Birmingham state herald. (Birmingham, Ala.) 1895-1897, 1896-10-15
RBPUBLICANIsM AND FREE COIN
AGE


gressional Record, volume 81 page 4256,
Fifty-first congress, first session, used
these words:
when merchandise is the cheapest
men are the poorest and the most dis
tressing experiences in the history of the
country-aye, in all human history-have
been when everything was the lowest and
cheapest, measured by gold, for every
thing was the highest and dearest, meas
ured by labor"
In 1890 he spoke and voted to increase
the money of the country by adding to it
$54,000,000 of silver annually, instead of
| $24 600 year, under the Bland-Allison
law-to utilize all the silver bullion pro-
duced in the United States and put it In
circulation for the movement of the bust
ness of the ry.--Congressional Rec
ord, June ., page 5647
At that time we had about 62,500OOO
population in this country, and yet ac-
cording to Mckinley, we stood in press
| ing need of all our silver product for
money uses. Now, with II 500, 900 popula-
ton, an increase of 100000 of people, and
a decrease of $40 per capita of our whole
population since 1890, and in our total
circulation of more than $154, 100000 in
three years. he says: "It is not more
money we want; what we want is to put
what money we already have at work"
In 1890, with an average of $-3.S2 Of
money in actual circulation for every
man. woman and child in the land, and
every cent of it busy at work, according
to Mckinley, we needed an increase or
$54,000,0 600 year, or by 81 apiece for each
of our people; now, with only $2l.l0 or
nominal circulation on an average FOR
each person, and with much of it locked
up and perversely withheld from use. not
by want of confidence, so much as by the
insatiab BILE greed of its holders, this same
man announces with all the solemnity OF
an owl just walked up, and blinking ana
hooting at MONDAY, that the country
needs no more money, but to put to work
what it has,
He processes to believe, but really does
not, that it is a want of confidence
which keeps the money that lis In the
country out of circulation. He knows
that 1t is kept out of circulation by the
same power and for the same purpose
that raises and puts Mark Hanna's cor
ruption fund in circulation; namely, TO
convert this republic into an oligarchy OF
money lenders; to force the issue OF
bonds; to make an everlasting bonded
debt; and to perpetuate the strangling
grip of the gold standard upon the pro-
ductive industries of mankind. Mckinley
is far from being a strong man morally
or intellectually. His relations to Hanna
and the syndicates demonstrate this. But
even he knows better when he claims that
1t is a want of confidence INSPIRED by the
apparition of the free coinage of silver,
that keeps the money we have here out
of circulation and idle, and prevents for
eign money from coming to this country.
He is not ignorant of what all the world
knows-that both British and American
gold is freely going into Mexico. Japan
and other free silver countries, and there
eagerly seeking and finding safe and
profitable investments in productive in
dustries, which it cannot now find In this
country, on account Of the shrinkage in
all values but that of gold.
In 1888 this same man, as chairman Of
it's committee on platform, wrote In the
republican party's creed these words,
while the Bland-Allison act was in full
operation, clogged only by Clevelands
hostility:
1.-THE republican party is in favor of the
use of both gold and silver as money, and
condemns the policy Of the democratic
administration in its efforts to demone-
tie silver"
Now, he is the candidate of that same
party for president which has changed
front completely, and while damning
CleveIands administration with fierce de-
nunciations for its financial policy, pro-
poses to perpetuate that policy with in
creased enormities. until the consent or
the leading commercial nations of the
world can be obtained for its abandon
ment.
In 1891 Mckinley, at Toledo, again just
" denounced with all the vlgor of which
he was capable the financial position ana
movements of Cleveland, as inimical 10
the best interests of the country and its
people and as tending to make money
the master and all things else its slave
He now illustrates. lamentably and
shamefully. the truth Of his declarations
then made. The same malignant in
auneces that were back of Cleveland in
1891 and unknown to the democracy or
tbe land. stealthily working him as
nnnpet. emboldened by success, threw
themselves openly into the st. Louis re-
and for a consideration, paid or prom
Used. set up Mckinley as it's marionette,
~ dance and talk as he Is now doing, as
the bosses and syndicates may pull the
strings. It is difficult to say whether
his position is one to call more for OF con-
tempt or pity.
"The American people from tradition
and interest favor bimetallism and the
H. 80
republican party demands the use or
both gold and silver as standard money,
with such restrictions and under such
provisions to be determined by legisla-
tion. as will secure the maintenance of
the parity of the two metals, so that the
purchasing power and debt-paying pow
err of the dollar, whether of silver, gold
or paper, shall be at all times equal"
These words just quoted, from the re-
publican national platform of 1892, may
be regarded as the latest utterances or
that party on the subject for the herd at
st. Louis. in 1896, bought in and rounded
up by the trusts, combines and corpora