The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1896-09-17
What, asks the farmer, are we to do

/ What, asks the farmer, are we to do
with our votes to remedy this wrong?
The plausible reD!- of the silver
miners and their re: .ers is this: We
will supply you with plenty of money
Delegates to us who can now mine and
smelt silver bullion to almost any ex-
tent at a cost of sixty 900 to seventy
OO cents an ounce, or about 80 cents
on a dollar, the power to have silver
lngots or bars made into round pieces
OF silver or coins in the mint at your
expense; also give us the power to
force you to take these round pieces Of
silver or coins which are named dol
lars, for your crops, at one hundred
and Twenty-Five cents (S1.29) an ounce,
or at one dollar for what costs US 50
cents, and by this course we will at
once advance your prices and perhaps
enable you to get as much In 5O-cent
silver dollars as you secured In gold
dollars in 1901 or even in 1881. That
course, they say, will profit us In fact
at the rate of thirty million dollars
($30,OOO,0OO a year or more for three
or four years Tn our mining operations,
and will profit you in appearance at
somewhat similar ratio. ,.,,
Undoubtedly the inside talk of these
silver barons and their confederates is
something like this: These farmers
are slow, stupid fellows; third of
them are tn debt. the rest want better
prices, and before they find out the
trick we shall get three or four years
of pickings and can pull out hundred
million dollars (S1O0 ,OON00O for our
selves. In the meantime we will lend
our profits on gold mortgages Gas sena-
tor Stewart Does and keep the re-
serves Of all our own banks in gold
coin (as the banks in Representative
Newland's state do,. We have done
this all along while we were making
our profits out of Uncle Sam Under the
Bland anG Sherman acts"
In reply to this plausible statement
by which the advocates Of free coinage
have attempted to mislead the farm
ers. THO simple facts may be cited:
Under the Bland act silver bullion
had been bought at the rate Of $1,000
600 per month from 1873 to 1890. Tn
der the Sherman act of 1890 $500 600
ounces had been bought month by
month until 1893 Undef those two
acts the national debt due on demand
has been increased nearly $5OO,HD,-
600
At the end Of 1892 and in the begin
ming of 1898 it became apparent that
this compulsory purchase of silver
bullion by means of forced loan was
destroying the credit Of the nation, and
with it the credit Of every man in the
community There are no crimes in
history which have ever Inflicted 50
much misery as the debasement Of the
coin Of the realm. That was in part
accomplished by the Bland and Sher-
man acts, and that Is the avuWed OBJ
ject of the silver miners and their con-
fedefates in the proposal for the IN
limited coinage of silver dollars OF full
legal tender at 100 cents costing about
SO cents on dollar in gold.
What happened between 1891 and
1895 was that the evil effect of this de-
basement of coin came to light. The
beginning of the remedy in the repeal
of the Sherman act came too late to
prevent the disaster of 1895 and the
even worse conditions Of 1896.
The greeInack craze preceded and
brought ON the panic of 1873. The
Greenhack party was crushed out or
existence in 1874, when the whole
West sustained President Grants veto
of further imitation.
The silver craze will be crushed out
by the uprising Of the farmers OF the
ten grain growing states in November
in support Of the present standard and
only lawful unit Of value, a dollar
made of gold. This gold standard al
ready existed, but was esta blished
more fully by Andrew Jackson and
Thomas Hart Benton in 1884. 1t was
re-established by almost unanimous
consent of congress in 1873, after an
exhaustive debate beginning in 1870.
Again re-esta hlished in the resumption
| act Of 1875. Restored in it's full in
tegrity Jan. I, 1879, when specie pay
merit was resumed, it has been main
tanned throughout the wonderful pc
Rod of progress in the ten grain
growing states until 1892. Then the
subtle poison Of national discredit un-
der the threat Of debasement exposed
the cause and brought the true remedy
| into view.
! That remedy consists in banding to-
gether the farmers, manufacturers,
| business men and bankers-Democfa
and Republicans alike-in a great
union party for the maintenance OF the
honor and integrity Of the nation and
the restoration Of general prosperity
| by crushing out the fraud to which
thousands upon thousands of honest
but misguided men have lent their aid
under the speclous sophlstry OF the
silver miners, their attorney IN con
gress and their cOnfederates IN the
1ublic agitation of their dishonest ef'
Fort. Edward Atkinson.