The Wallace miner. [volume] (Wallace, Idaho) 1907-current, 1919-10-09
THE STATUS OF SILVER
DISGUISED BY P|TTMAN
PRODUCERS WOULD BLOCK
LONDON CONTROL.


tific Press Senator Key Pittman, Of
Nevada, author of the Pittman silver
bill, says: Il have just read the con-
tribution to Discussion by Edwin d.
Wolfe in your issue Of August 16. en-
titled The Status Of Silver Mr..
Wolfe, after quoting from an article
by me in which I said Our govern
ment by promising to buy silver
whenever it dropped to one dollar per
ounce, prevented London from fixing
the price below that amount. In 9TH
er words, it took the control Of the
silver market away from London
proceeds to demonstrate that the
price of silver followed the sterling
exchange market Of London.
There Is no conflict between the
assertions Of Mr.. Wolfe and myself,
although he apparently takes issue
with my statements. London al
ways has and does now largely con-
troll the price of silver because Lon
don is the buyer of probably 80 per
cent of the silver production OF the
world. As long as this is the case,
and so long as thousands of separate
producers are competing with each
other to sell to this one great purchas-
err, London will control the price OF
silver.
The only thing that prevented Lon
don from reducing the price OF silver
below one dollar per ounce was the
Pittman silver bill. To this extent
the control Of silver was taken away
from London. 1t would have been
more accurate If, in the quotation
given above. / had said that the con-
troll of London was limited by our
Government
1T Is also true that our government
did hold the price of silver down to
$1.O1k per ounce during the war as
far as England was concerned AS
England required all the silver that
we could supply, this left China and
Japan practically without silver to
meet their demands. This condition
naturally caused these countries to
bid high for silver. If the Govern
ment had not been directing all the
silver to the war zone, there would
not have been such an acute demand
in China and Japan, and it would nat
urally follow that their bids would
not have been nearly SO high. In
other words,you cannot take Isolated
conditions to determin what would
have been the price of silver The
fact remains that the price of silver Is
not $3.50 per ounce at the present
time and never has been since the en-
barge was lifted, although the demand
in China and Japan had been cumu-
lating during the period OF embargo
sour departments dealing with
foreign relations and with finances
bearing upon the war, Tor reasons
which appealed to them, considered
the holding down Of the price OF silver
necessary as an aid to winning the
war. There was great effort made
to fix the price Of silver at S5c. IN
stead of, a dollar. In fixing the min
imum price at dollar 1t was COM
promise. without this compromise
probably nothing would have been ac-
complished and silver would have soio
down at IS cents per ounce, as 1t did
sell at. the time Of the introduction OF
the Pittman bill.
upon the signing Of the armis-
tice the government kept its prom
ise and lifted the embargo on silver
This, last act did not accomplish
what silver producers predicted would
be accomplished. I never expected II
would accomplish what the producers
thought It would accomplish and
never Joined in the optimistic pre-
dictions that were made.
II stated in a recent article that one
potent remedy would be the compiha-
ton of the silver producers undei
the webb Pomerene Act for the sale
Of silver abroad. Such step, In con-
nection with the government kuaran'
tee of a minimum price for American
silver, would complete Americas con-
troll over silver. what price silver
might then go depends upon too many
various monetary considerations fol
me at this time to venture an opinion
II think we will all agree that tn
present time silver is in a.much hap
pier state than gold and probably any
other metal. ITS future Is ever
brighter"