The independent., 1903-10-15

tOf OF Inc luuepeHutut mouC a. i~1oH
ments to attend, though pressed with
a thousand other duties. 1t was time
lost, though Congressman Hill and
other distinguished lights Of the re-
publican party were the principal
speakers. 1t was the same old thing
without variation that has been told
over so often that it makes a man
tired to come in hearing distance OF IT.
Why speaker in addressing body OF
bankers should think that it was nee
essary to go over the history of the
Suffolk System into details OF how
bank notes were redeemed in Canada,
the amount of gold held by the gov
ernment banks of England, Germany
and France, the amount of their re-
serves and talk for an hour concern
ing the kindergarten work Of bank
ing, is past comprehension. II these
bankers had never read a work on
banking, never locked at the reports
il. the financial magazines oF-the COM
mercial columns of the daily papers,
then that sort of talk might have been
appropriate.
One thing was noticeable. Every
theory advanced took for granted that
the quantity theory Of money, which
almost every one of these banking
scamps present denied during the last
two national campaigns, was true.
They were all in favor of destroying
the greenbacks and recoining all the
silver dollars into subsidiary coins,
thus destroying their legal tender
power. Congressman Hill made the
bald statement, so often made before,
that it had cost the government mil
lions to keep thu greenbacks in cir"
culation, but he, like all the others OF
that ilk, did not make any attempt to
prove the statement.
Another thing was prominent, in
fact. it permeated every sentence, the
discussion of every law, and every
change in laws that was proposed. 1t
was to be for the benefit Of the bank
ers. The profit that could be got out
of it was the only thing that they were
interested in and still they made the
claim that the whole S0,000;000 Of the
population of these United States
should take their advice and that OF
no other person CO.'S ,rning the me-
dunn of exchange that the people
should have. Satan himself could not
exceed that exhibition of Cheek
While Hill advocated one United
States bank with branches, the turn
ing over to that bank and it's branches
every dollar of government revenue as
fast as it was paid in, the destruction
of the greenbacks and the silver dol
lar, and asset currency, the majority
Of those present were not willing to
go quite that far. Not just at present.
They could not see any profit" for
themselves in asset currency and felt
sure that branch banking would throw
all of them out of business, SO they
were down on those propositions and
Mr.. A. ]. Frame of Wisconsin was
particularly denunciatory in his re-
marks concerning those schemes. If
there had been any profit" in it they
would probably have looked at it in
different light.
Another one Of their propositions
was that bank note and check was
essentially the same thing. That sort
Of financial rot has been taught in our
state university. A bank note put
out and used as money" which goes
without Endorsement or Identification
of the bearer, is so essentially differ
ent from check, that 1t takes the
same kind of satanic Cheek to make
the assertion, as that it cost the gov
ernment per cent per year to keep