The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-04-18
THE DEBT TO MIR. CLEVELAND.

One feature of MT. Fowler's report
 on the bill of the committee on banking
 and currency has not received as much
 attention as Is due to the Republican
 inent political opponent whose invalua-
 ble services to his country, in render
 ing which he sacrificed his standing
 with his party This is the frank and l hearty acknowledgment that MT. | Cleveland saved the country from sil- verism and the debasement of it's mon- etary standard.
 | Mir Fowler contrasts the splendid | services of the Bank of France to it's | country during and after the war with 1 Germany with "the stupendous waste | due to government operations and consequent depreciated currency suf- | fered by our own country during the civil war, and the humliating specta-
 cle in later years of the United States government hiring fer stipulated sum a syndicate of bankers to come to it's rescue and save it's credit from utter
 and everlasting dishonor." And then the report says:
 But Grover Cleveland was a patriot,
 and did his duty, and that act alone should make his name immortal. The
 shame was in the ignorance, or the
 political cowardice, or both, that ren- dered such condition possible"
 Those words are true. MT Cleve- land is entitled to them, and commit tee of Republicans does itself honor in
 uttering them. And yet a Republican senator as a man of education with few rivals in our public life, a gold standard man, and coming from one of
 the most educated and one of the
 wealthiest of our eastern states, whose
 loyalty to the gold standard never way cred for moment, was so far carried away by mere partisan feeling that in a speech in the senate he denounced that contract with the gold syndicate as upon it's face the blackest contract
 in our history"
 In the session of Congress between MT. Cleveland's second election and his second inauguration an effort was made to repeal the Silver Purchase law There were enough sound money men in Congress to do 1t, but they had to be taken from both parties and mere partisan feeling kept a sufficient num- Der from getting together on a matter which they knew to be or vital interest to the country. Most of the Democrats were silverits; most of the Republicans were sound money men. But the sound money Republicans divided. A part, under the leadership of MT. Reed, unit ed with the sound money Democrats to anticipate the wishes of Mir. Cleveland and MT Carlisle. But the rest, under the leadership of a western member, took the position that the silver pur chase law was Republican legislation and it would be bad party politics for Republicans to repeal one of their own acts in order to smooth the way for an incoming Democratic administration. And yet the western member of this group of members said in private con- versaton that MT. Cleveland alone had saved the country from the disaster of free silver coinage Had the silver pur- chase law been repealed in the winter of 1S92-3 it is probable that the panic that came a few months later might have been averted But the country suffered that party strategy might be 
 MT. Cleveland did save the country from the disgrace and disaster of free | silver coinage. His political opponents | are now beginning to do him justice, | and at some day in the future his own party will do the same.-New York | Journal Of Commerce