Year: 1878

/ duu suioosiiiy ohiy Dy shS AcaiNy Co-opSi1-


tion OF the banks and the Secretary of the


Treasury goes without saying. We have on
several occasions recently pointed out to


the banks and to Secretary Sherman the


urgent necessity Of coming TO perfect and


thorough understanding on all the elements


of the problem, and are now reassured by
report from Washington that at a private
conference held last week between the
Secretary and several gentlemen repre-
senting the New York Clearing House certain


points of very great and indeed decisive
importance were discussed, and, our CORE
spondent reports, substantially agreed upon.
Our Washington correspondent recites
these points, and if ne is correctly informed
they include policy for the Treasury and
policy for the banks mutually co-opera-
tive, and, taken together, as it seems to us.
admirably designed to make the work OF
specie resumption certain, easy and with
out disturbance to the country.


The banks, il appears, ask Secretary Sher-
man to limit the coinage of silver hereafter
to two millions per month. as the law allows
him to do, and to withdraw the one and two
dollar legal tenders and substitute silver
dollars for them. We should think he
would be glad to agree to this proposition,
for it will enable him to force his silver
dollars into circulation, and would so
reasonably and lawfully limit their amount
as to prevent their beingt too severe a burden
on the people.


The banks, on their part, propose, after
the 1st Of January, to pay out gold and
greenbacks indiscriminately; to discontinue
the special gold accounts which they now
keep and have for years kept under the law
with their customers to cease the use of
gold checks in the Clearing House ex-
changes, and to refuse to receive silver
dollars except as q special deposit, under
special contract, to be returned as de-
posted. They will also refuse to use silver
certificates in the Clearing House transac-
tions, and silver, except in small sums of
ten or twenty-five dollars


We gather from a private source that all
this is at the present time not in the form
of a positive agreement, but in a tentative
shape, to be further considered by both par
ties, the Treasury and the banks; but we
have strong hope that the good sense of
both sides will lead to it's adoption rs the
conjoint policy of the Treasury and tho
banks. If this hope shall be justified the
country may be congratulated on the speedy
and quiet consummation Of one of the most
important events in our history, and the
Secretary Of the Treasury will be very for
tunate maE. What he is asked to do is
what he must feel is precisely what
he would like to do. He has q right,
under the law, to limit the coinage Of silver
dollars to two million dollars per month,
and the general and outspoken disgust Of
the people with this dollar should lead him
to coin as few specimens Of it rs the law
permits. On the other hand, as the friends
Of silver may urge that the country has not
yet had fair experience of its use, if he
withdraws the small legal tender notes he
will satisfy the silver men and give the
public such an opportunity to judge OF the
convenience of silver dollars as they de-
mand.


The proposition Of the banks meets all
the difficulties SO far as they and the public
are concerned. Resumption being fact,
they propose to pay out greenbacks and
gold indiscriminately, and cease, in all
their accounts and dealings with ems.
toners or between themselves, to ac-
knowledge or make any distinction


between the two. AS to silver, they will
ignore it, precisely as greenbacks have
been ignored in California by the banks.
The greenback. while it was greatly depre-
ciated, was legal tender in California pre-
cisely as in all the other States, and any
one who chose might offer it in payment of
o debt, or send it to bank as part Of his de-
posits at its nominal or legal tender value.
But the California banks held that, as they
dealt only in gold, and rs their capital
stock was paid in in gold, and their de-
posits in like manner, they were not.
bound to depreciate either their cap
ital or their deposits by allowing any
customer TO send them deprecated green
backs. OF course customer might stand
upon his legal rights and require that his
legal tender notes be received; but the
bank protected itself by refusing any longer
to keep his account. In like manner the
banks now will easily and effectually pro-
tect themselves against silver And, as in
California, they will have the sympathy and
cooperation OF the whole mercantile public
with them. What is proposed tor them is
therefore entirely practical and feasible
and il the banks which unitedly form the
New York Clearing House agree upon this
sound and safe policy they will draw after
them all the other banks in the country.


II will no doub. be objected by the
friends Of the silver dollar that this policy
will eliminate that venerated coin from the
currency. But the reply is, first, that
Secretary Sherman already knows, by abso-
lutte test, that the silver dollar is not liked


by the country. He has faithfully, and
indeed with IN almost immoderate zeal