The record-union., 1896-09-13

CIlCdpSLIHS pTOCeSS mas De0n marked
and conspicuous for a third of a CEN
tury, aided by a protective tariff and the
rich rewards that our prosperity has Of
fered. Whenever agricultural products
have fallen in price, 1t is discovered that
there has been an increased production.
AS great areas of lands have been
opened to the raising Of farm products,
the quantity of such production has in
creased, and the demand not increasing
in the same proportion, prices have log
ically and inevitably fallen If there is
one days labor for sixteen working
men, you would not get as good wages
as though there We're sixteen days
work for one workingman. daughter
and continued applause.) And that is
the sort of 16 to / we want in the United
States. (Applause.)
The changes in the prices Of agricult-
ural products or any other commodities
which have been cheapened in their
production by improved machinery and
more competitive fields with great pro-
duction does not prove that gold has
advanced in value, but simply that such
products have fallen in price A bushel
OF wheat even at the present low price
Will buy more American commodities
than the same quantity would have
brought thirty or forty years ago. All,
gentlemen, are not the wages paid labor
rather than the ever-changing market
price Of commodities the best and most
logical test? Is not the labor Of men,
rather than the thing which his labor
creates, the real test? Have the wages
paid to labor since 1878, as measured by
gold, decreased? Applause.) That is
the crucial question.
We resumed specie payments on a
gold basis January l, 1870 Since that
time wages and salaries have not de-
cllned, but have risen. In 1880 the
number Of employees in the manufacto-
rles. and more of them United States
men and youths, was 2,132, 900, aggre-
eating in wages S947 1915, 900, or an
average Of S324 per capita In 1890 ten
years after resumption, the number Of
| ge-earners was 4,712,622, and their
aggregate earnings We're 50, 2S3, ,21S, ,529,
or S4SS per capita. This showing would
clearly indicate that the gold basis has
not injured labor.
The cheapening Of commodities
comes from the introduction and appli-
cation OF labOr-Saving machinery both
on the farm and in the factory There
is scarcely any branch of production
which does not turn out more commodi-
ties per hour of labor than in 1873 It
would be. just as reasonable and lust as
conclusive to say that the suspension of
the free coinage of silver in 1873 reduced
the price of steel rails from $12O per
ton to SD or $50 per ton, the price now
prevailing, as TO say that act reduced
the price Of wheat
The price Of wheat is fixed by the
law of supply and demand, which Is
eternal Gold has not made long crops
or short crops, high prices or low prices
Gold has not opened up the wheat fields
OF Russia, India or the Argentine Re-
public; nor will free silver destroy
them. Gold has not kept up the freight
rates for the agricultural producer, and
the stoppage Of free coinage il 1873 has
not advanced it, In 1873 the average
freight on grain by lake and rail from
Chicago to New York was 269 cents per
bushel. In 1895 -ft was 60 per bushel.
Our working prople have bought the
necessaries and comforts of life cheaper
for themselves and families during all
these years since 1873 and down to
1897. They We're getting better wages,
paid in gold, for their labor than ever
before. In the United States everything
has been cheapened but men, and as
| nearly as / can ascertain in free
countries, such as Mexico, Central
America and South America man alone
has been cheapened; everything he buys
has been steadily increased with con-
slant fluctuations by the steadily in
creasing price of silver.
With the gold basis and the pro-
Workingmen of this country were never
before 50 steadily employed. They
never before received such good wages;
they never before were paid in better
money, and their wages never before
DC ught as many of the necessaries
comforts and luxuries Of life Cap
plauseD If gold standard deprived
the American toler of single days
work. or his family Of a single COM
fort, or reduced his wages or made life
| harder for him, I should be against it.
| CApplause) AS it does not, and as it
| promotes the general prosperity and
upholds the national credit and honor,
l am for it, and shall steadily favor it
SO long as believe it is truly beneficial
and advantageous to our country
cloud and continued applause)
The Hon. John G. Carlisle the dis
tinguished Democrat who is at present
Secretary Of the Treasury, on April 13,
1896, addressed the workingmen of Chi
cago In speech of great power and elo-
quence. Among other things he said:
The value of the silver dollar under
free coinage would fiuctuate from day
70 day, moving up and down with the
rise and fall Of the commercial price of
bullion contained In 1t, as the Mexican
dollar does now, and the premium on
the gold dollar void, of course nuctu-
ate to the same extent, thus affording
| an opportunity to bullion brokers and
| spectators to buy and sell it at profit
Ii would cease to be used as money,
because no man would pay his debts in
| Sold dollars or in paper redeemable in
| gold dollars worth 100 cents. when the
| law PERMITTED him to pay them in silver
| dollars worth only 81 or % cents EACH
The sudden withdrawal, says Mr. Car
| Isle, of SG2O,OOO,00O Of gold from the
currency of the country would undoubt-
edly produce great industrial disturb
| ance, far more disastrous to the interest
| of labor than has ever been experienced
| in our history, and no man who has
a particle of sympathy for the working
men and their families can contemplate
the possibility of such a calamity with
out feeling that 1t is his duty. whether
he occupies private or pubic station,
| to employ every honest means at his
command to avert it,
| Those are. the words Of truth and So
berness, and | recommend them to the
wcrkingmen Of Homestead. Applause.)
And the entire country as well. / am in
favor Of protecting to-day the laboring