The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-09-14

+ Omaha. Sept. 13.-One Of the most
+ distinguished gatherings OF financial
students and authorities that ever as
sembled opened three days session
at the Nebraska building on the expo
sition grounds this morning. Scarcely
/ we'll known name on either side of the
great currency problem which has been
! so long before the American people but
/ is represented on the programme for a
set paper or part in the running de-
bate.
Hon. J. Sterling Morton presided to-
+ day. Horace White of New York, Ed
ward Atkinson, Editor P. Robinson Of
/ the Railway Age, Louis r. Enrich of
/ Colorado Springs and Governor Shaw
of Iowa took part in the programme
( Mr.. Atkinson was not here owing to
/ illness, his paper being read by Mr.
/ Morton.
/ Messrs. Warner, Towne, Bartine,
/ Weaver, Reynolds and other leaders of
/ the silver and paper money sides took
part in the joint debate today.
MORTON AND ATKINSON.
Shortly after 10 o'clock Mr.. Morton
| called the convention to order and
without any unusual formality beyond
/ a few words of explanation and well
| come said:
! "As president of the National Sound
Money league l call this assemblage
to order.
gentlemen, you have been convoked
] for a patriotic purpose. That purpose
is to candidly discuss the money ques-
ton, with the intention of ascertaining
! the best currency for conserving the
prosperity, strength and honor of the
/ American republic.
"Three questions demanding your
/ solution are:
acted between the coins which governs
/ the relative value of the metals in
bullion? Or
] Second-"Is il the relative value of
\ the metals in bullion which governs
the relative value of the coins?
Third-"If no single and separate
/ state can maintain a fixed legal ratio
! between the metals when coined in un-
: limited quantities, can an international
4 agreement among the principal mer-
/ camille countries of the world do so?
You enter upon this Investigation
I with a jealous intention of finding the
1 truth. Your love lof country prompts
you to make this inquiry and TO over
} throw error and establish truth.
Mr.. Edward Atkinson, the dis
I tinguished economist and Dublicist OF
( Boston, was prevented from attending
! because OF ill-health. Therefore he
| sent TO me for presentation on this
/ occasion his paper entitled Force
Bills or Legal Tender And without
further prelude proceed to read 1t,
He dealt with the question of legal
! tender, saying good money needs no
! act of legal tender. Only bad money
calls for an act of force or legal tender
to make people take it whether they
want i or not. He held that the So
! called free coinage act proposed in 1888
was nothing but a preteXt. Coinage
/ consists in the manufacture or round
| discs of metal certified in weight and
| quality by the stamp of the govern
ment That exhaustS -he word. Free
coinage could be admitted of gold, sill
yer. cooDer or nickel if hat were the
! end of the matter. The vice of the free
/ coinage policy is hidden under the
name OF legal tender Legal tender
acts were born in fraud and have been
nursed in corruDtion ever since. That
! is the record from the dawn of imam
! cial history to the present day. All
legal tender acts or DEGREES with the
exception of those relating to subsi-
| diary coin have been intended for one
of two PURPOSES. They have either
| been the acts or DEGREES of absolute
rulers or desootic governments for
! the purpose of cheating their people
and defrauding them of their earnings
| or else they have been acts for the
, collection of o forced loan in the con-
! duct OF the war. like our legal tender
acts of 1S61-62: or else for The collection
! of q forced loan for the purchase or
/ silver under the Bland and Sherman
= acts which is now resting in noXlous
! disuetude in the vaults of the treasury
of the United States.
, Money is. necessary to the conduct of
! &c a exchange
of products or services for mutual
! benefit.
Who invented money? No one knows.
! All EXCHANGES must first have been in
! the nature of barter. When men met,
! each os whom had something to spare
which the other did not want at tnat
| time, money came into use II Is one
of the great inventions of the world
| corresponding to the wheel, the making
| of fire, the spinning of cord
! The oldest records of commerce are
! those of the Assyrians, Babylonians
and Fgvptians. They were engaged in
! a great commerce. They used different
/ kinds of money-money made or goid
and money made of silver, both metals
passing by weight. They also used
/ oxen. sheep and other cattle. Less ad-
vanced nations have used shells. leath-
/ er. skins. stocl1-fish and many other
| articles-always something of constant
demand, either for ornament or for
use. Money was invented to meet the
necessities of trade before there was
any law or legislation in the sense IN
which those words are used. 1t came
into use by custom, and out of customs
originated DEGREES, ordinances and
| laws. BY and by laws were perverted
under acts of legal tender to cheat the
masses of the people. Coinage was in
vented long after money had done its
work. nuggets of gold and silver pass
ing by weight. The names of all the
early coins are names of weight. Every
contract to sell or deliver goods was a
barter of coin passing by weight
Every contract for the purchase OF
goods was a barter of coin passing by
weight for a measured quantity OF
goods. We shall never solve the diff
culties and confusion of our coinage
and our currency until we came back
to this true conception of double bar