Iron County register., 1899-03-23
ITS INHERENT DISHONESTY.
The Gold Standard Historically Con.
sidered by Prof. GhOsh, of CAL
cutta, India.

In order that we may clearly under.
stand the evil nature of the monometal-
lie system as well as its inherent and
abhorrent dishonesty, it is only nee
essary that we consider the subject OF
money in its historic and economic re-
lations.
Let it not be supposed for a moment
THAI the bimetallic theory in its ele-
mentary principles is a new-fangled
| idea, an untried experiment of econo-
mists, working in their solitary cham
bers, utterly unconscious of the actual
monetary condition of the world. 1t
is really as old as the hills-at least as
| old as King Solomon. One cannot do
better than quote the researches of
! Prof. Max Muller on this subject: Solo
mon, meeting with the same difficulty
| that we do now, namely, the deprecia-
| tion of silver and the disrupture of the
| trade with India (curious how history
| repeats itselfD acted wisely lin this
case history does not repeat itself!)
and performed an act of true bimetal-
| ism by consenting to receive taxes in
! either gold OF silver, in spite of the de-
| probation of the latter metal. at d fixed
! ratio. viz, 1879 to 1. The silver thus OBJ
! tanned was sent to India (Ophir in the
! Bible) to buy precious stones. ivory,
| etc, as mentioned in the Book OF Kings.
Without, however, going 5000 years
back, we may safely say that the dis
covery of America is the first landmark
| i'll the history of bimetallism. Every
| schoolchild knows that soon after the
| discovery of the silver mines of Potosi,
oF
! home laden with silver, and flooded
Europe with it. The act of filtration
from Spain into the other states cf Eu-
rope was performed in the ordinary
course of trade, helped no doubt as re-
CARDS England by the prowess and
activity of Drake, Frobisher, and their
valiant compeers. The enormous in
crease in the supply of silver as COM
pared with gold during the sixteenth
century may be judged from the fact
that whereas the annual production of
silver increased from 6 425, eco at the
beginning OF the century to e3.T0O.000
at the end, the annual production of
gold during the same period increased
from 6 500, coo to e1.000,0C0 only. Had
such an enormous difference in the rel
ativc supply of the two metals taken
place under the present system of gold
monCmetallism. the value of silver with
regard to gold would have come tum-
bling down and dwindled away to a
vanishing point in LESS than no time"
They were wise. however, in those be-
nighted days, and allowed free coin
age of both metals, both being legal
tender in fixed ratio. The ratio was
II 10 ! at the beginning of the century.
but the great supply of silver led to
its being IL to 1 at the end of the cen
tury. Of course these rates were not
fixed by international agreement. for
the days of monetary conferences had
not dawned, but were merely the alge
braical averages OF the different ratios
prevailing in the different countries Of
Europe. 1t must, however. be men,
toned that these various rates of the
different countries of Europe were
very nearly equal-in fact being iden-
tically the same within certain groups
of states. 1t was obviously to the in
terest of these countries to have rates
as nearly the same as possible. For
otherwise each country would have lost
one or other of the two metals-eXcept
1OF the EXPENSE Ol lEdHSIl-dCcOEulh
to Gresham's law.
Since the last 25 years che value of
silver in relation to gold has fallen by
more than so per cent: i. E., whereas
formerly it took 1913 ounces of silver
to buy one ounce of gold, it now takes
about 80 ounces of silver to buy one
of gold. Hence the question is, what
can be the cause or causes of this de-
probation of silver, of this apprecia-
tion of gold or. if you prefer it, we
shall not quarrel about phrases and
say ''of this divergence between gold
and silver?" Monomctallists swear
that gold has done nothing. that it is
perfectly innocent, and lay the whole
blame upon silver. That, they say, is the
true culprit; that hasfallen by its own
fault, by being produced too much
but gold has remained exactly where i
it was. Bimet lists on the other hand. |
maintain that. the relative supply of |
both metals has not altered. but the |
relative demand has. Now it is easy |
enough to decide between the parties |
as to which is right and which is
wrong. Bimetallists say that the sup
ply of gold is about where it was be- |
fore. but that there has been created |
an artificial increase in it's demand by |
countries like Germany, Austria and |
more recently Japan. etc. If this be the |
case. then we would naturally expect |
a scarcity of gold in these and all other |
countries having a gold standard |
for the same quantity of gold would |
now be wanted by more people-and in |
consequence fall in the prices of COM
modities in general in those countries. |
because more commodities would now
be competing against the same quantity ,
of money. This is exactly what has I
taken place, viz: fall in the prices !
of commodities in general in countries |
having a gold standard. Again. BIZ !
metallists say that silver has stood |
nearly where it was before; that it
has not been overproduced. Now. if !
this is the case. we should expect to
see much the same quantity of silver
as before in countries having silver
standard. such as China. Mexico. etc..
except that the silver. displaced by
gold in Europe might have found its |
wav into these countries-in conse-
quence we would expect that the prices
of commodities in general Except !
of those commodities which are i'm
ported from gold countries) would re-
main unchanged. Now we know that
this is exactly the case, as all must ad-
init who know anything about condi-
tions in silver-using countries. Prices
have not declined there as they have in