The Jasper weekly courier. [volume] (Jasper, Ind.) 1858-1922, 1899-03-03
PLAINLY AND POINTEDLY PUT.

An island far out in mid-ocean.
1t has a population OF 10 900 up-to-
date IN all social, political and eco-
nomlcal functions. Itmust necess-
arily have currency to transact
the daily and hourly business like
every other civilized community.
The currency, whether oyster shells
or gold dollars, each having the
the government stamp, aggregates
$40 per capita of population
800, 200. Ninety per cent. of all
business transacted is done on cred
Ilt. Therefore, ninety out of every
hundred business men of the island
are debtors to the other ten.
All at once, "surreptitiously" or
otherwise, one-half of this currency
is rendered absolutely Of no value.
A, who has mortgaged his farm to
b, finds it twice as hard to liquidate
the debt as it was before the "de-
monetization. In other words, on
account of the vilainy Of the "sur-
reptitious' scoundrels, he must now
pay $1,000 instead of the $500 he
honestly owes.
"Oh, but one dollar will purchase
as much as three dollars did be-
fore, = say the surrepttious scoun-
drels.
Is that SO? Whv, then, Messrs.
Sht rman, Carlisle & Cleveland, did
you undertake the abominable
work which left TIE money question
practically just as it was before?
Please answer that 1t is the first
time the question has ever been so
lplainly-you may think so i'm.
Ipolitely-put, but why venture up
on change which Mr.. Carlisle de-
Iclared, drought more woe and
misery upon the country than war,
famine and pestilence, if no class
lof our people was to be benefited?
Why reduce the corn and wheat
growers of Kentucky, and the cot
ton pla alters of the lower Mississippi
% penury, unless somebody was
benefited?
"Honest money!" shouts the
gold bug. The debased 50-cent
silver dollar echoes his brother.
! Bat there is one great overwhelm-
ling question which the surreptitiJus
demonetizers must answer in 1900:
VINO debased the silver dollar? In
1873 it was worth 3 cents more than
the gold dollar was worth. The
two metals had gone along hand in
hand, neck and neck, amid almost
a century of unexampled prosper
lity. They had carried the country
through the war of 1912, Of 1916,
and even the greatest and most dis
asterous Of all, the civil war from
1861 to 1865. No man or woman
ever heard of a tramp or strike
(save under that exception which
proves the rule) before 1873.
There was no popular clamor-no
great Cor smalD public demand for
knocking out silver and establish
ing the single gold standard.
Let every American citizen bear
this great fact in mind William
Mckinley himself, his friends, dar-
ed not 60 to the country in 1896 on
a gold standard platform. The st.
Louis platform declared for both
gold and silver.
Debased silver! Who debased
1T? Our own government went to
Europe, having dishonored our own
metal. Why could we expect for
eigners to honor the child which
we ourselves had bastardized?
"Silver isn't worth half as much
as gold," echo our great financiers.
1t was worth more than gold before
it was stricken down in the house
of its friends. Suppose two
thoroughbred racers in adjoining
istalls. This is view Of the matter
that will impress Kentuckians,
rennesseeans and Indianians.
Suppose some night, two English
and American jockeys Grained Seyd
and Sherman, accidentally, per-
haps) take dark lantern, steal
"surreptitiously," into the stalls,
break the legs of one of the
thoroughbreds, and next day COM
plain that the "debased" colt is
not able any longer to keep pace
with the other one!
The average horseman would be
tempted to break the necks Of the
two jockeys without waiting for the
verdict Of Jury.
But suppose in addition TO this
Insult to popular intelligence, the
Jockeys should hold that the fortu-
unate colt was now worth more to
mankind than both were before the
maiming or "debasing." What
the genuine Indianan, Kentuckian
Ior Tennesseean would respond, the
J Dispatch forbears to suggest. The