El Paso daily herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1881-1901, 1897-08-03
THE OHIO DEMOCRATIC PLATFORM
Its Assertions and Arguments COnsid-
cred and Answered.

| ''RecOgnizing that the money ques-
| ton is paramount to ali Others at this
| time, we invite attention to the fact
| that the constitution names silver and
gold together as the money metals OF
Sue United States
This statement is inaccurate and in
tentionaIly misleading. The only
place in which The constitution names
silver and go'd together" IS where it
declares that no slate shall make any,
thing but gold and silver coin tender
in payment OF debts" 1t does not Say
that silver and gold shall both be
coiued in an Unlimited manner or that
{ lther one or DO h shall be coined at
all, but specifically gives to congress
the power to determine what the coin
age OF the United States snail be, both
as to the metals used and their rela-
lions, by saying 10 explicit terms in
section s: The congress shall have
power to coin money aud regulate the
value thereof" 1t does not name
silver and gold together" as the plat
form says, but names gold and silver
together, pointedly giving the prefer
ence TO gold by saying in section 10:
No state shall take anything but
gold and silver coin as payment of
debts" If anything is to be Inferred
as TO the relation which it intended
clearly that GOLD was to be preferred,
since IL is first named in the only place
where the metals are mentlOni d. If
the trainers of the platform wanted 10
b. frank, why did they not follow the
wording of the constitution in their
statement and say gold and silver"
instead of reversing it and SAYING "sil-
yer and gold
the first coinage law passed by
congress under the constitution made
the silver dollar the money unit and
admitted gold to free coinage at a ratio
based upon the silver dollar unit"
The iii st coinage law clearly made
gold standard by first naming all the
gold coins which. 1t said, should be of
the value OF Il given mum Der of units,
and sad that the unit should be .'of
the value of Spanish milled dollar as
the same Is now current, and t. contain
416 grains of standard > lver." If the
advocates of silver insist that this act
interpl eted the meaning of the cOnSti-
tuition and that this Interpretation
must be followed. why do they now
insist upon standard silver dollar
with only 4l2t grains of silver instead |
of the 4l6 grams which the act specifi- |
cally names? By their own PROPOSE !
ton they demand violation of what /
they cla IN is Il constitutional require |
ment. This act which they claim Is an ;
Interpretation of the constitution on :
this question provide that every If ,
teen pounds weight of pure silver
shall be of equal value in all payments
with one pound weight of pure gold"
If this is an Interpretation OF the con-
why do these sticklers for rs
observance propose to violate it by
saying that every sixteen pounds
weight of silver shall now be equal to
one pound weight of gold?
Would there not be equal authority
for saying that every seventeen or
eighteen or twenty or thirty pounds
weight OF silver shall be equal to one
pound weight of gold?' By their own
to change the ratio they adj
NIT that neither the constitution nor
Jhe first act passed under it
S binding as to the future relations of
gold and silver as money. The factthat
ibis act specifically said that every
fifteen pounds weight of pure silver
shall be of equal value with one pound
weight of pure gold" indicates that
gold was intended to be the measure OF