The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-08-12
INTERNATIONAL BrMETALL1sM

Prof, Francis A. Walker, Ph. D., ILL. D., president of the Massachusetts h. stitute of Technology, and formerly a professor at Yale's Shelf, has just pub lished a book, international Bimetal- lism," in which he enumerates it's ad- vantages, as follows:
 First, the establishment of an approXi- mate par of exchange between the gold using and the silver using nations. Twenty-Five years ago the world might be said to be divided about equally be- tween these two groups. The prepon- derance of per capita wealth and of general industrial and commercial pow CT was on the side of the gold using na- tions; but, on the other hand, the pre- pondenance of territory and popula- ton was enormously on the side of the silver using nations. As MT. Bagehot remarked: Ut used to be said, until q few years ago that England and Portu- gal were the only countries where gold was the standard of value; and there were certain countries which had double standard, but those were not very many; and all the rest were sil yer. Silver is the normal currency of the world; and from a natural cause, because silver is a much cheaper metal, and is suited to those small transac- tions which constitute the bulk of the dealings of mankind Midway between the silver standard and the gold stand ard countries stood small group of states which had undertaken to mediate hntWe tha txun al hliGb a proXimate price of silver in terms of gold of gold in terms of silver. This, as we have seen, was effective at least, so far as to reduce the fluctuations of the metals within a very short range; and thus to create an approximate par | of exchange. The influence of such a | cause upon the worlds trade, and in consequence, upon the worlds produc- | tion, could not fail to be of immense l benefit to mankind Without such a bimetallic link" trade between gold using and silver using countries would necessarily have been subject to fre- duent and often extensive fluctuations in the gold price of silver or the silver l price of gold. What this means we l have seen for ourselves within the past few years, during which silver has more than once fallen, in relation to gold, in the course of single year, to l a greater extent than it did during the | two hundred years preceding 1873. Such | fluctuations in the relative values of | the two money metals continually in- volve international trade in embarrass- ment and disturbances of q most seri- ous character; and often reduce 1t to mere gambling. Without some tie which can hold the two metals at least near to each other, during the time be- tween the manufacture and sale of commodities and the receipt of the pro- ceeds the producer in a gold country can never tell for how much silver he must sell his goods in order to make himself whole and perhaps win q profit. The range of possible losses or possible gains from this source is such as to be altogether out of proportion to the range of ordinary chances of industrial and commercial enterprise. A manu- facturer. for example, assuming for the | moment that the entire operation would be conducted by himself might produce goods of the best quality and at low cost; the goods might be of the right kind--that is, goods for which
 there was a demand; he might send them to the right market--that is, the
 market where the demand was at the time most active; he right dispose of
 them at a favorable price to the right persons-that is to peraons thoroughly solvent and responsible; and yet in spite of taking every one of the steps between the beginning of the venture and it's conclusion in the most sound and judicious manner, fall in the val ue of the money in which he was paid might, before the proceeds could be
 brought home, strip him of his antici-
 pated profit and even involve him in a
 loss, perhaps serious, possibly a fa-
 tai loss.
 We have dwelt to long upon the first
 of the advantages which may be look ed for from the successful establish
 ment and maintenance of bimetallic
 system - namely, the creation of al
 least an approximate par of exchange
 between gold using and silver using na-
 tions. The second advantage to be an
 ticipated from this course, if not ot
 equal, Is of very great importance --
 namely, the securing of higher de-
 gree of stability in the compound mass
 of the money thus formed than could
 possibly exist with the two metals sep
 arate and independent in their value movements. There is an important diff
 ference between this subject and the
 one with which we have just beer
 dealing: The beneficial effects of pal
 Of exchange between gold using and
 silver using countries would be equally
 experienced if both gold and silver
 were at the time rising or falling each according to the influences bearing up
 on 1t separately. The advantages we
 are now about to contemplate would be
 experienced at all times; but would be
 at it's maximum at time when one oi
 the metals was rising and the other
 falling It would be equally of benefit
 to trade between two gold using ma.
 tions and two silver using nations; an6 would be equally of benefit to iRterna
 and external commerce. In word, tho
 object sought is to make money every
 where a. better standard of deferred
 payments than 1t can be when 1t con.
 sists of one metal alone. It is witt
 reference to this aspect of bimetallisn
 that Prof. Laughlin says C"History o1
 Bimetallism in the United States I
 xD: Its chief end Is to secure, as its
 advocates claim, 8 less changeablt
 standard for paying long contracts" | Whether or not this aim of bimetal.