Belding banner. (Belding, Mich.) 1889-1918, 1896-10-08
in A SILVER COUNTRY
Condition Of the Laborer and
Business in Land Where
Free Coinage Exists
WHAT THE MEXICANS SAY.
A Representative Of the St Louis
Globe Democrat Tells What
He Saw.

Since the free-silver people began 10
point TO Mexico as an ideal country
where the free coinage of silver had
made everyone happy, contented and pros
porous, there has been much written by
men who had lived there and others.
The reports, which were not hattering
TO the country, were denied by the Sill
YER advocates and branded as lies. The
silverites stoutly maintained that II Ia
Dor was as well employed here as In
Mexico the great question of what 10 90
with the poor would be solved as there
would be no poor. They claimed thht
in that country there was no Wall street
that food, clothing and the necessities
of life were cheaper: that the nation
was prospecting as ii never had Deiore'
and all on account of the free coinage
of silver.
The st. Louis Globe Democrat. wish
ing 10 be just in the matter, decided
TO send a representative there who would
report what he saw and learned, with
out regard as TO how the reports would
affect the political situation. The man
was one on whom the paper could de-
pend to tell the truth.
Extracts from some of the letters
which throw some light on the subject
of free silver and its effects are printed
below:
Prices Depend on Foreign Exchange.
Pirates on the high seas could hard
~ be "A more dangerous menace to com
merce between nations than this huctua-
ton of exchange between countries on
different standards. Outside of few
money-changers at coast ports, business
men of the states hardly notice from
week to week the variations in exchange
between their country and Europe. But
in the business relations between the
United States and Mexico the changing
difference between the standards is
matter of hourly concern.
whats exchange today" goes with
every mornings salutation between mer-
chants in Monterey.
''Silver's up" or "silver's down" is the
commercial news of first Importance.
The shrewd representative of San
Antonio (Tex.) jobbing house on his way
back 10 the states from his midsummer
round of the cities of Mexico said:
Here's variation of DC between the
gold standard of the states and the silver
standard of Mexico within two weeks.
How is man going to sell goods or do
any business between the countries when
he has got to make allowances for such
fluctuations. When / sell n bill of goods
to a Mexican merchant on six months
time I've got to figure the prices high
enough to save my house in the event
that silver drops by one of those violent
fluctuations before the day of settlement
comes. The merchant has got to mark
the retail prices on margin sufficient
to protect him against possible change.
And so American goods must be sold in
Mexico at two margins above legitimate
profits in order TO protect the American
jobber and the Mexican storekeeper
against these rapid up and down move
ments of the standards The condition
is simply ruinous to trade. People will
hnU whom nripnG a roicnd np Thorn
My house may make tremendous profit
or barely save itself in a sale of goods on
six months time. That isn't the way TO
do business. You might as well have n
Chinese wall between two countries as
these fluctuations. And this is what we
will have on a vastly greater scale if
the United States goes to a silver stand
ard and Great Britain and the European
nations continue the gold standard.
know what this thing of two standards
means between Mexico and the States,
and i don't want to see it in our trade
with Great Britain and Europe"
A Dollars Worth of Labor.
A dollar worth so cents commands the
same labor in Mexico now that n dollar
worth dollar did ten or twenty years
ago. Right there is the cornerstone on
which prosperity in this silver country Is
building. That is what makes il now
profitable to work mines with ores worth
81 and So, Mexican money, ton. That
condition of labor brings the cost of min
ing and carrying out the ore down to 81
a ron. That kind of labor built and
operates the cables, which take the place
of thousands of burro trains, at n frac-
ton of the cost for like construction and
operation in the States. Cables have re-
duced the cost of conveying ore from the
mine to the railroad, two miles down the
mountain. to 20 cents and 30 cents n ton.
This labor enables railroads to haul ores
at from 80 cents to 81 ton. 1t figures
in the cost Of the transportation of the
coke from the gulf and the coal from the
border. And, finally, ii enables the
shelters to make an unprecedentedly low
rate of 81 a ton for treatment of ore
At every step, from the first blow of
the pick in the mine to the landing of the
base bullion into molds at the furnace
this ixity of wages on the basis Of a
dollar deprecated to one-half its value is
the chief factor which insures the profit
What matters il il silver goes down if il
commands just as much labor as ever.
and if the lead in the bullion can still
be sold for gold? The smeters of Mexi-
co buy ore from the mine owners, and
pay a Mexican dollar an ounce for the
silver they get out Of IL. They paid this
several years ago, when silver was worth
more than il is now. They still pay il.
Recently under the importation Of com
petition, while silver was dropping so
rapidly in the United States, some of
the smelters OF Mexico advanced the
price they allowed the mine owners for
silver. They are now paying under some
contracts $1.06 in Mexican money for
every ounce of silver found i'm the ore.
Today the brick-making plant few
miles out of Monterey, on the Mineral
railroad is shipping 100000 paving brick
TO San Antonio, in Texas. Ii does this
and pays the ad valorem duty Of % per
cent, which the Wilson tariff levies on
brick importations. The contract for
this brick shipment was obtained at
San Antonio because this company put
in the lowest and best of twenty-eight
bids. The Monterey company enjoys
the possession of excellent clay, but that
isn't what enables Il TO send brick TO the
United States az a profit. 1t outbid the
twentyxeven American brick-making
companies because II sells brick for
American money, worth 100 cents in
gold, and hires good labor for Mexican
money. worth 80 cents in gold This
company is paving three miles Of Monte
rev streets with brick, displacng the
cobblestones of time immemorial. Ii
nut down block OF the brick paving as
An object lesson, and the governor, Gen.
Bernardo Reyes, with n keen perception
for n good thing, ordered three miles Of
9Th Tho hrfaL