The Washington times., 1935-03-09

S ment is on the
Lewis Haney way to &C
cumulating a metallic reserve"
Is per cent of which is to be
silver.
There are two ways to use this
silver: "Bimetallism" and "Sym-
metalism."
BimetalIism means the al
ternate use of either of two
metals as the monetary stand
ard. Paper dollars would be
freely convertible into either
gold or silver.
But the rate of cOnvertibility
into the two metals would be
fixed according to an unvary.
ing weight ratio. Suppose this
ratio were "16 to l." Then, if
a paper dollar were made re-
deemable in 15.9 grains of gold,
the Government would give you
either that much gold or 16
times as much silver (if you
wanted it,, or 254 grains.
This would be like trying to
measure with two different yard.
sticks, one of which is shorter
than the other. You see. any
fixed quantity of silver is bound
to vary in value, and to rise or
fall as compared with the value
of any fixed quantity of gold.
Merely fixing the two quantities
Q5.9 grains and 254 grains) does
not fix the value of gold and
silver. Today a grain of gold
is actually worth more than so
times a grain of silver-no mat
ter what quantity is in the
dollar.
Just as the shorter of two yard
sticks would be used by mer.
chants, so the overvalued metal
would be the only one used in
measuring value. That means
that today if we were to try BIZ
metallism at 16 to /, silver would
become our only standard.
Value ratios always vary.
Weight ratios stay fixed. The re-
suit is that one or the other Of
the two metals is always over
valued in terms of dollars. So
bimetallism never works.
We may add that silver is
neither as convenient nor as sta
BILE in value as gold. Even if by
some magic, people could be
forced to use the two yardsticks
at the same time, the greater in
stability of silver would certainly
affect the metallic reserve" It
would "dilute" the more stable
gold, and make the monetary
standard less definite.
This is why the money doc
tors have cOnjured up the SYM
metallic" scheme. Symmetalism
has not been tried, but it pro.
poses to use both of two metals
jointly as the standard. The
standard money unit would be
a fixed quantity of one plus .
fixed quantity of the other.
It would be like taking two
yardsticks and piecing them to-
gether so they could be used as
a compound thing.
Some even go so far as to
propose that the standard coin
be composed Of an amalgam Of
gold and silver melted up to.
gether!
This is merely a vain attempt
to cover up the fundamental weak
ness Of bimetalism.
/. Even if it could work, the
injection of silver would make the
value of our standard less stable.
Our monetary yardStick would be
less definite and be subject to the
greater fluctuations at its silver
end.
2. A vital defect is that there
could be no joint conVertibility, or
for paper dollars.
Nobody would want an amalgum,
because of the cost of getting the
two metals out of it by a refining
process. If we try to make paper
redeemable in the two metals sep
arately, we merely revert to a
form of bimetallism.
Some one thing must always be
the real standard. Even under
symmetalism, the value of silver
would have to be measured in
gold! You can't measure a thing
with two different yardsticks at
the same time.
The bug under the chip in all
such schemes is the desire Of infla-
tionists to depreciate the dollar
by diluting it with cheap silver, so
as to boost prices. They are al
ways aided by the selfish interests
Of silver mine owners.
Next Wednesday-The Com.
modify Standard and MAN
a0nd Turrnnrv