The herald., 1898-02-22
TOWNE AT SAN DIEGO
THE BENEFITS OF BIMETALLIsM
FoRCIBLY SET FORTH
GOLD STANDARDS TYRANNY
Exposed With Its Many Menaces.
Two Thousand Citizens Enjoy
the Silver Orator

zens at the Fisher opera house this even
ing. r. A. Thomas, president of the cham
Der of commerce, presided and about fifty
representative business men of the various
political parties occupied seats on the plat
form as vice-presidents. Los Angeles being
| represented by Mayor Snyder. The speech
throughout was a masterpiece of oratory
logical in It's deductions and convincing In
its arguments. During its delivery Mr.,
Towne was frequently interrupted with
applause and much good will result to the
cause of bimetallsm by this forcible pres
entation of its benefits.
Mr.. Townes speech occupied more thar
two hours, and in the course of it he said
in substances:
I'VE are met in the high council of the
people. We live under a government OF
opinion. In order that men may have opin-
ions there must be inquiry, investigation
discussion. There is no principle of gov
ernment or question of political economy
that ought to escape the careful examina-
ton of self-governing people upon whom
1t is to be tried. 1t is in vain that the ad-
vocates of q monetary system conceived in
the interests of a few shall deprecate the
discussion of it in the interests of the
many. The advocates of the gold standard
decry what they call agitation. Let me say
to them that this agitation is merely n re-
suit of their system. For twenty-five years
the world has agitated in an endeavor to
get rid of the gold standard. This has been
because for twenty-five years the world has
suffered from the operation of the gold
standard. Remove the suffering and the
agitation will stop. Change the system
and the agitation against the existing sys-
tenn will cease. But let 1t once and for all
be understood by the supporters of gold
and monopoly throughout the world that
discussion. argument, agitation will con-
tinue in the United States until the gold
standard and it's attendant wrongs shall
have been overthrown and the rule of the
people re-established in the republic.
A TIRELESS CAMPAIGN
Ordinarily, political discussions are con-
fined to the campaigns that occur at in
tervals of two and four years. When, how
ever, new question of tremendous signifi-
canoes is brought forward by events, 1t be-
comes necessary, in order that its funda-
mental nature may be understood, that
the usual periods of discussion shall be ex-
tended. The great subject of coinage,
which the events of a quarter of century
have been fashioning for settlement, and
the careful study of which was entered
upon by the American people in
1896, continues to be the main
question of their inquiry. The cam
VI loJo ilttS IeNer StOppeu IL Is
on today. 1t will continue at least until
1900. and if the great matter thus discussed
is not settled then in accordance with hu-
manity and justice. the campaign will re-
main open and unfinished until the patriot
ism and intelligence of the American peo-
pie shall successfully assert itself
BELIEF OF BIMETALLISM
''The advocates of bimetallism believe in
the people We are content to rest our
cause with them. We do not involve our
proposition in cloudy phrases and ambigu-
Gus catchwords. We take the people into
our confidence. We appeal to their COM
mon sense. to their patriotism, to their
humanity. In this forum we defy the ad-
vocates of the gold standard to meet us.
We declare that history, authority, expert
ence and reason are combined to destroy
the principle upon which the advocates of
the gold standard have been reared and
by which it is defended, and that the doc
trines which sustain bimetallism are as old
as civilization, universally accepted by the
great economists, confirmed by the expert
ence of our own times, and ratified by the
dictates of reason. We affirm that in every
age of the world lessening of the quantity
of the stuff with which business is done.
values compared and debts measured, has
discouraged enterprise, despoiled the pro-
ducer, built up the boards of the oppres-
sors of mankind caused civilization itself
to pause, and, chiefly, occasioned all of the
great cataclysms of time. We assert that
nowhere in the writing of the great econo-
mists from the time of Aristotle until now,
in any language or in any age, can there be
found any dissent from the principle that
an appreciating money measure, if given
uninterrupted operation, will produce more
misery among mankind than war, pesti-
lence and famine. We declare that our ex-
perience and the experience of the rest of
the world during tn last twenty-five years
has demonstrated the cruelties and hard
ships of the gold standard. Nearly 400 00O,-
900 of human beings have within that time
been added to the less than 10000, 900 that
at the beginning of the period were using
gold as full-powered money. Meanwhile
the demand for gold in the arts and sciences
has increased beyond all precedent. and
relatively less and less of that material has
been available from the annual supply of
the mines for money purposes. For 1000
years men employed gold and silver upon
equal terms and power to measure values,
to perform the exchanges and to pay the
debts of the world. Finally, in 1873, at a
time when the increasing population and
the great expansion of commerce demanded
that there should be rather a relative in
crease than decrease in the supply of the
great instrument of trade, the creditor in
ernments to take action which denied. in
a constantly increasing measure, the right
of silver to be money, and threw upon gold
correspondingly multiplied demand for
this purpose. The great economic feature
of the last generation has been the vast in
crease of debt, both private and national.
In connection with this there has arisen
a class interested in the growth of debt in
getting rich out of the necessities and hard
ships of the producers of the world. These
men thrust England upon the gold stand
ard in 1916, just after the Napoleonic wars
and when the public debt of England had
increased from little more than ETA 900 900
in 1760 to over GS61 900 900 in 1915. They
forced France upon the gold basis just
after the Franco-German war, when she
was burdened with tremendous debt. BY
| the false allurement of the supposed exam
pie of Great Britain, Germany was in
duced about the same time to adopt the
system. In the United States, without the
demand and even without the knowledge
of the people, this same subtle influence in
| 1873, at the time when our public and pri-
vate obligations had been tremendously
multiplied, secretly thrust us upon the mar
rowing peninsula of gold. In later times
other nations have been similarly made the
victims of their necessities. One of the
most conspicuous examples among them
is that of Japan, where last year the gold
standard was adopted, against the wishes
of the agricultural and manufacturing
classes, and upon the demand of the cred
itors of the world, as the condition prece.
dent to getting tremendously in debt.
A TYRANNY OF WEALTH
1.-THE principle which outlines the vic.
lousness of the gold standard is easily un'