Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1896-09-03
ITS EFFECT ON THE FARMER.

proft.-Lockport, n. Y. Journal.
ITS EFFECT ON THE FARMER.
why the Free Coinage of Silver Would
Not Benefit Him.
Suppose we had free coinage of sill
| yer; suppose that all the silver in this
country were minted and in circula-
ton, would that sell an additional
bushel of wheat for the farmer? If it
would, how would it? Let the farmer
ask this direct question of the silver
/ agitator and see what the answer will
| be-
Does the farmer know that in the last
diminishing, the exports of grain from
the Argentine Republic to Europe have
increased many fold? Why? Because
in the Argentine Republic labor is dirt
cheap and, therefore, the Argentine
wheat raiser can lay down his product
| the American farmer can. This is true
also of Russia, of Egypt and of South
Africa. The American free trader lied,
then, when he told our farmers that
the Wilson law would open to them
the markets of the world. The mar
kets of the world have been opened to
grain raisers who employ cheap labor.
In the Argentine Republic farm labor
ers receive less than 25 cents a day in
silver worth only so cents on the dollar:
\ Ill ypL anu IGuSSld lucy IcCclFC SCdlSC-
| ly more than that for weeks wages.
| What, then, will sell the crops of the
| American farmer at better prices? Only
a protective tariff law that will put to
work so many men in the manufacture
ing centers that there will be an in
cereals. When, under the Mckinley law,
$500, 900 more wages were paid
year than now, the earners of these
wages spent the bulk of that three hum
dred millions of wages annually in food
and clothes. This made the home con-
sumption of cereals so heavy that there
| was not, as there is now, an enormous
! surplus of American farm products seek
ing in vain a market abroad. 1t is this
enormous surplus caused by the inability
of the American wage-earner to buy in
as large quantities as when he had
steady work at full wages that has bat
| tered down the price of wheat. And
when cereals had to go down to find a
market the cheap-labor grain raisers
could go lower than the American and
| where the American surplus was offered
| for sale.
If we put to work in the manufacture
ing districts the tens of thousands of
men who are not now buyers in the
home market for the reason that they
have less, or nothing with which to buy;
it we enable employers to pay out again
that additional $3OO,OOO,OOO a year in
wages; if we make every able-bodied man
in the United States a buyer and con-
sumner of farm products, the farmers will
sell more cereals for home market con-
sumption alone than they now sell to the
whole world. This will make better
| prices; for, with our home consumption
demanding an increased supply, there
will not be Oh the European market mill
ing for a buyer at any price: With the
European supply thus diminished by the
| increased consumption in America. Euro
pean prices will advance; for Europe
must have wheat. When we offer Eu-
rope twice as much wheat as she wants,
! however, Europe can fix the price. But
when Europe needs twice as much wheat
as we send her we can fix the price,
But look at the other side. If we ad-
here to the policy of free trade we shall
continue to pay less and less wages to
the American workngman. His con-
sumption of cereals, therefore, will di-
minish steadily. Each year there will
be bigger surplus of cereals, and so
| the price of wheat and other grains must
fall still lower. And added to this de-
structive operation of free trade there
will be free silver. Small as free trade
makes the gross value of wages now
paid. free silver would make it still
smaller. The Wage-earner who now gets
81 day may get too little-that is the
result of free trade-but his dollar will
buy a dollars worth of flour. Free sill
yer would cut down the value of that
dollar one-half. He then could buy in
the home market only one-half of what
he now buys. That will reduce the de-
| mand for cereals among wage-earners by
just that much. The farmer will suffer
just as much as the wage-earner-the
wage-earner because he cannot buy, the
farmer because he cannot sell.
The hope of the American farmer is
the home market. The backbone of the
home market is the American wage
Garner. The farmer cannot exist without
| the wage-earner; the wage-earner's life
| depends on protection. In protection only
is the salvation of the American wage
Garner and the American farmer-New
| York Press.
What Is Dollar?
An honest dollar is a coin that will
be accepted for 100 cents in any part of
the commercial world.
The gold dollar contains 1922 grains
of pure gold. Put it in the pot and
melt it into bullion and you do not de-
Put the silver dollar i'll the pot and
melt it down and it is worth about SO
cents. 1t contains 371.25 grains of
pure silver and passes for 100 cents
Why does this coin. worth but So
| cents, pass for one dollar?
Simply because the government under
takes to float it at it's face value and
relies upon it's gold reserve to do so.
Suppose the gold reserve to disappear.
Suppose every dollar in gold to flee the
country. Suppose the government, no
longer able to rely upon it's credit, can
no longer maintain that silver dollar at
par. What then?
Come. We farmers of Pennsylvania,
New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland,
among whom the Inquirer circulates,
what would happen?
The silver dollar, which now passes
! for 100 cents, no longer bolstered up by
gold. would be worth exactly it's melting
| pot value-its bullion value at the mar
| ket price.
With the deprecated currency in your
hands, what would happen to you? You
would be ruined.
That is the long and short of this free
silver business. Vote for free silver if
you will, but make all your prepara-
lions in advance for bankruptcy.
You were fooled four years ago by
the agitators Is it possible that you
can be fooled again? Philadelphia In
quirer.
/