Iron County register., 1899-02-23
ITALY IN THE Tolls.
Inequality OF Conditions That Pro
duce Wretchedness i'm the Midst
- AbundaaSe.

ard country. theoretically we have
| the double standard of silver and gold
but in fact it is the single standard.
| Under the Latin unios none of the
| silver coins are legal tender except the
| FIVE franc piece, and that has not been
coined since 1876. You have had a
somewhat similar experience with your
silver dollar since 1873. 1t is a well
known fact that where prices in the
home markets are kept up by protec-
zionist tariff, the surplus product is
sent abroad. without regard 10 profit,
in order to prevent a fall of domestic
prices. Thus the loss OF the exported
portion is recouped at the expense of
home consumers, who are deprived Of
the benefit OF competition amongst pro-
ducers.
This fact, with a limited supply Of
money and high taxes, produces condi-
tions that are very hurtful 10 the poor
and those who do business on borrowed
capital. In your free and happy coun-
try it is impossible for you 10 appre-
ciate conditions as they really exist
here. Italy is gaining bad reputation
as the mother of anarchists Nothing
short of long and systematic misuse of
the powers of government can ade-
quately take the life and heart out of
great masses of men, fill them with
corrosive thoughts, force them into
passionate brooding over the contrast
between their misery and the luxury of
others-between the great powers OF
governments and their failure to do
their subjects good. One knows the
typical criminal of the ordinary kind,
whose mind and body have never grown
up, with a weedy frame, with
face scanned and drawn with disease,
and with the temperament of vicious
child. The type is generated by GER
tain circumstances as sure as cholera
by others. Given enough poverty.
enough hopelessness, enough dis
couragement, nothing but an excep-
tional gift of character can prevent the
rest.
The Italian government has for years
been placing as many of its subjects
as il can in an environment manning
and stunting to all joyous effort and in
terest il life. Necessaries have been
taxed beyond endurance. Nobody
works harder or lives more sparingly
than the Italian peasant, but labor, en-
dured without proper food, and frugal
ity, practiced without perceptible re-
ward. must end by making life dis
tasteful. and government an object Of
hatred. That done. you have perfect
surface prepared for the striking of the
anarchisIic match.
In this perfectly Ineligible way Italy
has become the chief center and source
of criminal anarchism. When one
hears that a public man has been mur-
dered. even in France or Switzerland,
one expects almost as a matter of course
10 find that the murderer has an Italian
name. What the pilgrims camping
ground at Mecca is 10 the physical health
OF the world, Italy is now coming TO be
TO the political health of western Eu-
rope-a nursery Of public crime, as the
other is nursery Of cholera.
Our financial system is extremely Vi
cious. Expressed in the terms of your
money we have a circulation of only
about eight dollars per capita, which
reduces US almost TO the level of the
barbarCus races. France has a better
system. She practically sustains bi-
metallism by freely paying out both
gold and silver at the option of the
government. This sustains the parity
between the two metals and gives her
people the full volume of both. The
French per capita of circulation. ex-
pressed in the terms of your money.
-.
the world. Its benefits are seen in the
prosperous condition of her people.
When Germany scld her silver and de-
clared for the single gold standard she
was supposed to have done a clever
piece of financing; but the facts did
not sustain the theory. Her per capita
of circulation is only a trifie over S17,
less than half that of France; and in
spite of the fact that she collected a
billion dollars war indemnity from the
French. the Germans. / think, would
be very glad to exchange conditions
with their old enemy.
Although it is impossible to have a |
perfect working measure of value, and |
to take commodities as
3 whole. we should seek for a meas |
ure upon which we could rely as be- |
ng sufficiently expansive 10 keep pace |
with the growing demands made upon |
/: without varying seriously in its gem |
raj purchasing power Such meas |
IRE of value cannot be esta blished by |
he use of gold alone. II can only be |
formed by the unfettered and unfa- /
cred use of both gold and silver for /
he monetary purposes. by allowing |
open mints and free coinage for both /
like. Apart from the question of the /
uture supply of gold and the demand
or currency requirements. there Is
hat of boarding and consumption in
he arts The demand for the precious
metals. as plate in the western world.
'ests on the same instinct as that which
:as led the native Indian TO turn his
pare rupees into ornaments-the de-
ire TO make display of wealth. and
I the same time 10 accumulate store
# wealth in readily convertible form 1
free mintage of the metal or metals |
tored is an essential condition for the |
abstraction of this complex require
nent. and The continued withdrawal of
he privilege from the holder of sill
er will inevitably turn the boarding |
propensity of the western as well as
he eastern world on to gold alone
'ietro Marconi. in Mississippi Valley
Democrat.
The Danger OF MiIitarfsm.
'swe have spent $500. 600 coo in a war
With Spain We are in the outer circles
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