The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1897-09-15
Speaker Reed on Prosperity.

Speaker Reed on Prosperity.
In the Boston Globe of Sunday,
Thomas B. Reed has an interesting ar
ticle on prosperity in general and dol
lar wheat in particular, being re-
joinder to an article from William j.
Bryan published in the Globe of the
Sunday previous. Mr.. Reed is always
interesting as we'll as instructive. We
republish the subjoined extracts from
his article:
"What q striking resemblance there
is between 1896 and 1897 and the years
of our Lord 1878 and 1871 These years
are within the personal memories of
every man of middle life. In 1878 the
air was resonant with denunciations of
the wicked men who would not issue all
the greenbacks which suffering peo-
pie demanded. Here was sure rem
edy for great ills, and yet the remorse-
less rulers would not stir finger or
print single bit of paper. John Sher-
man was denounced on all hands.
Samuel J. Tilden declared that only
vast central reservoir of coin could pro-
tect us against the failure of the pro-
posed return to specie payments in
1879. The farmer was at his worst,
ruined, destroyed, eaten up by taxes
and usury. Down almost to the very
day of resumption the croaking came
with dismal and damnable iteration.
his readiness to give thousands and
thousands of dollars to stand at the
treasury first in the row of that vast
multitude which would surely assemble
on the first resumption day. That very
autumn, at the September election, the
State of Maine, Mr.. Blaine's own State,
in campaign under his able and skill
full leadership, went over to the fiat
enemy, horse, foot and dragons,
changing a majority of Il, 900 for sound
money to majority of IA 1000 in favor
of the widest carnival of unreason that
ever overwhelmed an intelligent peo-
pie. When the first of January came
no crowds thronged the sub treasury
corridors. Hardly greenback was
presented, and we got back to the cur
rency of the world without movement
or jar.
From that moment prosperity be-
gan, not the eternal prosperity Of the
New Jerusalem, but an earthly pros
perity, enduring as long as human ma
ture would permit. New York Central
was 112, and went to 100. Northwest
common rose from 60 to 81, the pre-
fered from So to 104. st. Paul from 20
to 70, the preferred from sc to 100, and
all the rest of them in like proportion.
OF course, the greenback leaders ex-
planned that this was all temporary,
because no real prosperity could come
without greenbacks. Nevertheless, the
world went on. There was no lack of
money, because we had business which
paid, and whenever a nation has bust
ness which pays it can draw on the
money of the whole world. How like
this are the events of the last twelve
monthsl Prior to the passage of the
tariff act we had scenes like those which
preceded the first day of 1879. The Of.
ferers of the patent remedy stood by
and jeered. They Knocked at us when
our fear came. But when the due leg
islation had been had and there was no
further change to be looked forward
to, when business had reached its
sound basis, and there was reasona-
BILE chance to calculate the future, there
came repetition of the phenomena of
1879.
Stocks have gone up, not because
gamblers have played, but because
mems minds have changed, and the
whole nation takes utterly different
views of the future. A stock which is
worth 40 when everything seems on the
down slope easily becomes worth 80
when people feel that we are on the up
grade. When you are going down into
the dark nobody knows how far down
you may go, and when you 60 up into
the sunlight nobody can tell how far
up you may go. Fear increases the
fall, hope increases the rise. What
makes prosperity, and what makes hard
times? Way down to the base of
things, the causes may be different
each time, and perhaps incomprehensi-
BILE, but on the surface they are both
only the results of states of mind.
"What is prosperity for a nation2
1t is to have all its people at work.
When all the people are at work the
nation is adding to its wealth all that is
possible in its day and generation.
New inventions might have made it
more, but for each year the labor of
each nation is the sum of that years.
creation of wealth. All mod
ern making of things require the union