Year: 1878




WAsHINGToN.D d. c.. Sept. 16, 78.


Your correspondent spent some days
just before and after the election that has
just occurred in Maine in those portions
most notorious for the prevalence of the
greenback craze. 1t was honestly en-
deavored to get down to the causes
underlying the remarkable revolution
in public sentiment that has taken
place during the past three months, as
indicated by the vote cast on the 9th
inst. The campaign was fought almost
exclusively on financial issues, the
Greenbackers forcing the fight as
though anxious to divert attention from
the undeniable purpose of the leaders
now supreme in the counsel of Democ.
racy to ignore the verdict of the late
war, wipe out the constitutional amend
ments adopted after its.close, and return
to the reign of the bowie knife, the pist |
and the mob. Those who remained
staunchly loyal all through the dark
days of the war, including the most
intelligent elements, felt they had been
forced into a false position by making
matters of finance, vital as they we're
conceded to be, the only issue. Bat
they had no choice but accept the gaunt-
let as thrown down by. an opposition
that grew more blatant and domineering
from the beginning of the contest to the
turning of the polls at 5 o'clock P NJ on
the 9th inst It was noticeable that the
same classes who supported the war at
first but gradually arrayed themselves
under the banner ofdisloyal Democracy
as the price of their tea and coffee in
creased and as a draft became more
certain. and the voters who have grown
up since under the tuition of that style
Of patriots, fell one by one away from
their allegiance to the cause of honest
money and the preservation of national
faith to It's creditors as the promises of
the Democratic Greenback orators be
came more profuse in their promises of
an abundance of money provided their
candidates were elected. Ridiculous and
absurd as it may appear to dispassionaie
observers, large proportion of voters
esteemed as whole exceptionally INTEL
ligent, talk and appear to believe that
money under the circumstances named,
will be as plenty as the stones in their
fields. The one leading idea every
Greenback orator seemed most solici-
tious to inculcate however much they
differed on other points, was that of @fiat"
money. The delusion that government
can give intrinsic value to piece of rag
or paper by the impress of the stamps is,
IN many localities, overwhelmingly pre-
valent. 1t seems to strike an outside
observer as a sort of epidemic craze.
More financial wisdom, such as it is, was
gathered in a two weeks visit there
than has been accumulated in a ten
weeks residence here among the repre-
sentative men of the nation a part of
whose business has been to know some
thing ofnational finances. Men heretofore
credited with knowing next to nothing
have suddenly acquired celebrity as the
ablest expounders of the new science.
Boys sixteen years old and usually occu-
pying ounces place in their classes at
school can reel it off by the hour, so
constant have they been in their attend
ance at the rallies that have been held
at nearly every school house or public
hall in the State. The old system of
finances founded on silver and gold as
the only standard of value which the
fathers devised and was never before
seriously questioned, has been uprooted
and rejected for the new one by the
amatuers. But the day is not distant in
the future, likely, when the teachers
who have acquired such sudden proni-
nence will be estimated at their proper
value; and the crude and revolutionary
doctrines they have so industriously
dessimated spewed no.


The work of relieving the yellow
fever sufferers is still the one occupying
lu6 RICdtccI c4d1O VI Ou4 oeSCAAOAA.
The ingenuity Of every one has been
stimulated by the rivalry to do mostand
new methods Of raising funds have been
resorted to with fair success.


The Star of recent date says


The Republican COnsresHona Com
mittee win forthwith take the necessary
steps to secure phonographic reported
the speech made by the President in
Minnesota yesterday and viii give it the
widest circulation. The speech is gen,
eraIly accepted, even by the personal
and political enemies of the Presidensto
be an able one, full of sound logic ana
incontroyertible facts. The Kepunlcans
recognize in it a speech which will en-
list the interest of the average reader,
and for this reason it viii be extensively
circulated. mAAmA'