The Wichita daily eagle., 1897-01-26
No one property is a fit measure OF

| Falue Tor OIler properly, therefore tne
| commodity theory of money-the metal
lie theory of money is to be discarded
and the fiat theory to be substituted
wherein the value of money is based
upon not one but all species of proper.
ty-just how no one has ever been able
to satisfactorily describe. This idea has
been tried and retired, discarded and re-
discarded more than any other one
thing in the history of monetary sci
ence and yet it persists. The best of
the Populists, while admitting that this
| fat money experiment has proved a
| failure, say that il is the ideal and only
perfect money, but the people have not
been educated up TO tit is sort of
millennium in money science to be laid
aside temporarily, till the dense ignor-
ance of the people can be made to give
way before enlightenment on this SUBJ
| ject.
SO in many ways, upon many eco
nOmic theories, these Populists confess
they live; that the world is not yet quite
ready for the ownership of railroads
and all natural monopolies; but they ad-
vocate these advanced ideas that
something may be done tending in that
direction whereto all things should
come in the sweet bye and bye. They
ora not a,o no ,-ro ccod hv racf faiIuroS.
when men come into the light they will
the more rejoice and despise their own
ignorance that so long kept them from
the realization of these glorious eco
nomic achievements. The world in time
and again rejecting these advanced no.
ti0ns may have been, and may still be,
wrong. But right or wrong, the record
stands. The past proves that every
measure of the radical Populist has
been tried and discarded in some form
or another. Hence there is no great
surprise TO see these issues abandoned
temporarily" However, it finds the
Populist working to a condition TO come
in the so distant dim future that the
radical reformer must feel at any rate
discouraged, A century has elapsed
since the French Revolution and gov
ernment "land loans" promise to be no
better than French "assignats." When,
oh, Populist. will the people be educated
up to the point where they will recog
nize the perfection of purely national,
Ron-metallic money, issued in quantities
sufficient to do the business Of the
country upon cash basis and without
the intervention Of banks?
The inventory of live, potent, immi-
nent present issues is, indeed, matter
of disappointment. The silver cause!
The free coinage Of silver is step in
the right direction. Good Populist, here
you should pause. Free coinage Of sill
yer may commit us to an irrevocable
metallic base money and destroy all
hope of the ideal dollar; make the value
of money depend upon the accident of
the output of the gold and silver TOR
silver mines; restore, at best, the BIZ
metallic condition that existed in Eu-
rope under absolutism. An inventory
OF men. POpulist leaders in this state
brings much gloom. The way is strewn
with the dead who strove to live and
toll for the plain people. Populists have
slain some Of their own high priests.
those whom they appointed to consult |
the Oracles. because these brought not |
such favOrs from the OracleS as they |
hoped or demanded Let others take |
warning. PETER shall not die in vain |
The Populists expect something. and |
woe to them through whom these ex-
pectations are disappointed.