The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1900-10-26
FALsIFIED PROPHECIES.
salaries OF Many Have Csased Entirely,
While Others With Decreased Salaries
Find Cost Of Living Much Higher.

While Others with Decreased Salaries
Find Cost Of Living Much Higher.
Mr.. Bryan has been much criticised
by republican orators and newspapers
because he predicted, in 1896, that the
demonstration of silver would tend
to depress prices and diminish wages.
Yet there can be no doubt that, apart
from other considerations, this proph-
ecy is true. 1t is automatic that, in the
absence of disturbing elements, the
prices OF every marketable thing, in
Guiding the wages of labor, are exact
ly measured by the amount of stand
ard money in circulation.
Nobody anticipated in 1896 the dis
covery of gold in large quantities in
the Klondike, nor that the worlds
annual production of that metal would
increase from $500 Psi, 900 in 1896 to
1921 .sO5,456 in 1899; nor that repub-
lican administration would coin $685.
O34,O33 in silver money denounced as
bad) in 1898, and perhaps as much
more in 1899; nor that the $21.1O per
capita in money said to be in circula-
ton July 1, 1896, would be increased
to $25 per capita July 1, 1899. Yet
these facts are all shown Except the
silver coinage of 1897 by the statis-'
tical abstract published this year by
the secretary of the treasury In 1896
it was claimed by the republicans that
we had too much money, and that
the silver money amounting to SIS or
SO per capita ought to be eliminated.
Neither did anybody in 1896 con
template the alarming growth of the
trusts that. supervened the Inaugural
ton of President Mckinley. Encour-
aged by his election, and fostered by
the Dingley tariff act, they have quad
rupled in capitalization in the last
three years; and. controlling the
greater part of the manufactured
products of the country, they are now
the great disturbing element as to
prices. Many articles have been
doubled in price, not in pursuance of
the law of supply and demand. but by
the arbitrary action of the magnates
who control the trusts.
But now as to false prophets. Re-
publican orators and newspapers made
strong appeals in 1896 to men who
worked on salaries and others who
had fixed incomes, saying that if Bry-
an was elected, and the bimetallic
standard prevailed, their salaries and
incomes would not be increased, while
the cost of living would be greatly
enhanced; but, if Mckinley was elect
ed, their salaries would not be dimin-
ished, and their "sound money" would
buy more of the necessities and lux
uries of life, SO that the election of
Mckinley would be to their net adj
vantage.
The fact is, the salaries and in
comes of many such men have either
been diminished or entirely cut off by
the consolidation of independent in
dustries into trusts, and all consumers
are obliged to pay much higher prices
for goods manufactured or controlled
by the trusts. And so the election of
Mckinley has not been to their adj
vantage, but to their detriment The
republican orators and newspapers
of 1896 were the false prophets that
led many men astray and induced
them to vote against their own inter-
ests.-Judge David Martin, of Kansas.
Public Ownership.
Miners are idle and SfaryinU in