Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1899-12-29

the most conspicuous gold standard
advocate among the great bankers of
the county was obviously not de-
signed to promote any kind of bi-
metallsm. To be sure there was sent
abroad the alleged International Mon
etary Commission. Unless the hoax
was to be openly confessed. this was
the least the President could do. But
for fear that, after all, foreign govern
ments might take the procedure seri-
ously, he sent to Congress in July,
1897, at the very moment when his
commissions proposals were before the
English cabinet, special message
recommending the so-called Indian
apolis monetary convention plan, with
its program of the single gold stand
ard, retirement of the greenbacks, and
extension af the powers, privileges and
immunities of the national banks.
Meantime, his Secretary of the
Treasury was declaring in interview
after interview, most of which were
carefully reproduced in Europe, that
bimetallism i'll any way, international
or otherwise, was not only impossible
but undesirable. Of course, no seri-
Gus negotiations were possible after all
this. The international commission
became an international joke. 1t
folded its tents like the Arab and ST.
lently stole away. Its distinguished
and discounted chairman sought
early opportunity in the Senate to ex-
plain its failure in a speech in which
neither his diplomatic artifices of
rhetoric nor his denunciation OF the
Secretary of the Treasury could hide
the responsibility of the official head
OF the administration.
"The remainder OF the program
entered on at st. Louis has been
obediently pursued. The information
al agreement for the international
free coinage OF silver having failed to
be promoted steps are being taken
to insure that the gold standard shall
be preserved
"The present bill preserves it with
vengeance. The vast bond debt of
the country, now payable in COIN
that is, either in gold or silver--is to
be made payable in gold alone. Near
ly half billion of standard silver dol
lars, heretofore not redeemablein any
thing, constituting burden on
neither the gold reserve nor the credit
of the government, but forming
large percentage of our basic money,
are hereafter to be redeemable in gold,
thus increasing tremendously the
strain on that metal and thus becom-
ing ian endless chain with which to
pull gold from the treasury and afford
ing an excuse for the final destruction
of the silver dollars as money and
their forced sale as bullion, after the
manner of the German procedure in
1872.
"The greenbacks, the best paper the
world ever saw, the product Of the pat.
riotism and craftsmanship of the Re-
publican party in the days of Abraham
Lincoln, are to be virtually destroyed
by being changed into gold certifi-
Gates, to be locked up in the treasury
and paid out only for gold.
"The tax on the circulation of the
national banks is to be reduced, and
the amount of the bank currency
they may issue on government bonds
deposited is to be increased from 80
per cent. to par of the bonds. thus
making their business enormously
more profitable, opening the way to an
immediate possible initiation of the
bank notes, not legal tender, excellent
for getting into debt on, but unavail-
able for getting ont of debt with, to
the extent of $500, 600, 900. and plac-
ing the regulation OF the volume of
money, and hence the determination
of prices and the burden OF debts abso-
lutely in the power of the banks and
the creditor class. The inevitable
tendency among these banks will be
toward a uniformity and cooperation
of management, the result of which
will speedily be the era of great
bank money trust, more powerful than
all other trusts and combines, and ul-
timately, if the Republican party
should remain in power, irresistible
and unresisted by the government it.
self.
"Thus. fellow citizens, the scheme
we denounced in 1886, is nearing con-
summation. The policy that was de-
MED by the Republican party in that
campaign stands now confessed. Mil
lions of you who voted the Republican
ticket in 1896 would not have done so
had you believed your party destined
so soon to be the agent of the forces
that now dominate it. Millions of
you were bimetallists in 1896 and re-
main so to-day. Now that the prom
ises then made are clearly seen to
have been insincere; now that as a
consequence of the deception prac-
ticed upon your honest confidence
your cause is about to be handed to
the ownership and control of the great
speculative banks and their associated
trusts and combinations, may we not
appeal to you to come to the rescue of
the liberties OF the people and their