Middletown transcript., 1897-04-10

| money. This appeals to his prejudice and is
wholly untrue. Wages are not paid in silver
at tlsc end of each day, but they are paid by
| the year, month or week, In currency or gold,
with Just enough silver to make the correct
| change. The kind Of money In transit is inn
material so 1t goes, but when 1t is boarded.
laid by for rainy day, then its staying quail
ity becomes interesting. The rich man boards
by investing in property or by depositing in a
bank, and the bank has the option Of paying
him In silver, while a large per cent Of the
poor men patronize the sock leg and the bosom
Of the earth, and they always hide gold for
two reasons-they have more confidence in its
stability and being less bulky 1t Is easier to
hide. So these poor men are on gold basis
and the rich men are on silver basis, If the
banks elect to put them there.
Prejudice is the curse of this country. It Is
the only reef In the path Of our ship OF state,
the only menace to our experiment. of self gov
ernment. The prejudice of the uniformed
makes them the prey of professional agitators,
calamity howlers and politicians who are an
hungered for office.
Our Excellent Financial Showing.
The argument is made that we owe SO much
foreign debt that the interest is eonhscating
us. The ablest fnanciers on this continent
who have made the subject a study place our
foreign debt at So COO COO. co., which as they es-
innate at 41Srate Of interest amounts to an
globe trotters are spending annually $47, COO, :
600 abroad. Most Of them are ignorant Of the
beauty and grandeur of their own country,
which far surpasses anything they see abroad.
They ought to give up this foolish fad and
spend their millions getting acquainted with
this country for q few years. If we are actu-
ally insolvent and cannot pay we ought to
make general assignment for the benefit Of
all our creditors. This L. the way an honest
man does when he fails in business. He does
not hide out his property and offer 80 cents on
tho dollar. Instead of being insolvent we
are better able to pay than any people on the
face Of the earth. Our national debt is in
duced to one-third its former amount In 1865.
It was S. 845, 007 coo. Tho debt Of Great Britain
and Ireland (the creditor nation) is So $50 49,
900; the debt of France is $4446, ,000, 600; Rus
sa, S. 49l. 600 COO; Austria Hungary, 81 866 co.,
600: Italy, 81, sz4 00,cO0; Germany $1,656, ,0O0
600; Spain with one-fourth Of our popula-
tion), 81 1.25l, 100000.
The per capita debt of France Is SIG: Of
Great Britain and Ireland, $S7; Italy, $70;
Spain, S73; Russia, sc, while our per capita
debt is Sl4. Uncle Sam, bless his old soul, is
the only good housekeeper In the whole lott
Our bank deposits amount to $4,000, COO, ,0O0
while those of all Europe only amount to
Sc 500, 100000. By our last census our per
capita Of wealth, as shown by the assessment
rolls, was s34l and the people have never been
bad about assessing their property too high,
The war veterans cannot be for Reputation
on account of our alleged inability to pay. It
is a fundamental principle of law and morals
that q man must be just before he is generous
and that gifts made by an insolvent are void
ss to creditors. Our government Is giving them
about $40, ,000, 900 annually. II we can afford
to be liberal, we ought to strain point and
be honest too. If our government can give it
like a prince, 1t ought to pay like gentle
man.
Who Are the Debtors2
A large part of the debts figured against Us
are in fact not interest bearing debts. They
consist Of railroad, real estate and other cor
poration debts where defaults were made, and
mortgages on the property have been fore
closed, the property sold and the debts prac-
tically extinFrishsd.
The only debts that the people at large are
Interested in are the national debt and the
state debts The state lcbts, by the last CEN
sus, amounted to s22S,G97, ,3S7. The county
debts amounted to SI45 0iS, 045: school district
debts, s3S 7Gi, ,a4S w.ile the debts of cities and
towns amounted to Ss24 H., 0j0, making a total
of 81, 1856 2l0, 442. Tou will observe that about
three-fourths Of this total debt Is owed by the
cities and towns. With this borrowed money
they have built gas, electric light and water
works plants, paved their streets, etc. Now,
the I6 to / city man asks his country brother,
who uses coal oil in his house and darkness
outside who draws his water from well and
bathes in the creek, who splits the mud In wet
Weather and kicks up tho dust in dry, to help
him repudiate the debt incurred by him In
getting ahead of the countryman as to these
comforts and conveniences of life. As to all
our private domestic debts, it Is immaterial
to the governments whether the redheaded
men owe the black headed ones or the black
headed ones owe the redheaded- ones. One
holds the debt and the other holds the prop
a.11t thNxr Qnh nf her
Injustice of Scaling Debts.
The suggestion is sometimes made that by
the enhancement of gold, debts have been in
creased when measured in property, and
therefore they ought to be scaled. have dis
cussed the gold enhancement theory, but de-
sire to add: That practically all our debts
were contracted since the gold standard was
adopted, and that standard entered into and
became part Of every contract, and If gold
has advanced it would be just as dishonest to
pay by any other standard as it would be If 1t
had not advanced. If q man contracts for
1000 bushels Of corn. it is no answer to his
contract to say that corn has risen since the
contract was made. Besides, all our obliga-
ttons have passed from hand to hand, most OF
them many times, and the present holders had
No more to do with the rise or fall of gold
than they did with the rise or fall Of the tides.
The underlying, fructifying element Of this
16 to movement is socialism. 1t is the same
old effort to get something for nothing. The
Coxeyites wanted grub for nothing. The sin
gle tax cranks want land for nothing. The
Populists want government monopoly Of trans
portation and private monopoly of the wailing
business for nothing. The 10 to people want
80 per cent Of debts for nothing. The Bellamy-
ties want everything for nothing. And 7
might suggest that the new woman wants our
bifurcated garments for nothing, but that Is
not pertinent to the subject under discussion
and will not do so.
The movement means Reputation. All else
is theory, pretense and dreams. 1t is an effort
to pass left handed, bankrupt bill, not for
the benefit of the unfortunate debtor who
cannot pay but for the rich as well, who can
pay, but want to beat their creditors. The
poor man is not in debt; he never had chance
to get in debt. The corporations, Spectators
and plungers generally constitute the debtor
class. Every wage Garner belongs to the cred
itor class. No one would be benefited by l6 to
! coinage except the debtor class. Even the
mine. owner would not, for the temporary
stimulus given to silver would increase its
production until the price would fall below
what it is now. On the other hand, all would
suffer. If bill for free coinage Of silver at
I6 to were to pass either house Of congress-,
and it was ascertained that it would pass the
other house and that the president would sign
it, the panic that would ensue would be to
that of 1893 what tornado Is to zephyr.
Creditors, to avoid being paid in debased mon
ey, would crowd and crush for payment as the
people do for exit in theater on an alarm Of
fire. Credit and confidence, the twin divini-
ties Of prosperity, would depart from us.
All business would be paralyZed, labor unem-
ploycd, and despair would hang her black
pail In million Of homes, cnly II be lifted
when reason resumed hor sway. 1t took
France 60 years to entirely recover from the
John Law fssco.
How England Is Eufning Us.
Tho denI1 soGuos, in erlcr TO undermine the
moral sense OF the people and make repudia-
ton palatable. rail about Eli gland y wealth and
falsely assert that she is trying TO dictate our
monetary stem AM. to eriIsh rs. England is
rich, but if she is trying to ruin us she has
peculiar way Of nlaIiiiest:ng her hostility. For
the year ending june 60, 1854, she took S423,
OCO0C0 of Cur experts, :obnzlt seven times as
much ss all tho FREQ silver countries in the
world We took slUT, ,C90. GO CT her exports, and
she paid us the difference i'll geld or its equiv
aleut. Did you ever hear butcher or baker
or a man with cotton 10 sell complaining that
his customers Lad too much Eioney to spendf
Instead Of trying to drive us to gold stand
ard, it would bo immensely TO her interest to
have her commercial rivGl abandon the stand
ard Of commerce and take back seas with the
half civilized, uonc6mmcrcial nations. The
ridiculous story Of Ernest Seyd was exploded
years ago, and, though the vase was shattered.
the scent of tkat lie hangs round the country
still. The silver tongrcd orators stin tell the
reonla there WAS a consriiucy to demonetize