Press enter after choosing selection

Sound Advice

Sound Advice image
Parent Issue
Day
12
Month
July
Year
1895
Copyright
Public Domain
OCR Text

Uniterl States consul, Allm B. Morse, of Glasgow, Scotland, ex-chief justice of the Michigan supreme conrt and democratie candidato for governor in 1892, has written the following letter of warning and advice to the deniocrats of Ionia coiuity his old home : "Do not. I pray you, run af ter false gods. Stop and reflect before you pass any more resolutions, or commit yourselves, furtherin favor of the unlimited f ree coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1. What does such coinage meaii? It means : 1. That every holder of silver bullion in the United States can take such bnllion to the mints and have it returned without expense to him, stamped as a dollar, to be used as a dollar in the payment of all detbs, dues, demands and taxes, national and otherwise. Who holds this bullion? Not the merchant, manufacturer, professional man, farmer, artisian or laborer. It belongs to the millionaire mineowners,one-half of whom are aliens, as our silver mines are largely owned and controlled by foreign capital. The object of these mine owners is apparent. It will doublé their wealth. It will be millions to them. When it was ascertained that the free coinage silver bill, introduced last winter by Senator Jones, of Arkansas, gave the proflt of such coinage to the govern ment, and only the market value of th bullion to its owners, such silver min owners as Senators Jones and Stewart, of Nevada, dropped it, as they would a hot potato, and the bill was allowed to quietly die. It means disaster and ruin to the rest of our people, of whom the poor, as usual, will suffer most severely. Wealth like this cannot be created by legislation, and no one be the loser by it. What these men gain by this law the balance of our people must lose. # 2. It ïneans also that all foreigu ovraers of silver bullion can bring thei 50 oent silver into this country anc have it coined and stamped a dollar and then, if our government continue to keep gold and silver at a parity - ex changing one for the other at the wil ofjthe holder - take their silver dollar to the treasury and get gold dollars fo them,and export such gold to their own countries. How long do you think our government could maintam gold and silver at a parity if this were permitted? Within a year gold would disappear from our country, or be at so great a premium as to be found only in the hands of wealtly specculators. And when the government ceased exchanging gold for silver, our silver dollars would be worth what they could bring in tle melting pot as a commodity. 3. It means, if the claims of its sup porters be true.a corresponding inflation and expansión of prices in everything. If, as they claim, the doubling of the value of silver by law will doublé the value of wheat in dollars, it must act the same on all commodities. This means that the men who are working upon salaries or for daily or weekly wages (and these men are the vast majority of our people) will receive for such salaries and wages money with just half the purchasing power it has now. The advocates of free silver undertake to break the force of this inevitable result by claiming that salaries and wages are the last to rise in times of inflation. Their increase comes long after the prices of commodities have risen, and such increase is never commensurate with the rise of other things. And what benefit would it be to the laborer, who is now getting a dollar a day to have his wages increased to two dol. lars if his expenses of living were doubled? 4. It means that every business man who has money deposited in bank will have such deposit reduced one-half for the purpose he wishes to use it, in the buying and selling of goods. It means that the little hoard of the poor laboring man in the savings banks will be cut in two. It will reduce the patrimony of countless widows and orphaus to one-half of what it is now. 5. It means that the benefit of this forced rise in prices which can only come frorn the use of depreciated currency, will be reaped, as it always has been, by those who have the means to speculate in gold and other comrnoditief, while the great mass of producers and consumers alike will bear the burden of the losses. It means "Black Fridays" on Wall street, and failures in business everywhere. It may bring the want of bread tomany a poor man 's door. And after a few years of fever' ish specnlatiou with its attendant extra - jvagance in everything, w shallhave fco i settle down in the end, to a sound money basis; and the men who will have profited by the experiment will be ' the wealthy, and those who will have i lost will be the poor, as it was at the i time of the resumption of specie pay1 meuts. ♦ 6. The free coinage of silver, as adI vocated by the 16 to 1 men, will resnlt i in national bankruptcy and repudiation in so far that we shall be unable as a nation to pay our just debts in the same curreney in whioh they were contracted. I know that the cry of an inflation of prices has a charming sound in the ear of the producer who is now greatly in debt. He may be captivated with the idea that he can get more for his produce and turn what he realizes form his surplus production upon his debts at doublé its present valué. But it is a dishonest thought. The man who lends me a dollar has a right to have a dollar of the same valué returned to I him. I have been largely in debt all ! my life, but it is the proudest heritage I intend to leave my children that I never yet asked to pay a debt in any I eheaper currency than I contracted it, and have so far paid every debt cheerfully with current rate of interest. This is, however, no particular credit to me. Any other course would have been fraudulent. . Prices cannot be affected by unliniited free coinage unless this coinage depreciates our money. Prices will be regulated in the end by the great economie law of supply and demand - a law that always has and always will in the main control the prices of all commodities, labor not eacepted. Tariffs, corners, combines and cheap money may affect such priecs temporarly, but in the end must rely upon the law. I notice that wheat has materially advanced in price in the Unted States and elsewhere in the last few months. There are three reasons for this: 1. An increased export demand. 2. Fear of a scant erop. 3. The work of speculaton. Wheat dropped to its lowest price mainly becatise the world has produced for the last few yars mare than it consumed. The demand was not equal to the supply. I do not learn that the presen rise in wheat has affected the price of silver or been caused by silver in any sense, or that the price of silver has ever in our history had anything to do with the price of corn, beef or pork. The prices of these articles have been governed by natural causes, with an occasional fluiter caused by trusts and combines. The free coinage of silver by the ! United States can have no effect upon the prices of wheat in Liverpool, and the price there, as all the world knows, governs our price at home. This is because Great Britain is the chief buyer of the wheat of the world, and therefore makes the prices. We do not consume enough of our own wheai to affect the wheat market in times of ordinary production. The people who believe that we can coin silver of the market value of 50 cents into a dollar to an unlimited amount without the co-operation of the rest of the world, will find theniselves wofully mistaken, and we shall meet the fate and jutly so of other silver nations if we go into it. The rich will become richer and the poor poorer; and the nation,as a whole, will be treated as a bankrupt by all the other nations of the world. Our commerce will be crippled if not destroyed, and we can take rank with Mexico, where labor is glad to get 30 cents a day, in a cnrrency worth half its face. Perhaps some of you may think that I have no business to inflict my views upon you ; but, if I were at home, my sense of duty to our party and my fellow men Wuuld impel me, on every suitable occasion, to warn you against this false cry of benefit to be obtained from the free coinage of silver at the ratio of 16 to 1 with gold. And, therefore I have also feit it my uty ever from this distane to speak to you in behalf of a sound and stable curency, which has had the support of uch democratie statesmen as Jeö'erson, 'ackson and Tilden in the past. Fraternally yours, Alian B. Morse. Glasgow, Scotland, June 18, 1895. James A. Garfield, son of the late President Garfield, has been nominated or state senator by the republicans of ie Portage-Summitt district of Ohio, ie same district that sent his father to ' the state senate in 1859. He was nom inated on the second of July, the four teenth anniversary of the shooting o President Garfleld. He is twenty-eigh years of age, the same age as his father when the latter first entered public life Like his father he is a graudate of Williams college, and ambitious to ach ïeve honors in political life. It is sak that he aspires to represent his father's old district in congress, the distric which was represented so long by Josh ua R. Giddings and Ben. Wade and lat er by Garfield. It is a famous districi and one of the few northern districts that in ante-belhim days had great influence in congress bccause it had the good sense to send an able man to repre sent it and ,keep him there term aftei term. The disriot had but three representatives before Garñeld and he represented it for nearly eighteen years. The famous Harvey-Horr debate wil! begin next Tnesday and the country will no doubt be treated to the greatest exhibition of wind on record. The windy city is of course the proper place to hold the same. The doctrines set forth in "Coin's Financial School" wil] form the basis for the discussions. The i subject being chiefly wind is most appropriate for the occasion. One chapter of the book will be discnssed each day and three hours time devoted to the same. There will be no set speeches, I not more than a thousand words being allowed in answering a question or stating a proposition. The last half hour of each sitting will be devoted to answering questions from outsiders, no ; one person being pennitted to ásk more i than three. Each disputant is allowed ; not more than three minutes in giving ; bis answer, statement or question after his antagonist has finished. Owing to ■ this local atmospberic disturbance the weather next week will no doubt be squally. The con tention of two centuries standing between Franoe and Brazil relative to the boundries betweeu French Guiana and Brazil seems to be assuming an acute stage. An actual conflict has occured between the military forces of the two claimants and each government has called upon the other for an. explanation. The territory in dispute lies north of the Amazon and is as large as French Guiana, as usually shown on the map. France uses Guiana as a convict colony. The population there is consequently a desperate and lawless class, made up of a mixture of all races and nationalties. Trouble is constantly growing oufc of these conditions. It is thought that the matter may yet be adjusted by arbitration. If it is not so settled, Uncle Sam may have an opportunity to remind France of the existence of the principie known as the Monroe doctrine. The question involved is similar to the Venezuelian affair. That the wollen and worsted industries are sharing in the revival which has taken place in other lines is evidenced by the news which comes from Rhode Island to the effect that wages over all the state will be increased during the month from seven and one-half to twelve per uent. Why is it that the republican papers and statesmen (?) which so persistently howled "calamity, ' ' thereby helping to retard business revival, just as persistently allow such items of news to pass without comment? Surely they ought to be suftïciently patriotic to find some gratiflcation in the passing of hard times and the revival of industries. True, their chances of political preferment next year diminish in exact ratio to the increase of prosperity, still if the country cannot have prosperity and republican control then they ought to prefer the country 's prosperity.

Article

Subjects
Ann Arbor Argus
Old News