The Black Hills union. [volume] (Rapid City, Pennington County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1889-1904, 1899-02-10

tlcian who knew better than most men
that money constitutes the real sinews
CT war.
"If success be a justification, and were
justification needed, this attempt is fully
justified, for it completed the annlhiia-
ton of the credit of the assiglats, in
spite of the terrible means adopted by
the French convention to force their, Cir.
culation. II is not a little curious, how
ever, to reflect that within q very, few
years after the d%estrucicn, of the French
assignats-that is to say in l197-Mr.
Pitt should himself have been driven by
the force of circumstances to adopt this
very expeGient and risk the hazardous
step Of relying upon an lnconvertlble
paper circulation, and that this meas
ure, the fruit OF imperious necessity
alone, should be classed by his eulogists,
and by the first Sir Robert Peel among
others, among the brilliant phases of his
administration"
MIR. Stephen D. Delaye Of Philadel-
phia, in his history of the assignats and
mandats, 1877, speaks of the British
scheme of counterfeiting the French as
siguats Az follows:
"But finding that the revolution was
stronger than the clergy, stronger than
the nobility; that imperial France was
corQuering the enemies of liberty ev-
erywhere; that nation after nation was
yielding to its power; that it's armies
were victorious and its principles, de-
veloped by it's constitution and laws,
We're such as reason and humanity ap-
prnvoI tho o1orru or5 rho pohi1itt Saf
criminal law, honor and cvcfy principle
Of honesty at defiance anu organized
forgery and made the passage Of coun-
terfeiting %ass!Snats an occupation-thus
attempting by crime, by stealth and by
villainous and secret infany to under
mine the credit Of the assi2nat, deprive
France of its and overthrow
the revelation"
This business was prosecuted by in
dividuals in a small way in Belgium
and Switzerland, tut mainly in the city
of LCrdon, under the eye and approval
of William Pitt. the premier Of Eng
land.
The history proceeds as follows:
Seventeen manufacturing establish
ments were in full operation III Lon
don, With o force Of 400 men devoted
to the production of false and forged as
signats. The extent and success of the
labor may be judged by the quantity
and the value they represented. In the
month Of May, 1895, it was found that
there were III circulation from l2, 000,-
900 600 to Is. 900 900, 900 francs Of
forged %assignats, which were So exact
in form, appearance, texture and design
as to defy detection except by the most
minute examination and exact knowl-
edge of the secret signs by which the
initiated were taught to distinguish
them"
Now, taking all these facts into con-
sideration, can it be said with any show
Of reason and truth that the assignats
had a fair trial as money! With no es.
tablished government or sovereignty,
they were not III any true sense a legal
tender There being little revenue col
lected, they could not be properly hon
ored or received in the re aL ues in any
sort OF proportion to the amount issued,
and, being rudely executed and easily
counterfoited it was easy for the coun.
terfeiter to initiate them to the point Of
AAiSA was uOU a 6luSlo
condition on which to base a safe mon
ey system in France at the time the
assignats were issued. Not ali enterprise
on the farm, in tho shop or in the entire
fields OF science or industry could have
succeeded with SO many essentials lack
ing
And yet, in spite CT the difficulties in
the way, the French assignats made the
revolution a success. They overthrow
the monarchy and became the means of
permanently subdividiny the great land
ed estates of the nobility into small
homes for the people.
MIR. Alison, il his History of Eu-
rope, volume 4, page 37l. states this
part of TIE case very clearly Af.er men.
tionine the evils arising from the fall Of
the assignats Mr.. Allison says:
the other hand, the debtors
throughout the whole country found
themselves liberated from their uga
ment The national domains were pur
chased almcst for nothing by the hold
ars or the government paper. and tho
land, infinitely subdivided, required lit.
tie OF the expenditure of capital and be.
came daily mere productive from the
number and energy Of it's new cult.
vators. These vast alterations in the
circulation induced social changes mora
durable in their influence and far moro
important in their final results than all
the political catastrophes of the revolu-
ton, for they entirely altered, and that.
too. III a lasting manner. the distribu.
ton OF property and made a permanent
alteration in the form of government
unavoidable from a total change in the
class possessed Of substantial power"
In volume 8. page 3, Mr. Alison
further says:
"A great part of the landed property
of the country had passed into the hands
CT several millions Of small holders,