The Arizona copper camp., 1920-01-31
GERMANY'S STUPENDOUS INTERNAL Debt

and whether they involved further
dilution of the circulation.
Dangerous Remedies
This is sufficiently hopeless prob
lem, as anyone will admit, and it is
not at all surprising to hear that some
drastic remedies are suggested, the
most important and serious of which
should be here discussed 1t is said,
with probable truth that to avoid tax
alton immense amounts of marks are
being boarded, especially by those
who made large profits out of the war.
1t is proposed, therefore, at a given
date to declare certain issue OF marks
valueless, SO that in order to secure
some kind Of value for this hoarded
paper it will have to come out and be
taxed accordingly. This is about on a
par with Napoleons method of dealing
with the "assignats" of the French
revolution. They were repudiated,
and it took France at least 80 years
to recover any decent place in the
worlds credit 1t need hardly be re
called that a revolution and change
of dynasty were among the incidents
following that act of bankruptcy.
But can Germany afford to repudiate
it's currency in this way? Supposing
all of it were held by her own people,
the task would be difficult But the
writer, whose entry into and exit from
Germany were made through Holland,
is informed that Holland alone is the
uneasy possessor of something like
19 billions of German marks, in one
form Of indebtedness or another Rela-
lively to the other European powers,
Holland al present is on what might
be called 'easy street." and if the
Dutch gulden is not up to the par of
the American dollar it ranks above
the pound sterling. But the Dutch
bankers are getting cold feet about
their German indebtedness.
Fractional Currency and No Silver
One Of the most responsible direc
tors of one of the big Three of the
German banks said that every neutral
county was loaded to full capacity
with German reichsmarks and could
take no more; while what he consid-
cred the irreducible minimum of gold
held by the Reichsbank was all that
remained and from this must come
payment for the imports of food made
through the Official benevolence of the
United States government. An at
tempt, therefore, to repudiate all or
any part of the German currency
would have disastrous consequences
in countries where Germany has made
every effort to keep her credit good.
Let it be remembered, in paren-
! thesis, that the estimates of German
currency here offered do not include
those of every city throughout the
former empire, which in the absence
of silver money has floated unlimited
quantities of fractional currency.
Cologne, in fact, reached the point OF
a paper bill for ten pfennigs. Taking
the mark at two cents, this would be
worth 2 mills of an American cent,
or shade more than one-fifth of that
useful coin. But it would not be
worth that for any distance outside Of
Cologne. The other towns would re-
fuse to accept it because they would
want to protect their own fractional
currency, and the point is rapidly
being approached where this sort of
small change will be sold if not by
the pound, at least by the bucket No
one knows how much of it may be
afioat, and reputation is as easy and
as costly as our southern states found
lit in days we are all irving to forget