The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1896-09-03

will stamp every 412lk grains of it one dol
you a gold dollar for Ii. We cannot com
pei any one to give you a gold dollars
worth of merchandise for IL. We cannot
fix its value in exchange. If that dollar
buys less of goods. we cannot help it,. We
are trying "a free and independent fnan-
cial policy. and. as the legend on the dol
lar reads, In God We Trust IL you owe
n dollar, however. whether 10 the creditor
who trusted you, TO the deposition who put
il in your bank or to the laborer who has
given you of his strength and skill-him
We will compel. even If the dollar should
sink to so cents in value, to accept IL in
full payment"
At the advanced price there would be no
pressure to buy silver. but there would
come an enormous pressure to sell. Every
nation in the world would clearly under
stand that the artificial advance in price
could not be maintained, and there would
be 4 feverish competition to hurry silver
here. GU profound silver economists re-
ply that every one would be compelled TO
take something away for the silver. That
is the misfortune. They would take Sc
curities and commodities, and we would
have the silver. But we are not laboring
for silver. We cannot eat silver, nor can
we build houses of it, nor can we clothe
ourselves with il. 1t is food. shelter and
clothing that man principally works for,
ana the, precious metals are mere tools 10
that end.
H BEST CUSTOMERS.
Another branch of our silver friends
says: Even if the ratio cannot be main
tanned and we drift to a silver standard,
we shall have a brilliant future. because
we shall have a par of exchange with sill
yer using countries Which Is the best
trade of the world? That with Europe. or
with Asia and South America? In the one
hundred years from 1893 TO 1892. inclusive,
we sold to Europe twenty billions of mer-
chandise and to all the other countries in
the world six billions. In 1893 we sold to
Europe only 30 per cent. more than 10 all
the other nations. Now we sell Europe
nearly 500 per cent. more. The silver men
invite US to risk the loss of business with
rich, solvent customers in the hope of in
creasing trade with the slums. II a silver
basis would be such n help to increased
trade with silver-using countries. pray in
form us why the two most Intelligent
South American nations. Chill and Costa
standard countries, have within this very
yer changed to a gold basis?
There is no salvation in their proposed
financial experiment. 1t rests on a mental
delusion- 1t is poisoning the fountains Of
national honesty. 1t teInpts and corrupts
by the hope Of despoiling the creditor. 1t
points to the degradation of public faith.
If | had TO be crucined, / should prefer "A
cross of gold rather than the cross of silver
with the Internal fires of reputation and
of dishonesty naming underneath. There
has been no crudfxion of mankind. Since
1873 the deposits in our financial institu-
tons, excluding savings banks, have risen
from 1872, 000, GOO to the enormous sum of So
94o,O 900. In these same years the deposits
- 80 sew mss baAiho nave lli1 tSl~tu al
thousand million dollars, and the assets OF
our building and loan associations have
risen to over 5000, 900, 600. The latter are the
repositories of our wage earners. and the
growing deposits in these institutions show
the effects of the increase of wages in our
country, which, since 1860, despite the
shortening of the hours of labor, have adj
Vanced over 90 per cent. Since 1860 popula-
ton increased 81 per cent, and the national
wealth, despite the ravages of the rebel
lion. increased from SIG, 900. 000, 00U to sos, 000.-
100000. a gain of 302 per cent. DO not these
- ~ n ~ wa - Z al
TRANSPORTATION of mankind under the up
lifting influences of civil and religious lib
ertyi
INTELLECTUAL ASTIGMATISM..
1t is sometimes difficult to understand
why the same facts presented to intelligent
minds do not lead to the same conclusions.
Have you ever seen a patient examined for
astigmatism? The oculist places before
the patient a chart with converging lines.
He asks the patient to look at line after
line. The patient sees perfectly. Suddenly
he comes to a line or lines which he cannot
see. He has his eyes wide open. He is hon
estly trying to see. But he cannot. Nature
has denied him the power. L maintain that
that there is such a thing as intellectual
astigmatism, a condition of the mind which
renders it impossible for the individual to
see certain lines of thought and fact in
their true relation. That is what the silver
men are suffering from. You understand.
of course, that when intellectual astig-
matlsm becomes abnormal. we put the pa
ever. may retort in all fairness that we
are the intellectual astigmatics. So the in
of an asylum may lean out of the
windows and accuse the passers by of be-
ing the ones mentally afflicted. Who shall
decide? The doctors, of course. And how
do the financial doctors agree on the ques-
ton of silver? With one single exception,
there is not a political economist OF stand
ing in the wide world: there is not n single
man who was ever Secretary of our treas
ury, Controller of our cusrency, or Director
OF our mint: there is not one out of a
of the men whose business COM
pelS some acquaintance with the principles
OF hnance-I mean the bankers of this and
every other countrywide says that the
United States would be financially safe in
alone the unlimited coinage of
silver.
election. Its outcome will teach the on
looking nations that the crown of over 100
years of political life under Republican in
shall not be the national impair
ment of debt obligations; and it will be held
and our chiidren'ss Children that fnliare a
breath of dishonesty will be Indignantly
spurned by this proud American people. L
nave the deepest sympathy with many OF
the "free-silver' adherents. They are my
nelghbors. | am bound to them by my in
terests, my associations and my affections.
,Ihey are honest and sincere men. They
love their country and would not willingly
plunge II into destruction. But they nave
been deluded and misled. 1.-The best friend
or truth is time" and as time rolls or
these, our misguided fellow-citIzens. will
check them in their mad rush TO self-de-
structlon; they Will vet thank God for the
defeat which will ~overwhelm them in No
vember; and they will bless us who are as
sembled In indianapolis this day, and who.
by. the courageous, manly and patriotic
influences of this convention, will make