Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1897-04-01
Why MONEY IS SCARCE.
The Eject OF Certain Recent Treas
urv Ru1inEa.

The Effect OF Certain Recent Treas
ury Rulings.
Mr.. Gage rides into the treasury de-
zdrtment upoa the back of monetary
theory. but he will Immediately find
himself confronted by monetary con-
d;tion to which his theory cannot be
adjusted. Mr.. Gage is a great banker,
hut there is a vast difference between
Supervising loans and discounts in
banking institution where nearly the
entire volume of money employed is
owned by depositors and conducting
the machinery of government which
creates banks as well as the circulating
money medium of the country.
Mr. Gage is an uncompromising adj
vocate of the single gold standard.
which is to be expected, perhaps, in a
man who has all his life been a money
lender. As a lender of money Mr.. Gage
realizes the advantage of having the
volume of circulating money restricted
to the ability of dealers in money to
control it, but as the chief officer of the
governments treasury it is his duty to
see that the money lenders do not con-
tract and expand the leanable funds of
the country according as the contrac-
ton or expansion of the currency would
conduce to their individual profit.
A few days ago Mr.. Gage cited the
last annual report of the director of
the mint to show that the government
has not been antagonistic to the use of
silver as a money metal-that, in fact,
the output of silver dollars in recent
years has been upon dangerously lib
eral scale, and then he referred to the
fact that at the close of 1896 the per
capita circulation of silver was SSH.
against $S.40 of gold. But Mr.. Cages
statement is misleading, because he
does not state the whole truth. When
silver was demonetized in 1873 the coun-
try was on paper basis. The per cap
tia silver in that year was only Is cents,
and the total available gold supply did
not exceed SIS, 900, 900, and nearly all
of that was on the Pacific coast. 1t was
not until the specie resumption bill was
passed that gold and silver began to
increase in volume, and until President
Harrison's secretary of the treasury
made ruling that deprived silver of its
function as redemption money it was
upon a level with gold. Secretary Car
isle adopted Secretary Fosters ruling,
and Mr.. Gage says he will not
change it.
This ruling is that, although the gov
eminent creates several forms of money.
gold, silver and paper, 1t has not the
right to designate and tender any par
ticular form iii the payment of its debts.
That is to say, the governments cred
r1,o q
right to say which form of money his
account shalt be settled in. The conse-
quence of this railing is that silver is a
legal tender for all debts due the gov
eminent and the government is obliged
TO receive it, but the government de-
MES that it has the right to make ten
der of silver for debts it owes. And
this is how the country is on the single
gold standard basis in the face and eyes
of the law of 1890, which declares it Ito
be the policy OF the United States to
continue the use of both gold and silver
as standard money, and to coin both
gold and silver into money of equal in
trinsic and exchangeable value,r and
dollars shall be legal tender at their
nominal VaIue Tor ali ueDLS ana QueSs
public and private"
Under the ruling of the treasury, of
the $50 or more per capita money in the
United States, only the gold, $40 per
capita, is all-round legal tender money.
There is in the New York banks and in
the treasury of the government over
$500, 100000 of gold, and assuming that
the interior and other banks have $780,
100000 of gold boarded, we have in cir
culation about four dollars per capita of
what Mr.. Gage calls "sound money" It
is seen that Mr.. Gage, following the lead
of Secretaries Carlisle and Foster, re-
CARDS all our forms of paper money and
silver as token money whose value as
money is contingent upon their redemp-
ton in gold. The essence of our present
monetary system, as Mr.. Gage under
stands it, is that silver dollar will pay
as much debt due tie government as
gold dollar, but that a silver dollar is
utterly worthless as u tender for gov
eminent debt, unless the creditor is
willing to accept it. Hence, instead of
having a total volume of over $32 per |
capita we have $40, and instead of
having $22 per capita in circulation we |
have less than four dollars. Is it any |
wonder that times have been hard and |
money scarce ?-Los Angeles Herald.