The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1935-03-02
Liberal Viewpoint
by DIR. HARRY ELMER BARNES


THE initiation bloc in Congress is on the ram
Il page again. Before the present session OF
Congress is over the President may have to make
some concessions to it in order to get his more
important measures passed. Hence the new
flock Of money books are highly relevant to
current political problems.
Probably the best historical background Of
the present monetary tangle and the discussion
Of the gold problem is contained in Harold
Fishers The Inevitable World Recovery"
Doubleday Doran):
An observer from some other planet, look
ing down on the speck of cosmic dust called
Earth might have seen the play something after
this fashion:
When the curtain rises in 1914, millions Of
puny men are discovered struggling to restrain
the thing they call The Mad Dog Of Europe
broken loose after so years Of growls and
threats. TO infect them all with madness. And
in their urgent need he sees them consuming
all that the world can offer in the struggle, and
he sees them promising and promising what
would take generations to pay. But what they
promised to pay for did not take generations to
in less than five years. Strange that it should
take generations to pay for what can be done
in five years.
F" A ND after the first act, he sees them, all
"A these puny millions, gathered round
huge ball many times the size of any of them.
And the ball looks like gold but is not. But
they have promised the spirit Of gold that they
will treat it as if it were his own pre-war self.
They are trying to push it up hill, and, like the
ball of Sisyphus it forever rolls back upon them.
so they bring wedges, to bolster it up, and
il absorbS the wedges into itself and grows larger
and bigger than ever The more they wedge it,
the bigger it grows, for the hill is time, and
the wedges are gold loans and the gravity pull
of time on the whole ball increases.
But the time comes when it has grown so
big they can roll it no farther, and when it
grows bigger still it rolls back on them in spite
OF all they can do And after millions more
have suffered in the struggle they suddenly lose
faith and say, If it must go, it must CO., and
they scatter, each nation going to its own
place.
And behold when they scatter, the ball
collapses and shrinks to ridiculous size, and
there in the middle, like caraway seed in
football is a very tiny piece of real gold.
THE mountain of debt is crashing, its pre-
war gold valuation has been cut from under 1t
and the newly freed protential of goods and
services ascends beyond the horizon, like the
sun at dawn"
"A MESSRS. WILLIAM BROWN C'The Inher-
I'VE ent Function of Money" McAllister, SD
and Frederick Soddy ("The Role of Money"
Harcourt. Brace likewise argue strenuously for
sweeping reform of the whole money system.
Mr.. Brown asserts that "all other reforms wait
on money reforms" while Mr. Soddy, a. very
capable student, goes far as to assert that our
present monetary system is a veritable challenge
to civilization:
THE monetary system is actually based on
the very error, to the point-blank denial OF
which Western civilization owes its greatness.
1t serves only the convenience of a parasitic
and upstart plutocracy practising world wis
dom the exact opposite of that which is the
foundation of the age.
1T prefers the dark in times when all men
seek the light, and is sowing the seeds of hatred
and war in world weary to death of strife.
1t is poisoning the wells of Western civilization,
and science must turn from the conquest Of
nature to deal with a more sinister antagonist,
or lose all that it has won.'
Nothing more completely reveals the chaos
and inadequacy in the scientific theories of
money than the symposium edited by Mr.. E. G.
Riegel Of the Consumers Guild of America. He
has consulted eight out of the 10 authorities
named by Irving Fisher as competent to discuss
the problem of money and has compiled and
analysed their responses.
Do these men present such a unity of opinion
on fundamentals as will allow us to build solid
structure of monetary theory? They do not:
The time has come for ruthless scrutiny of the
storehouse of economic knowledge to find, if
possible sound timbers with which to construct
here"