Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1898-01-06

the 'tunit," and Hamilton said n his
mint report that this would be appro-
pirate designation of it, but as the
eolonists had long been accustomed to
the use of the Spanish dollar as their
unit of account it was called the IDOL
lar" that is, by the statute above
quoted, it is the unit in the scale of
valuation. Thus viewed it is as Hog
zeal and absurd to talk of "fifty-cent
dollar" as to talk of a six-inch foot
measure or an eight-ounce pound. Any
change in the purchasing power of the
unit or dollar changes the scale. and, as
the value of all property is expressed in
the terms of this unit, its multiples and
fractions, this change affects all prop
erty or the general range of prices,
while the market price of particular
commodities will vary or oscillate ow-
ing to causes affecting these commodi-
ties, such as the supply as compared
with the demand for them, etc.
\ just and honest scale is an even
scale, the unit of which does not rise to
the injury of debtors or fall to the in
jury of creditors, and an honest dollar
is an unchanging dollar, one which does
not require larger sacrifice to obtain
it when a debt natures than when a
debt was contracted, however long or
short the intervening period may have
been. The value of the unit of money is
not at all affected by the character of
the material in which it is embodied.
If all the money in this country could
! be instantly changed and embodied in
some other substance or substances,
with a corresponding denomination,
| without any prospective increase in its
| quantity, or change in other things,
/ there would be no change in the value
or purchasing power of the unit or the
prices of commodities of their ex-
| changeable relations. 1t is only by in
| creasing or diminishing the number of
units or dollars in circulation that the
value or purchasing power of the dollar
or unit is changed; as the number of
| dollars is increased, the value or pur-
chasing power of each dollar is dimin-
! ished; as the number of dollars in
circulation is diminished the pur-
| chasing power of each remain
! ing dollar is increased. To suppose
| that dollars can have different values
is as absurd as to suppose that bushels
| of wheat of the same grade can have
| different values in the same market.
| One dollar, endowed with the legal ten
| der function and circulating as money,
is of the same grade is of the same
| grade and value as every other dollar.
| When the material of which the dollar
is made is worth more as commodity
than as money, then, of course, its COM
modify value will be greater than its
value as money; but as money it can
never rise above or sink below its legal
valuation.
| The gold in a ten-dollar gold piece
may as a commodity be worth more
than SO, but it is legal tender for only
| $40, for the law which authorized its
| coinage for monetary use says: 1T
shall be of the value of 10 units or dol
lars" so every dollar, whether embodied
in the silver coin or the gold coin or
| floating upon paper, has the same value
| as every other dollar. How misleading,
then, are the current phrases in party
| platforms requiring lone dollar to be a.
good as every other dollar" etc.
| All money is an emanation from the
| supreme power of the state, and it is
breach of good citizenship to try to in
! spire a want of confidence in this mon
| ey, and the official acts and utterances
of our late president discrediting our
silver dollars cannot be reconciled with
sense of patriotic duty. a sentiment
he so fondly applauds. In the destruc-
ton of values the cost of his admins
tration was vastly greater than that of
the civil war.
| HENRY G. MILLER