prove? They
prove conspiracy from 1S73-when silver
was stealthily demonetized-downt to '96
when for the first time the crime is open
ly glorihed and boldly stated and en-
bodied In a national party platform.
1t Is never necessary for honest men in
pursuit of honorable ends to resort to
double dealing. strategem and deceit.
said "silver was stealthily demone-
tized"
1t is a notorious fact that leading
members Of congress when they voted
for the coinage act. and even Presi-
dent Grant when he signed 1t, did
not, as they afterwards declared.
know that it involved the fatal
omission of the silver dollar and the re-
pudiation of its debt-paying power Had
the referendum then been a part of the
organic law, as II is destined to be in the
future when the people shall be truly
sovereign, the evil and the treason
might afterwards have been remedied
by the restoration of silver.
But. as 1t is. we have referred the mat
ter to our representatives, so called, and
where these have not been unduly "in-
fuenced" by the money lords, the veto
power has thwarted the will and the in
terests of the people.
In 1878, five years after the "demon"-
etization infamy, James G. Blaine, one
OF the many members of congress who
afterward declared their ignorance of
the poison secreted in the coinage bill,
said In speech delivered in February
of that year: II believe that the strug-
gle now going on in this and other
countries for a single gold standard
would, IL successful produce widespread
disaster in and throughout the CONNER
cial world
John G. Carlisle. then the idol of the
same Kentuckians who now hiss with
disgust and rage at the mention of his
name. said on February 20, 1878:
THE conspiracy which has obtained
here and in Europe to destroy by leg
islation and otherwise three-sevenths
to one-half the metallic money of the
world, Is the most gigantic crime of
this or any other age. The consumma-
ton Of such scheme would ultimately
entail more misery upon the human race
than all the wars. pestilences and fam
ines that ever occurred in the history
of the world
These are not "Populistic rantings,"
but the honestly and bravely expressed
convictions of two of the greatest lead
ers of the Republican and Democratic
parties, respectively.
And now all of these dire predictions
have been more than realized, and mill
ions Of people are on the verge of star
walton because nearly as many millions
of unemployed men and women dare
not ask for food-or even work-from
fear of being labeled tramp" and va
grant" and arrested as such under sane
tion OF government that has permitted
trusts and combines to absorb and con-
troll all the country'S vast lands, indus
tries and other natural means of live
lihocd. To hear men who have always
professed to be pupils and followers of
Blaine-and Of ]. c. Carlisle, before the
falp'-say now that they don't know
what the matter Is" and that the st.
Louis platform is good enough silver
doctrine for them," Is enough to make
the sphinx weep and Liberty enlighten-
ing the world blow out her torch and
jump into the sea- Carlisle, since that
truthful prediction, has changed his
mind. 1t was the hidden hand of uSury
in the year 1876, at the Cincinnati Repub-
lican national convention, that slew the
'plumed knight" and enthroned in his
stead Rutherford B. Hayes, who was
pledged in advance to veto the fee COIN
age bill-should one be passed-and who
was fraudulently counted in" for this
express purpose. We all know how the
party manipulators, inspired and steered
by English pilots, have, from that time
on, endeavored to obscure with ambigu-
Gus phrase-trimmings and "silver lin
ings" the form and dimensions Of the
Wall street golden calf.
This has been SO persistently done,
through the party press and political
platforms, that thousands Of honest,
and In some respects intelligent, voters
are utterly at sea on the money question,
and as regards the real meaning con-
yeyed In financial planks. Only a few
days since I heard Pasadena grocer
who is not an ignorant man-declare
that the Republican platform upon
which Mckinley stands is ''silver
Thousands of others will
De 1ooied In the same way by these Wall
street hypnotizers and yet it would seem
as though the wayfaring man, though a
grocer, ought to discern the gold inward
less or the political decalogue delivered
oy Mark Hanna to the new Republican
Moses Of Canton, Ohio.
The manner in which the single gold
idea has progressed through
political platforms, from bi-metallic pro-
fession to a final bold statement of gold
at the st. Louis conVen-
ton in June, has been the most
subtle and successful illustration
f evolutionary indirection in ras-