The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1896-09-16

and at the same time degraded.
In every aspect the proposed policy
is partial and one-sided, because it is
only when profit can be made by
mine-owner or dealer that he takes his
silver to the mint for coinage. The
government is always at the losing end.
Stamp such fictitious value upon silver
ore, and a dishonest and unjust dis
elimination will be made against every
other form of industry. When silver
bullion, worth little more than fifty
cents, is made into legal tender dol
''r, driving out one having purchas-
ug and cebt paying power of one hum
uieG ems, II will clearly be done at the
expense and injury of every class of
the community.
The dollar of our fathers, about which
so much is said, was an honest dollar,
silver maintaining full parity of in
trinsic value with gold. The fathers
would have spurned and ridiculed a
proposition TO make a silver dollar
worth only fifty-three cents stand of
equal value with gold one worth one
hundred cents. The experience of all
nations proves that any depreciation,
however slight, of another standard
from the parity with gold has driven
the more valuable one out of circula-
ton, and such experience in a matter
of this kind is worth much more than
mere interested speculative opinion.
The fact that few gold coins are seen
in ordinary circulation for domestic
uses is no proof at all that the metal is
not performing a most important func-
ton in business affairs. The founda-
ton of the house is not always in sight,
but The house would not stand an hour
if there were no foundation. The great
enginery that moves the ocean steam
ship is not always in view of the pas.
senger, but it is, all the same, the pro-
polling force of the vessel, without
which it would soon become a worth
less derelict.
1t may be instructive to consider a
moment how the free and unlimited
coinage of silver would affect a few
great interests, and l mention only
enough to demonstrate what calamity
may lie before us if the platform for
muated at Chicago is permitted to be
carried out. There are now on deposit
in the savings banks of thirty three
states and territories of this Union the
vast sum of $4,000, 100000. These are
the savings of almost 5000, 900 deposit
ors. In many cases they represent the
labor and economies of years. Any de-
probation in the value of the dollar
would defraud every man, woman and
child to whom these savings belong
Every dollar of their earnings when
deposited was worth one hundred cents
in gold of the present standard of
weight and fineness. Are they not en-
titled to receive in full, with interest,
all they have so deposited? Any legis-
lation that would reduce it by the value
of single dime would be an intoeratle
wrong to each depositor. Every bank
or banker who has accepted the earn
ings of these millions of dollars to the
credit OF our citizens must be required
TO pay them back in money not one
whit less valuable than that which these
banks and bankers received in trust.
There are in the country nearly 5000
building and loan associations, with
shareholders to the number of 1,SOO,-
900, and with assets amounting to
more than S500,000,000. Their aver
age of holdings is nearly $500 per
capita, and in many cases they repre-
sent the savings of men and women
who have denied themselves the COM
forts of life in the hope of being able
to accumulate enough to buy or build
homes of their own. They have aided
in the erection of over million of
houses, which are now affording COM
fort and shelter for five millions of our
thrifty people. Free coinage at the ar
bitrary rate of sixteen ounces of silver
TO one of gold would be equivalent to
the confiscation of nearly half the saw
iDgs that these people have invested.
1t would be tantamount to war upon
American home-makers. 1t would be
an invasion of "the homes of the
provident," and tend directly to "de-
stroy the stimulus 10 endeavor and the
compensation of honest toll" Every
one of the shareholders of those assC-
Citations is entitled to be repaid in
money of the same value which he de-
posted by weekly payments or other
wise in these companies. No one of
them should be made homeless because
q political party demands a change in
the money standard of our country, as
an experiment, or as concession to
selfishness or greed.
"
One hundred and forty millions. of
dollars per annum are due to pension
ers of the late war. That sum repre-
sents blood spilled and sufferings en-
dured in order to preserve this nation
from disintegration. In many cases,
the sums so paid in pensions are ex-
ceedingly small in few, if any, are they
excessive. The spirit that would de-
plete these TO the extent of a falthing
is the same that would organize sedi-
ton, destroy the peace and security of
the country, punish rather than reward
our veteran soldiers, and is unworthy
of the countenance, by thought or vote,
of any patriotic citizen of whatever 20.
litical faith. No party, until that
which met in convention at Chicago,
has ever veniured TO insult the honored
survivors of our struggle for the ma
tional life by proposing to scale their
pensions horizontally, and to pay them
hereafter in depre ciated dollars worth