Year: 1879

| SisAI 10 fnllauelph1a, ana OF Course
Speech.


PHILADELPHIA. July 14.-Secretary Sher


man, accompanied by committee of th,


maritime exchange, the Mayor, Speaker


Randall and other Congressman and vel


known citizens, went on board the revenue
cutter Hamilton to-day and started on an in
spsction of tho Delaware river and harbor as
far as completed. The Hamilton will take
the Secretary along the eastern coast on an
official visit.


After the party, which numbered about
sixty, had partaken of refreshments VIM.
Brockie, president of the Maritime ex-
change, called the meeting to order and in
troduced Secretary Sherman, who said:
Gentlemen-I did not expect when read
your kind invitation that would be called
upon to make speech, and do not under
stand that my friends here desire me to
make speech, but will commence by re-
turning thanks for the pleasure 1 have en-
joyed in inspecting the shores of the Della
ware and witnessing the immense
progress and growth of the commerce
Of this great city of Philadelphia. It
presents combination of trade and CON-
merce that I know of in no other city in this
country. but as those points are quite famil-
lar with you willnot enlarge upon them.


In regard to ;he resumption experiment
my friend has paid me compliments that are
entirely exaggerated. I do not desire any
such compliments. A year or two ago I
thought was great deal too much abused
by great many. Now I am praised for
great many things don't deserve, so I hold
pretty fair balance. had an idea when
assumed the Office that ] now hold
that it would be good thing
to get back to resumption
for specie payments. They say am pretty
stubborn about principles, hold to and that
l will carry out what 1 begin. never had
any doubt about the ability to resume, none
at all. A great many good men, some of them
no doubt who hear me, thought it was not a
wise undertaking to attempt to make the
vast value volume of our paper money equal
to gold, that We did not coin enough
to do it. I was the judge; I had the
law for my side. The power to bring
it about and the determination to do it. The
result has been happy and beneficial to all
classes of interests and all industries, and to
rich and poor, those who labor as well as
those who spend money, all are benefited
by currency such as we have to-day.


Now, gents, I think I have said all need.
am very hopeful of the future progress of
our country. We are happily situated, COM
pared with other countries. We have a
broad, uncultivated area of land that has
never been broken with the pillow. We have
mines compared with which the vaunted
mlnesof Peru were poor and scanty. The Com
stock lode, of others, are greater than any
thing in the history of the world. Two
years ago labor was suffering in the principal
cities of this country. Men were afraid our
constitutions could not stand the strain and
Would break down, and that period of de-
preston greater than that in England, France
or Germany, had come, the people we're
suffering and could not get work and disas-
ter reigned supreme. Some went to the un-
cultivated land in the West, others went
away and migration finally equalized the de-
mand and supply of labor, until now in two
years, believe, there is not any part of the
United States where honest labor cannot get
an honest days work, and honest money to
pay for it.


There are those who hold that our curren-
cy never could be maintained equally to coin
with a demand on US of eighty or ninety
millions of dollars year. can say to you
now that we have means. So rarely do they
care about gold or silver for money that only
seven millions have been drawn for notes
and greenbacks. This is the strongest thing
about it. Now that gold IS so easy to get
nobody cares to take the trouble of carrying
it. It is a fact that in every month
last year and year before that there was more
gold paid from the treasury than has now been
demanded from the 1st of January of this
year to the present time for all purposes,
and our notes, instead of being at ten or
thirteen per cent below par, now that we
have gold and silver to pay them on demand
are actually at O premium. The treasury
department in San Francisco wanted notes
instead of gold, and we refused to givo them
greenbacks. In New York and Philadelphia
no one wants gold. When they couldn't get
it everybody wanted it; when they can, no
body does. Resumption is now fixed fact,
but we have got to stand by and not let the
demagogues and tricsters cheat us out of
what we have accomplished.