Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1898-11-01

trial history ana 1t Is declared that DUR
Ing the year ls9a the American kepuIn,i ! |.
had never before been known. But the
cold truth Is that while 1892 was better
year than some OF its predecessors, II
fell long way short Of giving. us what
we had right to expect in this coun-
try. Even then, millions of men were out
OF employment ana the great Homestead
the industrial history OF that year. But
beyond all this, the fact must not be for
gotten that during the year 1892. when
we enjoyed all this prosperity our Repub-
lican friends are so fond of talking about,
we had silver law standing upon the
statute books of our country, by which
something like four and half millions OF
dollars was every month added to the
money supply of the American people
That law was the Sherman law in the sup
port ana benifiicence Of which have pro-
tons from Senator Sherman. ex-President
harrison and President Mckinley. And
1t must also be remembered that the first
serious check to. SO much, prosperity as
we then enjoyed came when the. great
money power of New York. acting in con-
Junction with the administration. made a
combined effort, to sweep that law from
the statute books. Then came the panic
of 1898, during which six hundred banks
closed their doors, thousands of business
houses went down in ruin, millions upon
of employment, and poverty, suffering and
want in all their horrid forms appeared
in this fair land And in sweeping this
law frora the statute books. Repuolcah
Representatives Ia Congress were respon-
sible, Ss-Sause the large majority OF Demo
Gratis sr1 by William Jennings Bryan
voted against the repeal of that law ana
against the dictates of President Clexe,,
land sra among the true and faithful
Dem~yNss who "stood like stone wall
agairs, that bold and gold attack on sill
yer gill be found the name or Hon. James
Capenart And the fact must not be lost
sight of, my friends, that this great panic
with its direfui consequences, came upon
us fifteen months before the. Mckinley
tariff law was repealed, and when it was
altogether uncertain what changes. ii
any, would ever be made in that law.
THE RIsD OF WHEAT THE MAIN
CAUSE OF BETTER TIMES.
American citizen TO look the situation
squarely in the face and deal with IL in
diligently: The mere coincidence OF times
being a little better Just after the pas
sage of the Dingley bill, signifies literal
ly nothing when we can all of us see as
plain as light itself that the Dingley tar
if law has had nothing to Go with It:
except by inspiring a little Confidence y
] believe that word confidence" has
wrought more havoc in the moral affairs
of men than lightning and thunder. rain
and storms, earthquakes and GelugeS
combined have produced in the physical
world The one thing substantial in the
improvement or betterment of conditions
Speaker Reed, in his article intended TO pc
reply to William Jennings Bryan ,Vir-
tually admits as much. The rise OF Wheat
and incidentally of some other THINGS,
the products of the farm gives, as ne
says more purcha sing power to the
farmer. He can buy more goods from me
country merchant. The coEatry merchant
can buy more from the manufacturer, and
as a result, some of the manufacturers
that were formerly idle or running on
short time, were for a while in full blast.
Ip7rt frian6s tbara has hepO nothing
to sustain the operation of these FACTOR
les but the blind confidence to whica
l have referred, there run would nave
been an exceedingly short one Even as
1t is no man can tell how long 1t will
continue.
HAVE WE GENERAL PROSPERITY
EVEN NOW?
But is 1t true that we have general
prosperity even at the present time?
venture TO say that there are many per-
sons in this audience intelligent, capable
Industrious, people striving, in every nom
CRADLE way 10 get along, who will answer
that question by saying that no consider
able amount of this prosperity. has ever
reached them. Prosperity which is based
countgies and partly upon blind confl-
denSeS can neither be general nor lasting,
BECAUSE famines abroad will not continue
forever, and confidence at home cannot
permanently live unless it rest upon a
substantial basis.
NOTHING IN THE PRESENT SPFuA-
TION TO PROVE THAT SILVER
SHOULD NOT BE RESTORED.
But, my friends, there is nothing in the
present situation, even il we concede it
to be as good our Republican friends
claim it to be, which has the slightest
tendency to prove that the silver men are
lism is bad thing or that the gold stand
ard is a good thing. Even under the gold
standard, times Will not always be uni
forInly bad. There will be seasons when
business will improve and other seasons
when extraordinary depression will pre-
vail With gold as a standard of value,
downward. Some extraordinary thing
may occur such as the bad copdition OF
foreign crops last year, which will tend
to raise the prices of some productions.
But these cases are only exceptions TO
the general rule. There is not a single
feature of the present alleged prosperity
that would not be improved in my opln-
ion, by the complete restoration of blmet-
allism, and what is far more important,
the Improvement would be of a permanent
character. Owing to the unhappy condi-
tons existing in other countries during
the past season, the prices of some things
Were forced up, but there was no ADDITION
Or very little to the supply of money with
which to pay those prices. In other
Noros, people were required to pay more
tor what they bought of certain things,
but they were Furnished, with no more
prices rise, under such circumstances, one
mans gain would necessarily be, TO some
extent at least, another mans loss. In
the Presidential campaign of 1896, you
will remember, Republican orators and
Republican newspapers were highly indig-
nant at the idea of free coinage of solver,
because as they claimed, the effect would
be to make the poor MANTLE man who
carries the dinner bucket pay more for
the necessaries of life. Now, however, or
rather they were a short time ago, shout
ing with glee because wheat and some
other things advanced in price, thus com
pelilng the wage worker to pay more for
his daily bread. And this is not the
worst OF it. The wage worker did not
very much doubt If there is an establish
ment in the United States which is paying
Us hands higher rate of wages than 1t
aid year ago. Every once in a while
the trade journal informs us that some
establishment has been raising the rate of
wages, but when we inves tigate, we find
that shortly before the election of 1896
the wages in these establishments were
reduced and now that they have simply
been put back to the former figure Up
on an average l think 1t safe to say that
wages throughout the United States will
range fully ten per cent lower than they
did one year ago. And yet, as | have
said, the prices of some of the great sta
pies which constitute the poor mans ne
cessities of life, have risen or did rise
for while and the Republican leaders
dence that prosperity had returned Con-
sistency, where art thou at this stage
Of American politics?
FREE COINAGE WOULD FURNISH
MORE MONEY WITH WHICH TO
PAY THE HIGHER PRICES.
Now, my friends, there is this differ
ence between the rise of DriceS n 6 a result