Year: 1877

in your name are sincere.


----


HOW THE SILVER Fill WILL AFFECT
BUSINESS.


Obviously. the effect of the passage of the
Silver Bill has not been favorable to business.
Gold has advanced, though so little as to
prove that not many persons believe the bill
can become a law. Yet the advance is enough
TO indicate the certain result if such bill
should pass. Gold wOuld rise swiftly with re-
spect to paper currency, both because that
currency would then become redeemablc only
in silver and because there would arise a sharp
demand for gold IA the only form of money
in which reserves could be held or foreign
debts protected without strong probability of
loss. United States bonds Immediately de
clincd in London, although there, as here, the
prevailing opinion is that the bill Will not
pass. Dispatches announcing this belief, and
giving declarations of foreign authorities on
the subject, make it clear that the fall
i'm bonds would be one of startling import
ance to savings and other banks and tdu-
ciary institutions, if such bill should
seem likely to become law. The bonds and
shares of American railways which owe debts
abroad fall quickly also. In comparatively
few cases do railway or municipal bonds use
the word cOldn instead of cOn,' though
gold was always understood. Wherever the
word "cOinr was used. should the Bland bill
pass the bonds would become legally payable,
principal and interest, in silver. But the COM
plctc decentralization of gold, which that bill
is designed TO cause, would speedily make it
IL. T,r lv-n,
procure the gold for payment of principal or
interest, even where gold was promised As
to all railway shares, even the best, no legal
or moral obligation can apply, but foreign
holders are intelligent enough TO know that
dividend payments would be made to them
upon the same basis AZ to American share
holders, namely. depending upon the shifting
value Of a paper promise to pay a coin also of
shifting value.


1t is not easy 10 say how far the demOrali-
zati0n in the markets may extend. RumOrs
will multiply. as long as the bill is pending
rumOIs as remarkable as the one circulated on
Wednesday, giving Mr.. Stanley Matthews as
authority for the assertion that the bill would
pass, and would be signed by the President
These reports are more readily credited among
business men than among those who have
larger knowledge of the political forces likely
to affect the action of the President and of
the Senate and still more readily abroad,
where the authority for such statements can
not be weighed Men do not sell, or refuse
loans, because they beliere that mischief is
coming, one tenth as often as because they fear
that mischief is coming. Sales of bonds, sales
of railway securities and shares, purchases of
L, . Il
where new legal-tender can change its val
ne, refusals OF loans excepting upon special
contracts to pay gold coin-thesc are the nat
ural effects of disquietudc in regard TO the
silver bill. The mere apprehension will turn
the scale with thousands who do not yet be
leve that the bill can pass, but are not dis
posed to take any unnecessary risks But all
these things will be very trying to business,
as long IA the uncertainty continues.


Experience already indicates, also, that those
are mistaken who fancy that mere enact
mcnt OF reconciliation can make silver rise
TO equal value with gold. Some rise might or
might not occur during the purchases which
would follow the passage of such an act, but
the tendency Of the market does not now
favor the idea that any advance would occur.
hlot OF bOlu, Us COHlptItu Win paper III tnlS
country, and as compared with American Sc
curties abroad, does appear, but no approx
nation Of the two metals, nor any sign that
the remarkably strong vote in the lower House
of Congress has produced any of the effects
which the advocates of the measure expected
| Thus far, therefore, this raid upon the honor
of the country has been evil. and only evil, in
| its effects upon business. That prices have
| fallen, and confidence oozcd out, daily market
reports attest. But these effects are but n
| slight hint of those which would be Witnessed
should the opinion become prevalent that the
Silver Bill will become a law. Capitalists and
poor depositors, bondhoders, stockholders and
money lenders, would make haste to protect
themselves, not waiting for the actual passage
of the bill lest it should then bc found toe
late. When Congress met, the business pros
pects were bright. That body has not yc
been in session one month, but it has don,
more mischief than it can do good If 1t re-
mains I'm session for twelyemOnth. The
public credit has been shaken, values have
been disturbed, confidence has been chilled