UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIFRARY AT URBANA-CMAMPA1GN OAK STREET LIBRARY FACILITY • *. ■ ■ ’* «!«' •• \ r i! j - ' ,. i vr f •*» \ * * s j . • ;•*••* ^ ^ v <». . ' ** * * V -s %>-*:/'. • ~v s> < • r...* £ v; - !< 5 *.’ 4 3/:5C>Jl This Small volume is Respectfully Dedicated to Those Citizens of the United States Who believe in the doctrine of THE Americas for the Americans, BY THE AUTHOR. THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. It will be observed that throughout this entire treatise the author has endeavored to “brief 5 the financial prob¬ lem in such a way as to present, with all the clearness and force of which he is capable, the subject in consecutive sections so as to lead to a clear understanding of its merits and limitations, without attempting to enter into a discussion of its details. The author has persistently sacrificed grace of style for lucidity of expression in order to instruct rather than to entertain the student of the monetary problem; his apol¬ ogy for giving .this small volume to the American people is his conviction that they deserved to have the question clearly and dispassionately presented to them, so that they may the more wisely pass judgment upon it at the polls. The chief object and concern and purpose of the au¬ thor has been to give to the conservative elements of both the silver and the so-called “sound money” wings of the American people a policy, that they can adopt and enforce, without compromising the principles of either faction, but obtaining in a different form than what they demand the substance of what each faction requires. Before mentioning the nature of this policy, it is per¬ haps expedient to first explain the attitudes of the differ¬ ent parties and factions to this question. The two old parties, the Republican and Democratic parties, are about evenly divided into silver and gold wings. The gold wings of both these parties are in reality for the single gold standard, though to delude the people, they claim to be for “sound money,” the “honest dollar” and other catch expressions. 6 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT The gold wing of the Republican party wish the stand¬ ard to be gold alone, and all paper money to be issued exclusively by the National banks, thus giving into the hands of Wall Street not only all the redemption money, • gold, which they already own and control, but also all paper money redeemable in gold, thus enabling consoli¬ dated capital to so manipulate the volume of money that they can at their sovereign pleasure and to their private profit make money scarce and property low, money plen¬ tiful and property high. The monetary system they pro¬ pose is one based upon the bonded indebtedness of the National Government, increasing the burdens of the peo¬ ple while commensurately augmenting the profits of the few. The gold wing of the Democratic Party propose also to establish the single gold standard, but instead of the National Bank System insist on allowing private or State banks to issue money on any kind of security, to swindle the people by any kind of method imaginable. The silver wings of both parties demand the restora¬ tion of the bimetallic standard, giving the people the money .the Constitution of the United States guarantees them as their right, and of which they can not be Con¬ stitutionally deprived without its being changed as pro¬ vided. The Constitution declares both gold and silver to be money, and the people are determined to have their rights restored. Another faction pretends to expect that an international agreement may be reached that will remonetize silver; they expect that Great Britain, who is waxing fat at the expense of other nations as the result of gold monometal¬ lism, will voluntarily surrender that advantage. It runs counter to the convictions and sentiments of the American people, that this, the greatest and most powerful nation on earth, must ask the permission of its financial and commercial enemy to be allowed to resume its Constitutional monetary system; that we have to ask any Nation’s permission and consent to do anything we have the National right to do; that we must beg other countries to let us regulate our internal affairs. The charge is made that the “silver cranks of the West” AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 7 want to run the Government. Who are they? Ameri¬ can citizens as staunch and true to our interests and to the flag as any class in our Republic. The financial pol¬ icy of our Government has been against the rights, in¬ terests, and desires of more than half of our people since 1873. In accordance withi whose financial policy have our affairs been conducted during that period? Undeniably that of Great Britain. Why should Great Britain have more voice in our Government than our own citizens are allowed to exercise? Something must be done, and done quickly; but the factions now control, and will in all probability long con¬ trol the Government, preventing either the gold or silver wings of the parties from getting what they demand. They must apparently agree upon some compromise if they get anything at all; to do nothing at all, resembles too closely the policy that the only British Administration we ever had at Washington has been enforcing for the past three years, to be popular. The people demand re¬ lief, and they must get it. The coinage of the American silver product will not suffice; the difference between the bullion and coin value of silver in other lands than our own would give the gold advocates an opportunity to claim that its value in this country is artificial, and clamor for its repeal. The coin¬ age of American silver would, by increasing the volume of money in this country, increase the cost and price of our exports, while the price of foreign competing articles would not be raised, increasing the present difference, thus boxing our fabrics so effectually in our home mar¬ ket that they can never get out. That is a compromise the silver men should never consent to. The people are completely at sea as to what policy to pursue in order to get what they want, to get their Con¬ stitutional rights, and the leaders are incompetent to guide them. Never in the history of the Republic has there been so much cowardice displayed as by the so-called States¬ men of to-day, men who are absolutely afraid of nothing, so much as their own convictions, if they possess any. They tell us they want “honest money,” so do the people; they tell us that they propose to remonetize silver; how? 8 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT Nobody knows, and least of all they. Jack wanting his supper was no problem, for there was no doubt that he wanted it, and wanted it bad, but the all momentous prob¬ lem to him was how he was going to get it. The people of the United States have the right to know what the' views and policies of aspirants for office, and especially the Presidency, are, upon the issues of the day. Let them boldly, manfully say where they stand, what they are for, and what they propose to do, and how they expect to do it. Statesmen who have no opinion and no policy are unfit to lead; those who are too cowardly to express the convictions they do possess are unworthy of sup¬ port. Such politicians, for they can not be classed as States¬ men, are the products of King Caucus and Conventions, two of the worst enemies the people have to-day, by which a few “ringsters,” a few “wire pullers,” a few polit¬ ical manipulators defeat popular demands, dictate plat¬ forms and nominate candidates. No political system was ever more despotic, more monarchical in character and effect than the system of “boss rule” that prevails to¬ day in the American Republic. Men secure office not by reason of their merit and fitness for it, but as the result of truckling as henchmen to the “bosses.” Congressmen and Governors, and all other officeholders are no sooner elected than they at once start to do one or two things, either to keep the job they have got, or get another and better one; they do everything, but do their duty to the people. The most popular, most idolized politician and States¬ man of the future will be the man who not only has opin¬ ions on public issues, but has got the courage to fear¬ lessly express them, regardless of the votes it may make or cost him. He would be such a novelty, such a con¬ trast to the sea of pretense, cowardice and hypocrisy, that now universally prevails, that the people would refresh¬ ingly turn to 'him and acclaim him their chosen leader. The policy proposed by the Author for the solution of the monetary problem gives the KEY to Independent American Bimetallism. This policy is for Congress to enact a law requiring the unlimited free coinage of silver as soon as the silver in a dollar is worth ioo cents in the AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 9 open market. This policy while it would obtain all that the silver men demand, will assure to the ‘‘sound money'’ men an “honest dollar” worth its face value. Nearly all the silver in the world is produced in the United States, Mexico and Peru. The action of the silver miners of these countries will be directed to withholding their silver from the market in order to force its value up to ioo cents on the dollar, or $1.29 an ounce; they will “bull” the market by lessening the visible supply, that is, the purchasable supply. Another powerful factor, here, will assist the rise in the value of 'silver; the speculators, seek¬ ing to gain a profit on -silver before it reaches $1.29 an ounce, will buy, and the more they bid for it, the higher it will climb until it reaches that figure. The action of the speculators will increase the demand for silver at the very moment that the miners are diminishing the pur¬ chasable supply; its value would be bound to go up, or violate all the laws of economy. There would be all “bulls” on the market and no “bears.” And after the silver miners obtain a permanent market for their bullion ?t the value of $1.29 an ounce; after they get free, un¬ limited coinage they will keep its value at that figure. It requires no concerted action or organization to induce men to avoid danger or to seek a profit. If the silver miners knew that they could get their silver coined free at the rate of $1.29 an ounce, the moment it becomes worth that value, they will “bull” it until it reaches that figure, and when it gets there, they will keep it there. On the other hand, the country and the world has the fiat of law that no silver dollars will be coined until worth 100 cents, until they become “honest money.” The result would be that the country will enjoy a much needed finan¬ cial rest, commerce will not be disturbed by any possible change in the purchasing power of money, below 100 cents; no money will be frightened out of the country, nor will any remain away to avoid the “contamination of depreciated money.” The consequence will be that money now in hiding will be invested in productive en¬ terprises. This policy is the KEY, not only of the mone¬ tary problem, but also of the political situation; it is the KEY that unlocks legislative complications. 10 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT Politically this policy affords a great strategic advan¬ tage to the Republican Party, if it adopts it as its financial platform at St. Louis, and nominates a Candidate for the Presidency who will enforce such a law. The Candidate and the Party can promise the South and West that sil¬ ver will be admitted to unlimited free coinage the moment that the silver in a dollar becomes worth ioo cents; to the North and the East can be given the assurance that “honest money” will be guaranteed, for no silver will be coined until it is worth its face value in the market. This policy is no straddle, it is untainted by dishonor, it will be a pledge that can and will be redeemed, it is a policy that will give all parties, all sections, all States, in fact the whole Nation, the monetary system demanded It is a policy that the silver Senate and a “sound money” House can and will enact into law; it is a policy that no President be he for silver or for “sound money” would dare to veto. It is a policy that will catch silver men or gold men coming and will catch them going; if they are for free coinage, they get it when the dollar is worth ioo cents; if they are for “sound money” they get it, for no silver will be coined until actually worth its face value. It is a policy that cannot be beaten at the polls, or in the Halls of Congress. Does not this policy give the silver men, who are in a minority at the St. Louis Convention on the independent 16 to i proposition which the party cannot be persuaded or coerced into adopting as its financial plank, their op¬ portunity to advocate and demand so equitable and rea¬ sonable a plank, as is the plank to coin silver free in un¬ limited quantities at the ratio of-i6 to i, independent of the action of other nations, as soon as the silver in a dollar is worth ioo cents? Should any combination resist and defeat that just demand, that fair, honorable, safe and certain method of remonetizing silver and restoring bi¬ metallism would not the advocates of silver construe such action as an indication and proof that the dominant fac¬ tion in the party Was hostile to the use of silver on any terms? And might not the silver men, considering that their interests have been ruthlessly trampled upon, and their equitable demands rejected, have recourse to the AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 11 country; might not they form another party, and appeal to the people to thus restore our Constitutional Bimetallic System. Should not this danger be considered, this pos¬ sible defection be reckoned with? Republican success, next November, appears certain; the only factor that can probably defeat it would be an un¬ satisfactory financial plank in its platform, but if the Party adopted this policy, nothing could beat it, for, since all interests would be benefited, all will support it. The success of the Republican Party being thus assured if it adopted the plank, coin silver free as soon as the silver in a dollar is worth ioo cents, any legislation to which it committed itself, if victorious, would have at once the effect of law. If the Party committed itself to that finan¬ cial legislation, its effect on the value of silver would be apparent at once, before the Party actually gains power, before the next Administration goes into office silver would be remonetized and bimetallism restored not next year or the year after, but now, this year. It would be more beneficial to the country if the Republican Party adopted this platform, than if adopted by some other party having less certainty of success Let the voters remember that if the Republican Party advocated this policy, that the financial legislation will be known before the election is held, and the country will have the rest that certainty will give. Let the farmers and the laborers consider the fact, that if the Republican Party adopts that platform, that the instant rise in the value of silver from about 60 cents to $1.29 an ounce, will be accompanied, as it always has been accompanied, by a proportionate rise in the price of wheat, corn, cotton, all products of the farm and factory, and that wages will also rise correspondingly to the in¬ creased demand for labor that a rise in the value of prop¬ erty will create. The Republican Party should not reject this policy, equitable to all factions and States, which would render certain its triumph at the polls in November, for if re¬ jected might not its opponents find therein a chance to form a new party, adopt this policy as its battle cry, and carry the day by that appeal to justice and the Con¬ stitution? The Republican Party should not deceive itself, 12 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT it cannot gain power on ANY KIND of a platform, or if it does it will be unable to retain it, for when confidence in its justice and wisdom ceases, its power is shattered. This question must be settled in a way .satisfactory to all interests and to all parts of this, our common country. The tariff is no longer an issue, the Nation is for Protec¬ tion. The conservatism of the McKinley Tariff has been recognized, but even its distinguished Author will not claim that it will settle the money problem. It is a step in the right direction, but no measure short of a measure that will raise the value of silver to $1.29 an ounce; that will resultantly raise the price of Indian wheat, thereby lessening its drastic competition with American wheat; that it will retard the development of these silver coun¬ tries, whose manufacturers, even now in their infancy, threaten our Home Market, will prove a satisfactory so¬ lution of the question. This, Protection alone, cannot do. The policy this Author proposes by which the Constitu¬ tional Bimetallic System can be restored in a Constitutional manner, is the Constitutional Policy; it will also restore to the people of this Nation their Constitutional money of which they have been Unconstitutionally deprived. This Constitu¬ tional Policy will restore Bimetallism peacefully, surely, yet swiftly; it will expand the volume of our money from a scanty to an adequate volume; it will raise prices and wages from a lower to a higher level, maintaining at the same time the intended purchasing power of our dollars. If the Republican Party expects to retain the confidence and support of the people, it must if installed in office again, legislate for the people; it must awaken their en¬ thusiasm by appealing to their patriotism; it must fire the National heart by advocating and enforcing a Constitu¬ tional Policy that will maintain the dignity and the free¬ dom of the American Republic; it must restore our Bi¬ metallic System without subjecting our people to the hu¬ miliation of waiting for other nations to help us; it must demonstrate our independence by remonetizing silver by our own collossal might, and force the Continent of Europe to recognize it as money. The Republican Party must oonvince the nations of the earth that by this Con¬ stitutional Policy the United States of America has the AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 13 KEY to Independent American Bimetallism; that our Nation can make its own money, do its own work, carry its own freight, and by making all legislation, Protec¬ tion, Reciprocity, the creation of a great Merchant Marine and Navy, the construction of the Nicaragua Canal and other gigantic Internal Improvements bend to the up¬ building of the Nation, so that by its industrial, commer¬ cial and financial development and aggrandizement the Olney Doctrine may be realized, “THAT THE FIAT OF THE UNITED STATES ON TPIE WESTERN CONTINENT IS LAW/’ THE ST. LOUIS CONVENTION SHOULD ADOPT THE CONSTITUTIONAL POLICY. March 13th, 1896, . JOHN I. JACOB. Suite 904 Atwood Building, Chicago. 14 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT # CHAPTER II. THE LAW OF SUPPLY AND DEMAND. “The supply and demand of money determine its value, and the amount of money in circulation determines the price of commodities. If a country has more money than the nor¬ mal demand for it, prices will rise, or in otl^er words, the money depreciates, and if a country has not enough money to meet the demand, prices fall, or money appreciates. Thus we have the means of determining whether a country has money enough or not.”—Senator Henry M. Teller of Colorado. The supply and demand for money should always balance, otherwise its value will inevitably depreciate, or appreciate whenever its supply exceeds, or is less than the demand for it. History shows that the supply of metallic money, gold and silver, is limited; that its over- supply is all but impossible, and that instead its frequent, nearly constant scarcity, is the chief danger to be seri¬ ously apprehended. A surplus production of products frequently occurs, for the reason that the demand for products is necessarily limited, but an overproduction of money is practically impossible, because the demand for it is unlimited; the more money a man gets, the more he wants, because the more he needs. The demand for money is continually increasing, while the supply of it is constantly insufficient, therefore its purchasing power is always fluctuating. A fall in the value of money, accompanied by a corre¬ sponding rise in the price of commodities, does not demonstrate that the money is unsound, that it is cheap, for before that fact can be established, it must first be proven that the price prior to its rise was a fair price, that labor was then receiving honest wages, and that the price of products yielded to the producer a reason¬ able profit. If the wages labor got and the price producers ob¬ tained before the volume of money was enlarged was too low, if wages and prices did not afford the laborer and the producer a decent, satisfactory livelihood, then the money is not cheap, nor the prices inflated. AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 15 When money falls in value and property rises, enter¬ prise is stimulated, because the depreciating form of wealth, money, is exchanged for the appreciating form of wealth, property, which, in such case must be created by labor. When property falls and money rises in value, hoarding is encouraged, for money then earns a profit by idleness. If the purchasing power of money is to remain sta¬ tionary, as it should, the supply of it must correspond¬ ingly increase with the demand for it. Let ioo represent the demand for money, and ioo also represent the sup¬ ply, then the purchasing power of a dollar is precisely ioo cents, or normal. Should the demand for money increase from ioo to 200, the supply remaining 100, the purchasing power of such money would be 200, or doubled, a dollar would purchase 200 cents worth of labor, or of products. If, however, the supply was in¬ creased from 100 to 200, the demand remaining the same, or 100, the purchasing power would be diminished by one-half; one dollar would buy only 50 cents worth of labor, or of products. Any increase in the demand for money should be accompanied by a corresponding in¬ crease in the supply, else the purchasing power of money will fluctuate. The supply and demand must always balance. Eventually, primary redemption, or real money alone fixes values. Credit money may tempora¬ rily enhance prices, but when such promises to pay are redeemed, when measured in real money, all values and prices shrink. In 1873 the total supply of metallic money, gold and silver, was 8 billion dollars. Let it be assumed that the purchasing power of every dollar was precisely 100 cents worth of produce. As 8 billion dollars constituted the entire stock of money by which all values were meas- rude, therefore 8 billion dollars would buy the entire world. The demonetization of silver destroyed one-half of the supply of actual money. The remaining 4 billions of dollars of gold then and now values the product and can buy the whole world. A dollar now buys 200 cents worth of produce, or twice as much as it was intended, by the Constitution, to buy. Still further reduce the 16 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT supply of money to a i,oooth part of the present sup¬ ply, or to 4 million dollars, which would constitute the entire supply of money, measuring as it must all values, and could on demand buy the whole world. One single dollar, simply because of its scarcity, would purchase $2,000 worth of labor or of labor’s products, and those who would own or control those 4 million dollars could own and control the world and the human race. If at that stage, it was proposed to increase the supply of money from 4 million to 4 billion dollars, the present supply, some Shylock of Greed who now contends that the present dollar that only buys 200 cents worth of prod¬ ucts is the only honest dollar, would then arise and de¬ nounce the proposed dollars as dishonest; he would con¬ tend as plausibly as he does now, that to increase the supply of money would cheapen it; that it would debase it; that it would involve repudiation; that it would inflate values; he would contend that a dollar should continue to buy $2,000 worth of products instead of only $2 worth as it now does, or 100 cents worth, as it did prior to the demonetization of silver in 1873. This “honest money” man would argue that the $2,000 dollar was the only genuine honest dollar, and if it was made to buy only 100 cents worth, as intended by the founders of the Republic, that it would produce a terrific calamity Money possesses no intrinsic value whatever; that is, a value that never changes, no matter what changes have been made in the supply and the demand of money. Were diamonds'as plentiful as pebbles, aside from their bril¬ liancy, they would have no greater value, for value is not a fixity, but a relation between the supply and the demand. It is not the cost of producing money, but the ease or difficulty of obtaining it after it has been produced, that determines its value. Paper money, if made legal tender for all debts and dues, would buy as much as gold if it were as scarce. Scarce money, even though made of paper, bearing the stamp of the govern¬ ment and received by it for all dues, would buy more than plentiful gold, for the law of supply and demand govern s 0 AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 17 CHAPTER III. THE TRUE CAUSE OF THE PERIODICITY OF PANICS. It is popularly believed that periods of depression, known as panics, are inherent in our industrial system. Many seek to trace the cause to the inequitable distribu¬ tion of wealth; others appear to fancy that the existing method of production, the wage system is accountable. The true cause must be found in a fluctuating, insufficient and uncontrollable volume of metallic money, which is a most potent factor and cause of the inequitable distri¬ bution of wealth. The demand for money is always con¬ stant, always unlimited, the greater the supply of it, the more the demand for it expands. It is estimated that the average annual increase in the demand for money in the United States is $70,000,000, and if the purchasing power of our circulating medium be maintained at its designed power, 100 cents worth 01 products for a dollar, the supply must be increased $70,- 000,000 a year. The supply of money of the metallic character is pre¬ carious, unreliable, dependent upon accident, upon dis- coverv, upon what can neither be predicted nor con¬ trolled. The supply of metallic money is utterly insufficient to meet current or increasing needs. It is estimated that about one-half of the silver and gold mined is used in the arts, leaving the remaining 50 per cent, to restore the loss coins have sustained in weight by abra¬ sion, and to increase the supply of money to meet grow¬ ing demands for its use. There is no scientific method of increasing and controlling the supply of metallic money to meet the requirements of a constantly increas¬ ing demand for it. Just so long as the metallic money system is adhered to, just so long will we have an un¬ stable, unscientific and insufficient supply .of money; just so long will the prices of products and the value of property dependent upon this unsteady medium of exchange be subjected to fluctuation. Periods of depression, panics, are born naturally and inevitably of periods of prosperity, when the increased demand for products advances their price. Increased 18 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT business requires an increased supply of money, which, if not provided, the full benefits of such periods of pros¬ perity are not enjoyed, for the reason that if the pre¬ existing supply of money is not so increased its purchas¬ ing power is enhanced, and the selling price of com¬ modities commensurately reduced, which entails a loss on the producer, who, having paid wages to his labor when the supply of money compared with the demand for it was more plentiful, is compelled to sell his prod¬ ucts below cost. The beneficial results of such periods of prosperity, which would be fully enjoyed if the supply of money was proportionately augmented, are thus neces¬ sarily diminished to like extent, for the rising price of products resulting from an expanding volume of money would yield a profit which would encourage production and advance wages. Thus enlarged prosperity under the metallic monetary system inevitably generates suc¬ ceeding periods of depression. In periods of depressed trade, the diminished demand for commodities reduces their prices. This tendency of the value of property to fall in value during such periods is partially resisted and counteracted by the influence of money thrown out of employment by the lessened de¬ mand for its use in trade, to effectively increase the sup¬ ply of money, thereby enhancing prices and steadying values. It is therefore self-evident that periods of pros¬ perity and depression alternate, the latter being caused by the former, and the latter preparing the way by slightly rising prices produced by the volume of idle capital to encourage industry, for the succeeding period of prosperity. The remedy for the periodical panics is equally mani¬ fest; the demand and supply of money must always bal¬ ance, in order to secure a medium of exchange, whose purchasing power will remain unfluctuating. As this evil is inherent in and inseparable from a metallic mone¬ tary system, it must be supplanted entirely, or supple¬ mented by a legal tender paper system whose volume can at all times l3e easily and scientifically regulated, so as to exactly meet the increased demand for its use, whether caused by developing industry, or the exigen- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 19 cies of war, keeping the purchasing power of a dollar always precisely at ioo cents. As the average annual increased demand for money in this country is about $70,000,000, should the amount of gold and silver unre¬ quired in the arts, or needed to restore the loss of weight that circulating coin has sustained, be valued at only $50,000,000, the government must, if the purchasing power of the dollar is to remain steady, yearly emit, issue $20,000,000 of legal tender paper, greenback receivable for all debts or dues to supplement the increase in the metallic money so as to make the supply and demand balance. This scientific regulation of the supply of money would assist instead of checking, as the metallic system does, the rise in the price of products and the value of property that an increased demand for labor and prod¬ ucts creates. This continuously expanding volume of money would not only prevent the fall in value of prop¬ erty now occasioned by a shrinkage in the circulating medium, not only assist a rise in the value of labor and products, but still further advance prices, and impart to industry a stimulus it would not otherwise obtain. Ris¬ ing prices increase production, and in order to meet the increased need for money require a greater, volume of money, and the supply should be thus increased. The depression of trade due primarily to a scanty and inade¬ quate volume of money would thus be prevented. Appreciation of money encourages idleness, for the possessor of it can merely by hoarding it further en¬ hance its purchasing power, and by its very withdrawal from use in industry still further add to his “unearned increment” of value. This additional profit that its pos¬ sessor obtains, is at the expense of labor, which loses employment, or is forced by depressed industry to take reduced wages. Would such money be honest? This leads us to consider what is honest money. CHAPTER IV. WHAT IS AN HONEST DOLLAR? An honest dollar, is such a dollar that always buys 100 cents worth of produce or of labor at all times and under all circumstances, a dollar whose purchasing power never 20 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT rises or falls. A dollar that buys more or less than ioo cents worth is dishonest. The relation between the sup¬ ply and the demand of money, and between money and the supply of property fixes the prices of property. Money really never depreciates for the reason that the demand for money is always equal to the supply of it. Money apparently depreciates when its supply is in¬ creased, the fact is, however, the prices of commodities rise from an unjustly low to a fairer and a juster price. Stability of value is the most important and essential at¬ tribute that money can possess. Stability of prices depends chiefly upon the stability of money. Falling prices can be prevented by increasing the supply of money, which would engender greater industrial activity, thus stimulating values. If by doubling the supply of money, a dollar no longer buys 200 cents worth of prod¬ ucts, but can procure, only 106 cents worth, then it is the first dollar that is the dishonest one, and the latter the honest dollar. In such a case, the value of the money would not depreciate, for the dollar possessed an extra value that was not intended, it has been at a premium and that premium has been destroyed. A creditor who lends $100 at the legal rate of interest, and demands its repayment in money whose purchasing power is greater than that of the money he loaned, is a robber. If a debtor who borrows $100, can return it in money which buys less than what the face value would indicate was its purchasing power, then he is a swindler. But we have shown already that while money can be scarce and can buy too much, it can never be too plentiful and buy less than its face value, for the demand is always equal to it. Appreciated money can benefit only the creditor class at the expense of all ’ other classes, principally labor. The people are benefited only by a dollar which buys 100 cents worth, no more, no less, they require a standard in which obligations ex¬ tending over long periods of time will not vary, but pre¬ serve an accurate measure. The farmer’s prosperity is not augmented by selling twice as much wheat as he should, in order to obtain a 200-cent dollar; neither are the interests of the laboring classes promoted by working AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 21 twice as long in order to secure a 200-cent dollar. The people do not want scarce money; they want money which is sufficiently plentiful to do business with. The interest of the creditor class is directly opposed to that of the producing class, if the field for the investment of surplus capital is closed in the purchase of bonds, it must find use in industry, employing labor, making good times and rendering all classes prosperous; but if these millions are to be locked up in the Government vaults in exchange for bonds, it is withdrawn from use, from circulation in trade and from distribution among the people. So-called statesmen are now telling the people that they are opposed to “dishonest money/’ that they are for “hon¬ est money,” so are the people. Why this necessity to declare that they favor “honest money?” What do they pretend to say is “dishonest” they do not aver, though they allude to silver. The Constitution says that both gold and silver shall be money; that both shall be coined as directed by Congress and that both shall be legal ten¬ der for all debts. Are not these silver dollars which pay labor for toil, that pay rent, that pay our grocery bills and our tailor bills, that pay all the obligations of the people, that pay our sailors and soldiers their pensions for having received wounds and disabilities in defense of the Nation’s life, but which is not good enough to redeem Govern¬ ment bonds and certificates to repay Wall Street for its heroic sacrifices, are not such dollars “honest?” If they are “dishonest” it is because the creditor class which boy¬ cotts silver has made them “dishonest.” We are told that gold is our standard of value, and that the demonetization of silver in 1873 merely recognized gold as a standard which had existed since 1834. CHAPTER V. THE AMERICAN STANDARD OF VALUE IS IOO CENTS. The unit, or standard of value in the United States is 100 cents in the decimal scale; it always has been 100 cents; it has never been anything else, no matter whether it is represented in gold or silver. This unit the First Con¬ gress called a dollar, whose value was fixed by law. A double standard is an absurdity, an utter impossibility 22 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT that can no more exist than two yardsticks of different length. It is equally as absurd to contend that we have or ever had a “gold standard” or a “silver standard.” ioo cents is the American unit of value, just as much as the foot is our unit of measure, or the pound is our unit of weight. A unit is a unit/regardless of the fact that it is expressed in gold, or in silver. A pound is a pound whether it is lead or feathers. No one speaks of “lead” pounds, or “feather pounds,” but of a pound of so much of this or that commodity, therefore it is supremely idiotic to speak of sil¬ ver or gold units or standards of values. Our unit or standard of value is purely arbitrary; it has no relation to anything whatever, except the monetary standards of other nations. A bimetallic standard is simply the unit or standard of value expresed in two metals, gold and silver. A “gold standard” or a silver standard means ioo cents worth of gold or silver. The First Congress decreed by the law of 1792 that a dollar’s worth of silver should consist of 37 ij grains, pure, and that a dollar’s worth of gold should consist of 1-15 part of silver, or 24.7 grains pure. By that law of 1792 Congress authorized, as required by the Constitu¬ tion, the free unlimited coinage of both gold and silver, and fixed their ratio at 15 to 1, making both gold and silver money legal tender for all debts and dues. The unit of value by that law was expressed in a silver dollar of 37 1 1 grains, but the unit did not rest upon silver ex¬ clusively, for it rested upon both metals. The gold dol¬ lar, by that law of 1792, was a pure fiction, which, while it did not actually exist, nevertheless, the gold dollar effectively competed with the silver dollar. If the pos¬ sessor of 10 silver dollars or units sought to exact more than $10 worth of products, or labor in exchange for them, or that they should pay more than $10 worth of bonds, the owner of the produce could exchange it for a gold eagle, or the owner of the bond could redeem it in the same gold eagle equal in value to ten silver dollars or units. This competition between gold and silver pre¬ vented either from going to a premium, and consequently undervaluing property. Thus this law of 1792 was bi- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 23 metallic, it rested on both metals, otherwise it would have been monometallic. Double gold eagles were coined equal in value to io silver dollars, or units; they were not declared to be $20, but equal in value to $20; gold eagles were coined of the value of 10 silver units or dollars, they were not declared to be $10; half eagles of gold were coined which were of the value of 5 silver dollars, or units, they were not declared to be $5; 2J gold coins were coined which were of the value of 2 \ silver dollars, or units, they were not declared to be $2.50. Why this distinction? For this reason: it was decided to express the unit or dollar in silver, “to be of the value of the Spanish milled dollar, the same as is now current,” simply for convenience in calculation; the people had for years been doing business with that dollar, hence their transactions had been com¬ puted in them and they were familiar with its value. Then again, if the unit of value should be changed in weight and fineness it would be more expensive to recoin them than to recoin the gold coins, which were few in number and of larger denomination, and when tfiis change was being made the people would be at sea in their calculations. Consequently, whenever any change was made in the ratio between gold and silver, as was made in 1834 from 15 to 1 to 16 to 1, it was effected by reducing the weight of the gold coins, the gold dollar from 24.7 to 23.2 grains pure, and business was not dis¬ turbed. From the foundation of the Federal Govern¬ ment to the present day the weight of pure silver in the silver unit or dollar has never been changed, but has always been as provided by that law of 1792 of the weight of 371J grains, which was the weight of the silver in the Spanish milled dollar. The ratio fixed by Congress was arbitrary, though made to conform to the European ratio; Congress could have declared a ratio of 10 to 1, or of 30 to 1, as readily as the one it did declare of 15 to 1, though the concur¬ rent circulation of both metals would not have prevailed. Even the slight variance that existed after 1803, between the American and French ratios of 15 to 1, and that of 15^ to 1, prevented their concurrent circulation. The 24 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT fact that we first from 1803 to 1834 had only silver money, and from 1834 to 1873 had only gold in our circulation by no means changed the unit or standard of value, which was throughout that entire period 100 cents, the “Dollar of the Daddies.” The ratio adopted was not controlled or fixed by the ratio of the production of gold and silver, for it was entirely independent of it; it was arbitrary. The truth of this statement is proven by the facts. CHAPTER VI. THE LEGAL RATIO IS NOT FIXED BY THE RATIO OF PRODUCTION. Years. Ratio of Production. Legal Ratio. 1811-1820.47.4 to 1. 15.5 to 1. 1821-1830.32.4 to 1. 15.8 to 1. 1831-1840.29.3 to 1. 15.7 to 1. 1841-1850.14.2 to 1. 15.8 to 1. 1851-1855. 4.5 to 1. 15.4 to 1. 1856-1800. 4.4 to 1. 15.3 to 1. 1861-1865. 5.9 to 1. 15.4 to 1. 1866-1870. 6.9 to 1. 15.6 to 1. 1871 .10.9 to 1. 15.6 to 1. 1872 .12.7 to 1. 15.6 to 1. These facts show that during this entire period, while the ratio of the production of gold and silver fluctuated violently from 47.4 to 1 down to only 4.4 to 1, the con¬ trolling legal ratio, the French, remained almost steady at 15.5 to 1. The value of the gold and silver mined during this period changed in the ratio of the value from 4 to 1 of silver to gold to 3 of gold to 1 of silver. Had the legal ratio been based upon the ratio of the production of gold and silver, or upon the ratio of the value, it would have been absolutely indispensable to change it at least once a year. The legal ratio fixes the commercial ratio of gold and silver. The value of a coin is not regulated by the market price of gold or silver it contains, but by law. Instead of the market price or value of coins being governed by the commercial price of the metal they contain, the mar¬ ket price is fixed by the legal value, which, under the un¬ limited coinage of both gold and silver free, at all times controls. AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 25 Strictly speaking, under the unlimited free coinage of both metals, the metals possess no market price, for the market price must J^e adjusted by the supply of the prod¬ uct and the demand for its use in the arts of commerce, but when the price of a metal for use in the arts and not as money is absolutely fixed by the legal value of it as money an outside factor, it can have no market price. Rothschild cannot buy silver for 60 cents an ounce for use in arts, or for money at its gold valuation, if the United States Government will coin it at $1.29 an ounce, for the owner of silver ore will not exchange it for gold or com¬ modities at the price of 60 cents an ounce when he is per¬ mitted to coin it free and exchange it for gold or products at the value of $1.29 an ounce. From 1792 to 1803 the American and French ratios were precisely the same, 15 to 1. During all that period gold and silver concurrently circulated in the United States and France. The market ratio of gold and silver during that period was exactly the legal ratio, 15 to 1, showing that the commercial price was fixed by the legal value of the two metals. And in 1803 the very instant that Napoleon changed the French ratio to 15.5 to 1, the market ratio accordingly changed to 15.5 to 1. The ratio of France and the Latin Union changed the com¬ mercial ratio of gold and silver, although the American ratio until 1834 remained 15 to 1, simply because of the fact that at that stage of our national development, those nations composing the Latin Union were commercially and industrially more powerful than the United States, and consequently could use a greater amount of money in trade and the needs of their Governments were vastly larger. From 1803 to 1873 the French ratio absolutely con¬ trolled the commercial ratio the wide world over, regard¬ less of the sudden and radical changes in the ratio of the production of gold and silver, regardless of Great Britain’s attitude upon the question. Although Great Britain adopted the single gold standard in 1816, the London market ratio of gold and silver re¬ mained fixed at the French ratio, 15^ to 1, minus the cost of transportation, commission and the cost of coin- 26 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT age at the French mints; and when silver was required in London for shipment to India, the price rose to pre¬ cisely its French coinage value, plus the cost of acquisi¬ tion which included transportation, commission, etc., ex¬ penses demonstrating beyond the shadow of a doubt that the French legal ratio governed the market value of the two metals. Under the free, unlimited coinage of both gold and sil¬ ver, the legal ratio inevitably and invariably fixes the commercial ratio, for the reason that when the Govern¬ ment of the Nation that can use all the surplus gold and silver, coins the two metals free in unlimited quantities at a certain ratio an unlimited monetary demand is thereby created, which controls the price fixed by the limited demand for their use in the arts which is insufficient to absorb and employ their total supply for mercantile pur¬ poses. How this operates is very clear; if the legal ratio is 15 to i, no bullion owner of silver could be found who would give more than 15 ounces of silver for an ounce of gold, so long as he has the right to coin 15 ounces of it free which, by law, after its coinage, he can exchange for an ounce of gold. Therefore, when silver is needed in the arts, the purchaser must give one ounce of gold to get 15 ounces of silver. Nor is it possible for the silver bullion owner to exact a higher price for his ore by insisting upon exchanging it for less than the legal ratio, because the purchaser who so long as he can get 15 ounces of silver for one of gold by melting the silver coins, will not give an ounce of gold for less than 15 ounces of silver. Thus the market ratio of gold and silver can never, un¬ der their free coinage, be either more or less than the legal ratio. The silver bullion owners cannot for another rea¬ son extort a greater than the legal value of silver, because the mercantile demand for silver is insufficient to con¬ sume the entire product, so that could they force it to a temporarily higher price, it must eventually fall to the level of the legal value. From 1834 to 1873 the legal value of silver was higher in Europe than in the United States, therefore our silver left us to go to Europe, not because there was a greater AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 27 need for it in the arts than existed in this country, but because the legal value of it was higher there than here, where it was wanted for coinage into money. And as the legal value fixed the market price of silver it com- m?nded a higher market price in Europe than it could in the United States for its use in the arts, or higher than its legal value here. When the free coinage of gold and silver are both lim¬ ited, or when one metal is coined free in unlimited quan¬ tities, and the coinage of the other metal is prohibited, then the market and legal values of the two metals diverge and vary. When the coinage of both metals are limited, or prohibited, a surplus remains for which there is no mercantile demand, which depresses the market price, thus wedging apart the legal and market values. When, however, gold is not only coined free, but in unlimited quantities, while the coinage of silver is abso¬ lutely prohibited, the legal and market demand for gold is sufficient to use its entire output, while one-half the de¬ mand for silver is destroyed, leaving a fifty per cent, mar¬ ket demand to consume a ioo per cent, production of sil¬ ver, thereby cutting its market price half in two. This discrimination against silver in favor of gold by denving the former coinage while admitting the latter to coinage, of disusing one as money, and overusing the other as redemption money has forced apart their legal and commercial ratios. Prior to 1873 fully 50 per cent, of the gold and silver mined were absorbed in the arts, the remaining one-half was used as money. CHAPTER VII. AMERICAN FINANCIAL HISTORY FROM 1792 TO 1873. The First Congress of the United States by the law of 1792 fixed the market value of gold and silver in this country, by decreeing that 37ij of pure silver and 24.7 grains of pure gold should be 100 cents worth, or one dol¬ lar. Both gold and silver were admitted to unlimited free coinage, and both were declared to be, and treated as redemption money. Until 1873 both metals were treated equally. Dollars that are equal to the same 28 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT thing are equal to each other. In this country under the unlimited free coinage of both metals a dollar whether of gold or silver could be worth neither more nor less than itself, for the reasons given in the preceding chapter. Whenever the metal in our coins was worth more in another country than its coin value in this, they leit us and went to such country, but whenever the metal in our coins was worth less in another country than its coin value in this, it left such country and came to our coun¬ try. When our silver dollar was overvalued in Europe and undervalued in the United States, it was worth 103 cents in gold in Europe but not in this country, here it could pass for only 100 cents. However, even though the market and legal values be precisely the same, the purchasing power of a dollar may, simply because of the scarcity of the number of dollars, be greater than 100 cents, whether the scarcity is due to a lack of all kinds of money, gold and silver, or is due to the fact that one of the metals have been demonetized and its competition destroyed, allowing the remaining metal a chance to command a premium. All values are measured by the amount of money in circulation, which if it be scarce, prices are low, but if it be plentiful, prices are high. This change in the values of property, and the purchasing power of money can be effected without any change in the weight or purity of the dollars, and without any change or variance between the market and legal values of the metal undemonetized. Silver and gold circulated concurrently in this country, and Europe, from 1782 to 1803, during which time Ameri¬ can and French ratios were the same, neither being under or overvalued. In order to get more gold, Napoleon in 1803 changed the French ratio to 15! to 1, thus undervalu- ing gold and-overvaluing silver in the United States, caus¬ ing gold to leave us, and silver to come to us. In the United States, one ounce of gold could exchange for only 15 ounces of silver, while in France and on the Continent, it could' get 15-! ounces, gaining half an ounce, therefore gold left us and went to France. Silver, on the contrary, refusing to exchange 15J ounces of itself to get an ounce of gold, when by crossing the ocean to America it could AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 29 get the same ounce of gold with only 15 ounces of itself, therefore to avoid the loss of half an ounce, silver left France and came to our country. Whenever we bought goods or paid debts abroad we sent gold because being worth 3 per cent, more than silver, it bought or paid 3 per cent. more. During this period, 1803 to 1834, the gold in our gold dollar was worth about three cents more than its face value or 103 cents. Our monetary system still rested, however, upon both metals, for silver could not command a premium of a cent, for the moment it rose to 100 cents it would become equal in value to gold, it could not rise higher than gold or even equal in value to it before it would bring gold back again into concurrent circulation with (Silver. In 1834 we endeavored to secure their concurrent cir¬ culation by diminishing the weight of the gold dollar and increasing the ratio so that they would again become equal in value. The ratio was accordingly changed to 15.98 to 1, the ratio popularly known as 16 to 1, but this ratio made gold too dear and silver too cheap in the United States, so that while we did, as we desired, get more gold, we lost our silver. Sixteen ounces of silver refused to ex¬ change for one ounce of gold in our country, because in France 15 \ ounces of silver could get the same ounce of gold, thus saving half an ounce by leaving us and going to France, which it did Under this ratio, gold, by gain¬ ing half an ounce in the United States, left Europe and came to us. Our motive in paying our foreign debts or bills in silver became the same as it had formerly been to pay in gold, viz.: it paid or bought 3 per cent. more. The silver dollar was worth 103 cents in France therefore it refused to circulate in this country with a 97-cent gold dollar. In 1853 we attempted to retain our silver money by the Gresham Law which authorized the slight debasement of our silver coin/s 8^ per cent. The assertion that the Gresham Law of 1853 practically demonetized silver is false, for it merely discontinued the coinage of subsidiary silver on private account, limiting the legal tender quali¬ ties of such coins to $5, but the coinage of the silver dollar 30 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT remained free and unlimited and its legal tender qualities unrestricted. Silver still continued to compete with gold under the operation of that law. This attempt proved a failure, for even though we coined 8 million silver dol¬ lars between 1792 and 1873, although we had also coined during that period $140,000,000 subsidiary silver coins and made Spanish and Mexican silver legal tender, which brought many millions of such money into the country, this money all left us. So that in 1873 we had little if any silver money in this country, and in fact since i860 we had no gold, as we were doing business on a greenback basis in 1873- During the period 1792 to 1803, gold and silver con¬ currently circulated in the United States; but during the periods 1803 to 1834, and 1834 to 1873, we had the alter¬ nate circulation in this country, first of silver and last of gold During the entire period 1792 to 1873, however, we enjoyed the benefits of the bimetallic system. At no times prior to 1873 did we suffer the evils of monometal¬ lism which has resulted from the demonetization of silver in that year. (In 1873) “We had no silver (since 1834), and it had no influence whatever on our prices, or on our ability to pay debts.”—Carlisle at Covington, Ky., 1895. Is it true that the absence of silver from our circulation had no influence whatever on prices of commodities in this coun¬ try and our ability to pay our debts? For 40 years prior to 1873 our silver dollars because they were worth 103 cents in France, left us; the cheap gold drove out the dear silver. Suppose in 1873, Mr. Carlisle, 3 cents* worth of silver had been clipped from the silver dollar would it not have been worth precisely 100 cents? or suppose 3 cents’ worth of gold had been added to the gold dollar, would it not then have been worth 100 cents? as the result of either change in the weight of our silver or gold coins would not our gold and silver dollars have each become worth 100 cents, equal to each other in value, which was essential to their concurrent circulation in the United States? The moment the dollars became equal in value, Mr. Carlisle, would not silver have re¬ turned to this country, and we would then have had both AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 31 gold and silver? This, instead of proving the failure of bimetallism, demonstrates that had the United States and France adopted the same ratio, the two metals would have concurrently circulated; Now what effect had silver when absent upon values in this country? So long as the mints were open to the free, unlimited coinage of both gold and silver, and both were treated as redemption money, gold could not have risen 3 per cent, before it would have become equal to or exceeded the value of the silver dollar, which would have brought silver back into circulation. Gold could command no premium so long as it met the competition of silver. It was for the purpose of destroying the competi¬ tion of silver that it was demonetized, which forbade the coinage of silver coins, and treated the silver money al¬ ready coined as unfit for redemption purposes. De¬ monetization therefore prevented any further increase in the supply of money by the coinage of silver money, and the destruction of one-half the volume of metallic money of redemption, increased the demand and use of the remaining one-half, gold, thus sending gold to a premium. If the value of money rises, the price of products falls, therefore the competition of silver, by preventing any rise in the value of money, any rise in the purchasing power of gold beyond 3 per cent., did influence prices by rendering it absolutely impossible for prices to fall as the result of a rise in the value of money. Not only was Carlisle in error when he declared that the absence of silver from circulation had no influence upon our prices, but he was equally wrong when he as¬ serted that silver had in its absence no effect on our ability to pay our debts. For, since we pay our debts with products, with labor, with the proceeds of what we sell, that same cause which prevented the rise in the value of gold, viz., the competition of silver, and which prevented the corresponding fall in the prices of com¬ modities and of labor, maintained our ability to pay our debts. We were not obliged then as now to give 200 cents’ worth of commodities to get a dollar, as we are now. The competition of silver under the bimetallic 32 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT system guaranteed good honest prices, and even when absent did influence our debt-paying ability. Under that beneficent bimetallic system the debtor possessed the con¬ stitutional right to pay his debts and obligations in either gold or silver, and he always paid in what at the time happened to be the cheapest money. This option resid¬ ing in the debtor as which money he shall choose to pay, produced an increased demand for the cheaper and a diminished demand for the dearer money, which, caus¬ ing a rise in the value of the cheaper, and a fall in the value of the dearer money, until their values equalized. Under this system neither gold nor silver were able to go to a permanent premium, thereby insuring a greater stability of value than was possible if either gold or silver monometallism prevailed. Values were more stable when based on a bimetallic standard which for 80 years maintained a legal value at the ratio of 15J to 1 between gold and silver, than had values been based entirely upon either gold or silver whose ratio of production during that period fluctuated from 47.4 to 1 to only 4.4 to 1. Why was this monetary system which imparted such stability to values abandoned? and who secured its aban¬ donment? The power that displaced a bimetallic stand¬ ard as required by the Constitution, based on both gold and silver, by one based exclusively upon gold, must not only have possessed the requisite ability, but must also have some special and peculiar interest in effect¬ ing such a tremendous revolution in the monetary stand¬ ard upon which the value of all property, the stability of all business, upon which the liberties of men and the prosperity of the great American Republic rested. When money is scarce its purchasing power is in¬ creased, while the selling price of all property is corre¬ spondingly reduced. When money is plentiful, however, its purchasing power is diminished, while the selling price of all property is correspondingly enhanced. Certain it is that the class possessing property is not benefited by scarce money, which obliges him to give more of his property in exchange for it than he should do under bimetallism; certainly the laborer is not enriched by AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 33 scarce money, which forces him to work twice as long as formerly to get a dollar. It is evident, therefore, that the creditor class, which lends $100, which because of its scarcity buys $200 worth of property, is the class which would most natu¬ rally seek to overthrow the bimetallic system, which would prevent his getting his $100 back in money which will buy more than $100. The system that made money scarce would help the creditor class as much as the 'sys¬ tem which made money plentiful would hurt it. Provid¬ ing against the “undeserved decrement” of plentiful money the creditor class sought to obtain the “unearned increment” of scarce money. CHAPTER VIII. THE ROTHSCHILD GOLD CONSPIRACY. Though the springs are not the whole watch, they con¬ stitute its motive power; though the Rothschilds do not possess all the capital in the world, they represent the most effective and colossal combination of it that exists, or has ever existed, for they own or control at least $2,- 000,000,000, which is fully one-half of the world’s supply of gold or redemption money. Was it possible that such a conspiracy could be conceived, and be put into suc¬ cessful operation without the connivance, consent, and support of the Rothschilds who owned and controlled at least one-half of all the gold which was to be made ex¬ clusively the money of ultimate redemption, and who more than all others would be most benefited by such a change? Without their assistance nothing could have been done. To> correctly appreciate the power the Rothschilds possessed and understand the conspiracy which demone¬ tized silver in 1873 it will be necessary to review its his¬ tory for a century past. The British Government during the wars of the French Revolution was forced to borrow money to meet expenses. The larger amount of this loan it negotiated from the Rothschilds in silver and gold, as this family had several hundred millions which it had secured as the rich profits 34 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT of National brokerage in which for a number of years it had been engaged. These loans were made payable in specie, and under the stress of circumstances that specie was gold. Both gold and silver left circulation and hid so that in 1795 the British Government was forced, under the leader¬ ship of Pitt, to issue paper money at a time when the very existence of the Government was at stake, being menaced by the British fleet in mutiny under the flag of the “Float¬ ing Republic,” which threatened the city of London with destruction. In order to crush Napoleon the British Government was compelled not only to issue for its own needs several hundred millions of pounds sterling in paper money, but also forced to issue a vast amount of such paper legal ten¬ der money for other Nations on the Continent and guar¬ antee their payment. This money the British Govern¬ ment maintained at par, never a cent of it was ever at a discount. Great Britain fought with paper money, which always stands up and fights; Napoleon fought with metallic money, gold and silver, which, in times of danger and disaster, invariably sneaks out of sight. It was paper money which really conquered Napoleon, for he could eventually procure no money to equip and pay his armies, so thev disbanded. The condition of trade under this paper money period Alison, in his History of Europe, has described as follows: “Prosperity unheard of and unparalleled prevailed in every department of the Empire (British), the landed proprie¬ tors were in affluence; wealth to an unheard of extent had been created among the farmers; our revenues were quad¬ rupled, our colonial possessions encircled the earth; this period terminated in a flood of glory and a blaze of pros¬ perity such as had never been surpassed by any nation.” At the termination of the Napoleonic wars these Roths¬ child loans fell due, payable in gold, which the British Government could not readily procure. These loans were renewed on long-time payments payable in gold, and the British Government in 1816 demonetized silver and AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 35 adopted the single gold standard, resuming specie pay¬ ments on that basis in 1821. This step she took at the dictation of the Rothschilds, though at the time she was entirely upon a paper basis and enjoying unexampled prosperity, there being scarcely . a dollar of gold or silver in circulation. One of the results of the adoption of the single gold standard was that the number of English landowners was reduced from 160,000, in 1820, to only 30,000, in 1840. The Rothschilds, however, had scarce money, which they and the creditor class so fondly describe as “honest money. 7 ’ And when money becomes more plentiful and dollars buy only 100 cents worth of property as honest dollars should, they tell us that the country is flooded with “cheap money.” The British gold standard, before its adoption by the United States and France, did not affect prices and values outside of England, and only in England to the extent that silver was no longer treated as redemption money, gold being used exclusively for that purpose. Scarce money, however, prevailed in England and the British branch of the Rothschild family was secure, but their interests were imperiled by the immense gold dis¬ coveries of California and Australia in 1849 and for a decade following, but it dared venture no change in the monetary system, for its fortunes were based upon the single gold standard. The purchasing power of gold fell and the creditors got back money which, because it had suddenly become very plentiful, bought less than the money they had loaned. What effect did this “flood of cheap money” produce? Prosperity instead of adversity and disaster followed this so-called depreciation of the currency. At no period of our history has our Nation been more prosperous than just after those great gold dis¬ coveries in California. Gold was the plentiful and silver the scarce money, gold the “cheap” and silver the “honest money.” The Rothschilds of England had chosen the wrong metal, apparently, but they dared not change. At this Critical moment for the family fortunes, the German branch of the Rothschilds came to the rescue by demonetizing gold in Germany and establishing the sin- 36 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT gle silver standard. Holland also demonetized gold and adopted the silver standard. So far as the French Govern¬ ment was influenced by the French branch of the Roths¬ child family, if it was influenced at all, it was in the direc¬ tion of bimetallism, that branch of the Rothschild family preferred to straddle, so that no matter which metal, gold or silver, rose in value, it would be safe; at least France refused to abandon bimetallism. The output of gold began about that time to lessen, and the Nevada silver discoveries of 1859 threatened to make silver, as usual, the more plentiful metal, and gold the scarce metal. Germany thereupon hastily abandoned the silver standard and endeavored to induce France to adopt with her the single gold standard; France again refused. By the war of “71” Germany forced France to pay her an indemnity of $1,000,000,000 in gold, and immediately adopted the single gold standard, by demonetizing silver, and threw her melted 'silver on the market to the extent of $300,000,000 which exceeded the capacity of the mints and left a surplus. Partly for political reasons, and partly for financial, France to prevent Germany from exchang¬ ing her silver for French gold, suspended the free coinage of silver in 1876. All the European monetary systems are founded upon a perpetual debt that has never been paid, and is never expected to be paid, but prior to our War of Rebellion there was no great debt in this country upon which to ^ base such a monetary system. At the beginning of that War our Government was un¬ able to borrow money from Europe which desired the de¬ struction of our Union, or from Wall Street which lacked the patriotism to make any sacrifice for its preservation, except at the cost of a heavy discount and an exorbitant rate of interest, and even the money it loaned upon such terms was in small sums. To meet the extraordinary needs of the most gigantic war of all history, the United States Government was obliged to issue paper money based upon its honor and its existence which was then being weighed in the balance, which was made legal tender for all dues except custom duties and the interest upon the public debt. AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 37 This paper, known as the Greenback system, originated in a Bill in the House of Representatives early in 1862 which provided for the issue of full legal tender paper money, receivable for all debts and dues. That Bill was amended by the Senate, so as to require that all custom duties and the interest on the National debt be paid in coin, gold or silver. That pernicious and infamous amendment, Thaddeus Stevens declared in the House, Feb. 20th, 1862, “Made two kinds of money, one for the banks and brokers, and one for the people.” The Bill became a law as amended, and created a fictitious demand for coin to pay our custom duties and the interest on the public debt, which was scarce and in fact but very little specie, gold or silver, was then in the country. The result of this discrimination against the greenback in favor of coin was that gold and silver at once went to a premium, and the larger the importations, and the greater the bonded indebtedness became, increasing the amount of interest paid, the higher went the premium on metallic money, until the greenback dollar as measured in gold or silver was worth only about 40 cents. In order to pay their custom duties the people were forced to give $1 of the greenback currency, or a dollar’s worth of com¬ modities to get 40 cents in gold or silver. This system could inure only to the advantage of the class which pos¬ sessed the coin money, the creditor class, and gave the creditor class the opportunity to exchange their gold and silver for greenbacks at that heavy discount and with those cheap greenbacks to purchase at their face value the bonds of the United States Government. Wall Street thus secured almost the entire issue of our Government bonds. These bonds were made payable in the lawful money of the country, which at that time was greenbacks, as there was no other kind of money in circulation. The clause in that law of 1862 providing that custom duties and the interest on the National debt be paid in coin, gold and silver, demonstrated that the bond itself was payable in other money than coin, paper money. Wall Street bought the bonds in greenbacks which were 38 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT made payable in that kind of money, at a time when the greenbacks were at a discount of 60 per cent., thereby clearing a profit of that extent from that source alone. What right or claim had Wall Street to be repaid in other money than the kind it loaned, which was paper? But Wall Street was not content to receive the same kind of money it exchanged for the bonds; it was not satis¬ fied with the kind of money that had saved the Republic; the money paid the heroes of the War, their widows and orphans was not good enough, not sacred enough, because not scarce enough to satisfy the bondholders. But Wall Street was not content with the purchasing power of the outstanding greenbacks, which according to John J. Knox, at that time Comptroller of the Treas¬ ury, states that on July the ist, 1866, when the green¬ backs reached their greatest volume, amounted to $1,261,- 415,475 in Government greenbacks, and' $281,479,908 in National Bank notes, making a total of $1,542,895,383. Between that date and July ist, 1870, yielding to the dic¬ tation of the Money Power, for no other class would be benefited by it, the Government reduced the volume of greenbacks to $396,894212', (which with 1 the National Bank notes which had increased to $299,766,984, made a total of $696,661,196, thus contracting the entire currency of the country for practically there was no metallic money in our circulation, in four brief years, at a time when we most sorely needed every dollar we had, to the enormous extent of $846,234,177. The result of this infamous and uncalled for contraction was the panic of ‘‘73/’ which though it set in earlier than that year, did not become so pronounced until additional legislation in the direction still further of contraction made its avoidance impossible. Not content with the tremendous advantage secured by that Law of 1862, and the contraction of our currency since the war, the Creditor Class influenced Congress to pass the Law of March 18th, 1869, making the bonds themselves payable in coin, gold and silver. This was one of the steps in the most infamous, damnable conspiracy against the rights of the people ever conceived and exe¬ cuted, for it forced a great Nation to 1 pay its gigantic debt in another kind of money than the money it borrowed, AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 39 in money which was dearer, possessing greater purchas¬ ing power than the greenback because less plentiful, in money which forced the people to give more of their property in order to get it, to work longer for a dollar than there was reason to do. This Act vastly increased the already stupendous debt of the United States which the common people had to pay, and gave the bondholders a greater amount of money than the Nation had con¬ tracted to pay. That Act was an act of confiscation, be¬ cause it required the farmer to sell more wheat, corn, cot¬ ton, beef, etc., than justice exacted. This act of extortion and robbery did not glut the greed of the capitalists, for by the Law of July 14th, 1870, entitled, “An Act to Authorize the Refunding of the National Debt,” Congress directed the Secretary of the Treasury that when the 5-20 bonds fell due and the Gov¬ ernment had the option to pay them at the expiration of 5 years from date of issue, else they ran 20 years, to re¬ fund the debt by issuing in exchange for the old bonds, new ones bearing a lower rate of interest than the old ones, but running for a longer period of time. To illustrate the advantage of this policy to the Credi¬ tor Class by making our National Debt perpetual almost, the Government, we will suppose, owed $100,000,000 in bonds, which fell due soon, and the Secretary of the Treas¬ ury is persuaded by the lender that the debtor is not in a position to pay. Wall Street said to Uncle Sam, “you are not in a position to pay this debt of $100,000,000, bearing 6 per cent, interest; now we do not desire to be exacting, instead of paying us $106,000,000 due a year from date, give us new bonds payable in 30 years from this date for $100,000,000 and we will knock off 2 per cent, on the interest, so that when due you will pay us at 4 per cent., $220,000,000, a clear gain to us of only $114,000,000.” This is the great science of Refunding, which is heralded as an act of exceptional brilliancy and ability on the part of our Secretaries of the Treasury. It is the science of Robbery. But even this third step did not satiate the rapacity of these Vampires; not satisfied with securing the interest on the bonds in coin, gold and silver, nearly all of which 40 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT they held; not satisfied with making the bonds payable in the lawful money of the country, greenbacks at the time of their issue, also payable in gold and silver after having obtained them in exchange for paper money; not satisfied with extending needlessly the bonded indebtedness of the Nation, which Vastly augmented their wealth and power in return for no consideration whatever, this Creditor Class, by the Demonetization Act, passed by Congress February 18th, 1873, bv prohibiting the coinage of silver, or its use as money of redemption, doubled the value of the gold unit or dollar, making it worth at least 200 cents. The Act of 1862 needlessly increased the burdens of the people; the Act of 1869 made the National debt pay¬ able in a different kind of money than what the people had promised to pay; the Act of 1870, requiring the re¬ funding of the bonded debt, was as useless as it was un¬ just, postponing the date of payment, increasing the debt of the people for the benefit of the few; the Act of 1873 tampered with the unit of value itself and made it worth two to one, so that for every dollar that Wall Street loaned, it got back the same number of dollars, but dollars that buy twice as much as the dollars were worth in 1873. After Demonetizing silver and restricting the pjpyment of our bonds to gold alone, when they were really payable in coin, gold or silver, Congress, on January 14th, 1875, fixed the Resumption of specie payments to begin January 1st, 1879. The people of the United States are honest, they desire to pay their National debt, and have been fondly and proudly imagining that the National debt was fast ap¬ proaching extinction. In 1866, when the National debt reached its high water mark, our Government owed, in round numbers, $2,828,000,000; on January 1st, 1896, our National debt was $1,235,000,000. During that period of thirty years the people of this country have paid in interest alone on their National debt, the stupendous sum of $2,635,000,000. Apparently we have greatly, by $1,- 700,000,000, reduced the debt and its extinction at an early day is certain. Principal and interest the American peo¬ ple have paid $4,335,000,000. The number of dollars we AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 41 owe has been reduced, but when the people of the United States reflect that the remaining $1,235,000,000 that they owe in this year, 1896, will buy as much wheat, corn, cot¬ ton, farm and factory products as the entire $2,828,000,000 could buy in 1866, they will perceive that practically they have not reduced their National debt one single cent, that they have after all their heroic sacrifices to extinguish the National debt, paid nothing, but have in addition paid to the bondholders, or Wall Street, which holds most of our bonds, the tremendous sum of $2,635,000,000 as a present; they will perceive that it is as difficult now to pay what is left of our debt as it was in 1866 to pay the whole debt, because they have to give twice as much of their products to get the gold to pay the bonds. After paying $1,700,000,000, or more than three-fifths of the entire debt, the American people are compelled to give at the beginning of 1896 646,000,000 more bushels of wheat, or 90,780,000 more barrels of flour, or 8,673,- 400,000 more pounds of cotton, or 50,000,000 more bar¬ rels of pork, or 425,000,000 more pounds of wool to pay the remaining $1,237,500,000 than they were obliged to give in 1866 to pay the whole debt of $2,827,668,960. At the very moment in our history when our Nation needed the greatest volume of money, at the very moment when its expenses and obligations were greatest, at the very moment when Congress, the chosen representatives of the people, should have increased the volume of metal¬ lic, and paper money, when it should have protected the people against schemes to rob them, by paying the debt in the kind of money in which they were contracted, Con¬ gress, secretly or openly, passed laws increasing the pub¬ lic burdens, increasing the debt itself by making it payable in metallic money, and destroying one-half the volume of money. The result of this legislation is that the Ameri¬ can people are paying Wall Street their National debt at the rate of $4 to the $1 promised. At the very moment when Congress should have been true to the people, it betrayed them. On the very afternoon preceding his assassination, the immortal Lincoln gave to Schuyler Colfax, afterward vice-president of the United States under Grant, who 42 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT was just departing for the far West, this message to con¬ vey to the miners: “Mr. Colfax, I want you to take a message from me to the miners whom you visit. I have very large ideas of the mineral wealth of our Nation. Now that the Rebellion is overthrown, and we know pretty nearly the amount of our national debt, the more gold and silver we mine makes the payment of that debt so much the easier. Now, I am going to encourage that in every possible way. We shall have hundreds of thousands of disbanded soldiers, and many have feared that their return home in such great numbers might paralyze industry by furnishing suddenly a greater sup¬ ply of labor than there is a demand for. I am going to try and attract them to the hidden wealth of our moun¬ tain ranges, where there is room enough for all. Immi¬ gration, which even the war has not stopped, will land upon our shores hundreds of thousands more per year from overcrowded Europe. I intend to point them to the GOLD AND SILVER that waits for them in the West. Tell the miners from me that I shall promote their interests to the utmost of my ability, BECAUSE THEIR PROSPERITY IS THE PRpSPERITY OF THE NATION; and we shall prove in a very few years that WE ARE THE TREASURY OF THE WORLD/ Such was Lincoln’s last thoughts; increase the amount of money so that we could pay our debts easier, get better prices for our property, diminish the burdens of the people, and increase the prosperity and power of the Nation. But the great patriot fell by the hand of an assassin, and the people lost their best friend and great¬ est protector, and the very danger that Lincoln feared, the Conspiracy of Capital, was fully realized. There was absolutely no excuse or necessity whatever for the resumption of specie basis, for there was very little gold or silver then in the country; we were on a paper, greenback basis, our National debt was incurred on that basis, our contracts drawn on that basis, our property sold on that basis, so that to suddenly contract the volume of money by making these greenbacks, them¬ selves money, mere promises to pay, redeemable in gold and silver, which were scarce, the value of money would AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 48 be doubled, and tlie value of property reduced one-half. It was rank confiscation of the property of the people, and those who were and are to-day the beneficiaries of that atrocious piece of robbery are in no position to claim that a restitution to the people of their constitu¬ tional rights is repudiation of debts due them, which by their chicanery, duplicity, and act, was more than doubled. The condition of the country during this greenback period was highly prosperous, and if the greenbacks were at a discount, and gold and silver at a premium, it was in exact proportion to the extent that the greenback was discriminated against and coin money favored. Certain it is, that when the Secretary of the Treasury for a brief period just after the war made them receiv¬ able for custom duties, the greenbacks immediately went to par. A Government that refuses to accept the same money it pays its citizens and soldiers to discharge its obliga¬ tions and defray its expenditures is dishonest. If the greenbacks were good enough to pay the soldiers and sail¬ ors, and their widows and orphans, to save this Repub¬ lic, they were and are good enough for all purposes. Instead of rearranging the ratio to conform to the French ratio, so as to secure the return of silver, and the concurrent circulation of both metals, Congress prohib¬ ited the coinage of silver when it was worth 3 cents more than the gold dollar, and made gold the sole money of redemption. CHAPTER IX. THE DEMONETIZATION OF SILVER IN 1873. The demonetization of silver consists of two elements, without possessing both of which it can never be fully demonetized; first, prohibiting or restricting it free, un¬ limited coinage; second, the disuse of all silver money already coined, or to be afterward coined as money of absolute and ultimate redemption. The demonetization act of 1873, which omitted the coinage of the silver dol¬ lar, and destroyed its legal tender qualities, provided “that the gold coins of the United States shall be a dollar piece, which, at the standard weight of 25.8 grains, shall 44 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT be the unit of value;” then follows directions as to the weight and fineness of the other gold coins. The distinction between the bimetallic law of 1792 and the gold monometallic law of 1873 consists in this, that by the bimetallic law of 1792 the mints were open to the free, unlimited coinage of both gold and silver at a fixed ratio, and that both metals were used as money of ultimate redemption; while by the gold mono¬ metallic law of 1873, though the mints remained open to the free, unlimited coinage of gold, they were closed to silver, its coinage being prohibited, and gold alone being used as redemption money, thus destroying the competition of silver and permitting gold to go to any premium that greed could exact. By the bimetallic law of 1792 the unit of value, 100 cents, was expressed in the silver dollar of 371J grains pure, and also by the fictitious gold dollar of 24.7 grains, pure. Both dollars were legal tender for anything and any amount; they competed; if one got too dear, the other was used, until their values equalized; that was our bimetallic system. Restore that system, even though the unit or dollar be expressed in gold and the silver dollar’s weight be regulated by ratio in proportion to the gold dollar and bimetallism would be re-established. The silver men are not advocates of silver monometal¬ lism, because they do not seek to secure the free, un¬ limited coinage of silver and prohibit the coinage of gold, neither do they attempt to make silver the sole money of redemption. That would be silver monometallism. The silver advocates on the contrary demand the restora¬ tion of the bimetallic system which existed until its re¬ peal in 1873, and which even the opponents of its restora¬ tion concede was bimetallic. Silver cannot be remonetized by coining it free in unlimited quantities, if it be not treated and actually used as redemption money, nor can it be remonetized by using it as redemption money and prohibiting its coinage. To be remonetized silver must both be admitted to free, unlimited coinage and treated as money of redemption equally with gold. There has been about $500,000,000 in silver dollars AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 45 coined since 1878, more than in the 80 preceding years of the Republic, but that did not restore bimetallism for those dollars, though declared by law to be legal tender for anything and everything, were not treated so by the .Treasury Department, which has persistently, since 1878, redeemed all government bonds and certificates, by their terms redeemable in coin, either gold or silver, in gold alone. The act of February, 1873, partly demonetized silver by omitting the coinage of the silver dollar, and limiting the legal tender qualities of other silver coins, that is, subsidiary coins, to $10. Another act passed in December, 1873, restricted the legal tender qualities of ALL silver coins to $10, thereby completing its de¬ monetization. The Bland-Allison Law of 1878 partly remonetized silver by restoring to the silver dollar its complete legal tender qualities, but it limited its coinage to not more than $4,000,000 a month, nor less than $2,000,000 a month. The Secretary of the Treasury, Sherman, refused to coin more than the minimum amount required by the law, disseminating the pernicious, infamous and unconstitutional heresy that silver was a cheap money, not' to be trusted, and unfit to pay the national coin obligations and bonds which he and all of his successors in office have persistently redeemed ex¬ clusively in gold, in palpable violation of the law. If silver was “cheap” money in 1878 it was because he was the cause of it in large measure, for when its demonetiza¬ tion was secured in 1873, it was accomplished for the reason that silver was worth TOO MUCH, being worth 103 cents, the reason which he has given as the ground for its disuse as money, thus committing himself to the use of cheap money, gold, in 1873. The gold standard advocates claim that silver is trouble when the morning came. Have the men of active business, and the toiling millions who suffer most, been tempted in their distress to say that there is no longer any money in the country.” The Money Power tells us that the Government must stop issuing money, and go out of the banking business. Banks legitimately possess but two functions, that of deposit and exchange. The right to issue money, to increase, regulate and control its supply is an attribute of sovereignty; it is not a legitimate function of banking. The exercise of this sovereign power by the bank is the rankest usurpation, a privilege mistakenly or cor- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 71 ruptly given them, which imperils the liberties of the people, and endangers the perpetuity as well as the prosperity of the Republic. To empower either National or State banks to issue money creates a danger to public interests; by manipu¬ lating the volume of money, either to increase or decrease it, gives the banks an opportunity to engage in a specula¬ tion of all property at the expense of the people, the profits of which they possess full power to enlarge or diminish, for they willing it, would know beforehand whether money would be scarce and prices low, or money plentiful and prices high. Government bonds alone provide the only tangible and effective security that National Bank notes possess. But bonds represent indebtedness, which the people must pay; they are burdens upon industry. There is no more reason why a monetary system should be founded upon debt, than there is that health must depend upon disease. A monetary system should be based upon hope, not upon despair; upon possibilities, not upon debt; upon the resources of the country, upon its industry, upon, in short, its needs. The true monetary system is the one whose volume of money constantly increases proportionate to the in¬ creased needs of business. Now, if our paper currency consists exclusively of National Bank notes, as the banks demand, then its expansion involves a perpetual increase of indebtedness, which not only could never, but would never, be paid. To pay part of our bonded- indebtedness, which would secure such bank note currency, would con • tract the volume of money, and unsettle business; to pay all of our bonded debt would destroy all the security such bank notes possess, and would sweep them out of existence, and produce a panic. The result of the pro¬ posed extension of the present monetary system would involve the creation of a debt so large, that the Nation would eventually be unable to pay even the interest upon it. These proposed Government bonds would be given for gold borrowed of the bankers, who, while, drawing interest on those bonds from the Government, would 72 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT also at the same time be drawing interest from the peo¬ ple on the bank notes loaned, which would be issued against those same bonds, thus giving the banks a double interest, a double profit. This system could result in but one of two things, either slavery or repudiation, a repudiation effected by revolution. This usurpation of the banks must end; the National Government alone, the great central authority, should and • must issue all money. If there is a profit, and there is a large one, in this banking business of issuing money, let the Gov¬ ernment realize it, so that the whole Nation can enjoy it. This bank system is the rankest class legislation. “Equal rights to all, and especial privileges to none.” To empower a class to make money plentiful or money scarce, prices high or prices low, is not only to give it an opportunity to manipulate money for the exclusive benefit of that class, but also to give it the power that can despotically enslave the people. Give us Government money, “Greenbacks, the people’s favorite money, better than gold or silver” (John Sher¬ man, in 1894). Give us greenbacks not made redeem¬ able in gold or silver, but money itself legal tender for all debts and dues; money which the people, being ac¬ quainted with it and having confidence in it, would ac¬ cept, and upon which they would pa.y no interest. Government money alone provides and guarantees an elastic, a continually expanding curency, which would entail no burden, because it would represent no debt, but, being on the contrary fragrant with hope, would provide a currency that would impart vigor to commerce, confidence to business, stability to values, and prosperity to the Nation. There is no doubt about our ability to maintain such a monetary system, iii a time of peace, when we reflect that our Government did maintain it during four years of war to meet the needs of commerce as well as the exigencies of war, and maintained it during the fourteen succeeding years of peace, and that the discount it was sometimes at was due entirely to the discrimination against its use for interest or for custom duties. Government money, consisting of gold, silver and AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 73 greenbacks, all three legal tender for all debts, without discrimination against any, is the only genuine sound money possible, because it is the only money whose vol¬ ume can ever be equal to the needs of business, whose supply will ever equal the demand. An increase in Na¬ tional Bank currency would increase debt, and decrease our ability to pay it; an increase in Government money would not increase our National debt, while increasing our ability to pay existing indebtedness. The people must appeal to the Republican Party to re¬ form our monetary system by substituting Government money for Bank money, for the Democratic Party is in¬ dissolubly wedded to the old State Bank swindle. And if this appeal to the Republican Party prove in vain, then the people must organize a party that will protect their interests, and hearken to their commands, a Nationalist Party. Many expect relief from the evils of the gold standard by an international agreement, and believe that the assist¬ ance and concurrence of Great Britain can be obtained, but those acquainted with CHAPTER XVI. THE ATTITUDE OF GREAT BRITAIN ON THE MONEY PROBLEM, expect no concession from that nation, favorable to a bimetallic standard, until she is first forced and driven to it. The policy that helps Great Britain, hurts the United States, for the interests of 'the two nations are antagonistic. Great Britain is the creditor nation of the world, while the United States is a debtor nation. Great Britain is a gold producing nation, while the United States is both a gold and silver producing nation; it is to the interest of the former to favor gold and discrim¬ inate against silver; while our interests are best conserved by using both metals. Great Britain is a dependent nation; dependent upon the world both for what she buys and for what she sells. The United States is an independent nation, capable of producing all she consumes, and of consuming all she pro¬ duces. Great Britain imports 96 per cent, of the raw materials of her manufactures, and she imports also 94 74 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT per cent, of all her food supplies; Great Britain must buy of the world, or starve; she must sell to the world, or perish. Great Britain is, therefore, benefited by cheap wheat, corn, cotton, meats, wool, and other products of food, or materials of manufactures which she is compelled to buy. The United States is injured by the low price of such products, because she must, or at least does, sell them. Giffen, an advocate of the blessings to the debtor of the single gold standard, says: “A creditor nation is able to draw more from its tributaries, who have to pay it in appreciating money, than it would oth¬ erwise be able to draw. To pay the same debt they must send to their creditors 30, 50, perhaps 100 per cent, more produce than they would otherwise have to pay or send. There is no doubt that in this sense the weight of the gold debt of a debtor country like India, or the United States, has enormously increased of late years.” In proof of the profit that Great Britain obtains from re¬ duced prices of imports due to the shrinkage of values caused by her gold monometallism, we cite the testimony of the London Statist of January nth, 1896, a gold stand¬ ard paper, in which edition it gives the following facts and figures: “Our (Great Britain) foreign trade in 1895 has been the most profitable in the history of the country, and very much more profitable than it was in 1890, when superficially it ap¬ peared to be extremely prosperous. Reckoned by its cash value our foreign trade has been slightly better in 1895 than in 1894, and much worse than in 1890. In 1890 our imports amounted to £420,692,000; in 1894 they were £408,345,000, and in 1890 they have been £416,687,000. That is to say, our im¬ ports have been £8,342,000 greater in 1895 than in 1894, and £4,000,000 smaller than in 1890. As regards the cash value of our exports, an increase of £10,000,000 has occurred in 1895 as compared with 1894, and a decline of as much as £37,400,000 compared with 1890, exports in 1890 having been valued at £263,530,000, in 1894 at £216,194,000, and in 1895 at £226,169,000. “The cash value of our foreign trade is however, no guide to its real value or its profitableness. The United Kingdom is a consuming country, and it imports the greater portion of its food supplies, as w T ell as nearly the whole of the raw materials. These foodstuffs and raw materials are sent here in payment for purchases of British manufactured goods, for interest and profits upon capital due to Great Britain from producing nations, and for transports and other services ren¬ dered, consequently the lower the price for foodstuffs and AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 75 raw materials the greater will be the quantity required to be sent to this country to meet interest and other obligations, and to pay for other services rendered. Further, should prices of British goods not fall to an extent corresponding to the fall in prices of foreign and colonial produce, the profit on the sale of British goods to foreign countries and our colo¬ nies would be enhanced. The conditions of 1895 compared with both 1894 and 1890 have been that prices of foreign and colonial produce have been extremely low, and consequently a great deal more produce has had to be sent to this country in order to meet interest and other obligations. Further, prices of British manufactures exported have not fallen to an ex¬ tent corresponding to the decline in prices of foreign and colo¬ nial produce imported, and consequently the cash proceeds of our exports have purchased a relatively larger quantity of foreign and colonial produce. The cash value of our imports in 1895 was £416,687,000, but at the level of prices (of 1890) their value would have been no less than £507,100,000. The benefit to this country (Great Britain), therefore, from the fall in the prices of foreign and colonial produce in 1895 compared with 1890 thus amounted to the enormous sum of £90,400,000. On the other hand, our exports in 1895 were of the cash value of only £226,169,000, whereas at the prices of 1890 the value would have been £267,600,000, thus entailing a loss of £41,- 500,000, due to the fall in price. On balance, therefore, the fall in prices in 1895 compared with 1890 gave a profit to this country amounting to about £49,000,000 ($245,000,000). “We compare below the actual cash value of our imports in 1895 with what the value would have been at the prices current in 1894 and 1890: At prices of 1890.($2,535,500,000) £507,100,000 At prices of 1894.($2,169,255,000) £433,851,000 At prices of 1895.($2,083,435,000) £416,687,000 “The profit to Great Britain from, a fall in prices, £90,400,000, or $447,000,000. “Below we give the value of our exports in 1895 compared with what the value would have been at the prices current in 1894 and 1890: At prices of 1890.($1,338,190,000) £267,638,000 At prices of 1894.($1,174,010,000) £234,802,000 At prices of 1895.($1,133,435,000) £226,169,000 “The loss to Great Britain by fall of exports, £41,469,000, or $207,345,000. “A net gain to Great Britain from excess of fall of prices of imports over the fall in the price of her exports, amounting to about £48,000,000, or $240,000,000 in the single year 1895.” In order to maintain the position as the creditor nation of the world, lending gold, Great Britain must be a gold- producing nation; she must replenish her stock of gold; therefore, Great Britain has not only developed the gold 76 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT mines of her colonies, but she has stolen, and is to-day engaged in stealing every gold-producing nation, by one pretext or another, that she is permitted to. At present she is trying to steal the gold-producing portions of Venezuela, and is even endeavoring to steal some of the rich gold-producing part of our own Alaska. Rather than let her get another foot of American soil, we should drive her off the Continent at the point of the bayonet. It is the policy of Great Britain to encourage the produc¬ tion of gold, and discourage the production of silver, be¬ cause she is a gold lending nation, but not a silver-pro¬ ducing one. Owning and controlling the supply of redemption money, gold, Great Britain can, at her will, to suit her own purposes, make money scarce, and prices low. Gold monometallism gives Great Britain peculiar ad¬ vantages over her commercial rivals, whom she can seri¬ ously cripple by demanding the payment of their gold bonds on short notice, thus impairing their credit. This policy contracts the currency, and depresses the indus¬ tries of her competitors, and before they can recover, creates a market for British goods. In her commerce with silver nations, such as India, Japan and the South American nations, Great Britain sells her manufactures for gold, or for silver at its gold valua¬ tion, and buys their products for silver at its face value, thus pocketing the difference between the bullion and the coinage value of silver. The financial, commercial and political policy of Great Britain is controlled by the Rothschilds, who own her, be¬ cause they own her gold. Said Rothschild at the Brus¬ sels Conference: “Bimetallism for England is an abso¬ lute impossibility.” Gladstone expresses the sentiment of the British Government, when he declared in Parliament: “The world owes us ten billion dollars. I think under these circumstances it is a rather serious matter to ask this country to consider whether w T e are going to perform this supreme act of self-sacrifice. We have nothing to pay them; we are not debtors at all; we should get no comfort, no consolation out of this substitution of an inferior material, of a cheaper metal which we can obtain for less, and part with for more. We AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 77 should get no consolation, but the consolation .throughout the world would be great.” Though the Rothschilds forced Great Britain to adopt the single gold standard in 1816, 30 years before she be¬ came a free trade nation, it is proven by experience that gold monometallism has been her bulwark of protection against the evils of the free trade system. For years Great Britain has been engaged in a terrific industrial struggle with other nations, a struggle between free trade and protection. Protective tariffs have greatly dimin¬ ished the foreign market for British goods. The United States and the European nations have ceased to be the consumers of Britain; they have become her competitors. These nations are both industrially and commercially independent; Great Britain is not, therefore she possesses no power to industrially retaliate; she must continue to import her raw materials and her foodstuffs. If the for¬ eign market for her manufactures is lessened or destroyed she is helpless. The protective nations with whom she trades, in the five years, 1880 to 1885, inclusive, had the enormous balance of trade against her of $7,000,000,000. No nation could long stand such a tremendous deple¬ tion of its wealth; there must be some counteracting in¬ flow. What is it? Though Great Britain cannot stop or diminish her importations, the single gold standard en¬ ables her to reduce the price of such importations fully one-half, by making money scarce and products cheap. As Giffen says, Great Britain gets back money which because of its growing scarcity buys more than the money she loaned; both the principal and interest on these gold loans are returnable in gold, which is steadily appreciat¬ ing in value. The world annually produces an average of $130,000,- 000 of gold, nearly 80 per cent, of which some authorities hold, is used in the arts, leaving only 20 per cent, to be added to the stock of money, and this 20 per cent, is, or quite required to restore the loss coins have lost by usage, thus the stock of money is practically not increased. The world annually pays Great Britain more than $600,- 000,000 in gold as interest on the debt it owes her, or pays it in products at their gold price, which is five times the 78 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT amount of the yearly output of all the gold mines in the world. The United States alone pays Great Britain fully $200,- 000,000 a year as interest on the debt that it owes her, in gold or its equivalent in products, which is more than half a million a day. The ocean carrying trade, yearly yields Great Britain in its freights hundreds of millions of dollars; she gets . from us nearly if not quite $250,000,000 per annum. The freights, the appreciation of her loans under gold mono¬ metallism, and the balance of trade in her favor with silver-producing countries more than offsets the losses Great Britain sustains in her commerce with protective nations. Without the gold standard, Great Britain would soon succumb to the tariff warfare waged against her, though gold monometallism is partly the cause for high tariffs. No wonder Gladstone said, that the consolation through¬ out the world would be great, if his country gave up the single gold standard. Yet gold monometallism is not an unmixed blessing to Great Britain, for while it gives her great advantages, it also threatens her destruction. The supply of gold is utterly insufficient for the world’s needs. Goschen says: “A campaign against silver would be extremely dangerous for even countries with a gold standard. If all nations should adopt the single gold standard, there would not be suffi¬ cient gold for the purpose without a tremendous crisis.” Great Britain is to-day between two fires; if the value of silver continues to falfr she will not only lose her for¬ eign market, she will not only lose a large part of her textile and other manufactures, but she will at the same time be obliged to pay enhanced prices for all her im¬ portations from silver countries whose manufactures and industries have been encouraged by the silver standard. While on the other hand, if the value of silver rises, even if she can retain her foreign markets, she will be compelled to pay double prices for all she buys/ lose the margin she now gets between the market and coin value of silver, lose perhaps a large portion of her foreign trade with silver countries to a bimetallic manufacturing rival AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 79 like the United States, but additionally be compelled to lose one-half of all the ten billion dollars the world owes her by getting it back in money which only buys half as much as the money she loaned after the competition of silver has knocked all the premium out of gold. Great Britain has sprung her own death trap, her very existence is at stake, and either move silver makes, whether up or down, she is damned. Most of the British foreign trade is with silver coun¬ tries, that as a direct result of the single gold standard, gives double prices for imported goods in their money, and get only half price in their money for all they sell that is export. India and Japan therefore are ceasing to be her con¬ sumers, and are rapidly becoming her powerful com¬ petitors, especially in textile goods, such as silks and cot¬ tons. These nations possess the immense advantage of even Great Britain in having not only vastly cheaper labor, as measured in money, but even that vast differ¬ ence is doubled when their money is taken for only half its value. Japanese cotton laborers, men, get 18 and 20 cents a day in their money for the same work that the British laborer gets 75 cents and $1, and that money is worth only one-half its value in gold, so that in reality the Brit¬ ish laborer competes with laborers who get only 8 and 10 cents a day. Thus the beauties of cheap labor, and the free trade doctrine of the blessings of cheap goods is likely to come home to roost in free trade England in retribution for her activity in extending her trade. The gold standard is barring out imports from all sil¬ ver countries, but stimulating the exports of those coun¬ tries. Foreign goods are being imitated, foreign trade marks duplicated, thus destroying the Japanese market for all foreign, though chiefly British commodities. Brit¬ ish manufacturers are leaving England, and removing to India, China and Tapan. “The first cotton mill was erected in Japan in 1863 with 5,456 spindles. In 1883 there were 16 mills with 43,700 spin¬ dles. In 1894 there were 46 mills with 505,419 spindles. There have been seven new mills with 160,000 spindles already added this year (1895) and several more are nearing completion, 80 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT which will bring the number of spindles up to 711,000 before January 1, 1896. The 40 mills in the city of Osaka in 1894 paid an average dividend of 16 per cent. The highest was 28 and the lowest was 8 per cent.; the difference was due to management. The yarn mills pay the best."’—William E. Curtis, Special Correspondent from Japan for the Chicago Record. It thus appears how the silver standard is “ruining” Japanese industry, the dividends being from 8 up to 28 per cent., while under the gold standard in the United States, the manufacturers realized in 1892 about 4 per cent, profit. Not only will Japan and India supply all their own needs in the near future, but threaten to compete with European nations and the United States in the markets of the world. Already Japanese competition has alarmed our manufacturers. China is likely to become her own manufacturer of cotton goods at an early date. Eng¬ land’s foreign commerce with these silver countries will be destroyed, and with her commerce will go her mari¬ time supremacy. At the same time the development of these countries will create a home demand for foodstuffs and raw mate¬ rials, that will oblige England to pay far higher prices for them than she now does. England cannot procure cheap wheat from India when it commands a higher price at home, nor can she get cheap cotton when Japan will pay better prices for it; wool will also cost her more then than now, because higher prices can be obtained in the home factories, where the market exists, into which England cannot get entrance. Such are the dangers that a fall in the value of silver involves for Great Britain. Great Britain is also confronted by the imminent and fearful danger that some great bimetallic manufacturing nation, like the United States, will, by restoring bimetal¬ lism, raise the value both of silver, and of all the imports that England is compelled to buy, thus capturing the markets of these silver producing, silver standard coun¬ tries, involving both maritime and financial supremacy. Additional to these losses Great Britain would also lose half the debt the world owes her. AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 81 America is for bimetallism, and within less than a year after she adopted it, Great Britain would be compelled to follow. “We are the greatest of all the producers of silver. About 40 per cent, of the world’s supply of silver comes from our mines. We must therefore gain a special advantage from the restoration of silver to its ancient place as the coordinate of gold. All Asia and nearly if not quite all Latin America are silver countries. On the west we face Asia, as on the east we face Europe, and Latin America is within our hemisphere, with trade that is certain to be mastered by us, if we act wisely. No gold monometallic nation can maintain commer¬ cial relations with silver monometallic nations, so easily as the latter can trade with one another. If all hope of diverg¬ ence from the gold standard shall disappear, the possibility that we can overthrow British supremacy in the silver using nations will also disappear. Englishmen have not failed to appreciate this fact, and it may perhaps partly account for their strong eagerness that we shall abandon silver.”—The New York Press, in 1893. This paper has a keen perception of the reality of our position, and of our exceptional opportunity for national aggrandizement. Geographically, our Nation occupies the position of destined commercial, financial and political dictatorship; and the hour of destiny is the present moment. Eventually, the development of these silver-producing countries, would create such a market for silver money, while reducing the use of European gold, by destroying the market for European exports, that the values of gold and silver would balance. Such a result, remote as it might prove, would only inflict greater injury on the gold countries, and confer greater advantage and benefit on silver standard countries. CHAPTER XVII. THE POSITION OF THE UNITED STATES; OUR SILVER COM¬ PETITORS. It now becomes indispensable to review the industrial and financial position of the United States at the present day, before proceeding to consider the means of alleviat¬ ing the distress and removing the danger that exists. Naturally the interests of the United States, which is both a gold and silver producing nation, are best promoted 82 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT by the unrestricted use of both metals as money. The greater the volume of money in this country, the higher will be the price of our products; the higher prices and wages are, the easier it will be to pay our debts. Unless an enlarged demand accompanies an increased production of commodities, their prices will fall. The destruction of half the supply of money, increasing the use of the remaining half, which has to do double work, ap¬ preciates money as much as it depresses prices. Legis¬ lation should enlarge the volume of money so as to re¬ sist this fall in prices due to overproduction, instead of diminishing the volume of money and aggravating the tendency to reduce prices. In the 20 years preceding 1873, though production steadily increased in the United States, prices rose 20 per cent., but during the period 1873 to 1879, though production increased at no greater ratio, prices fell 30 per cent., thus we lost in five years more than we gained in the preceding twenty. This has not been due solely to diminished cost of production, for the price of real estate fell as much almost as products. The fall in prices due to a shrinkage in the volume of money, has fallen principally upon the farmers, more upon them than upon the manufacturers* who could buy their raw material in the cheapest market, thus shifting the loss upon others, which the farmers could not do. The clearest demonstration of the fact that the demone¬ tization of silver has appreciated gold, that is, forced it to a premium, is that the “50-cent” Mexican dollar now buys as much produce as the 100-cent gold dollar did in 1873, while the gold dollar now buys twice as much as it did then, thus disclosing the fact that silver buys as much of everything, gold alone excepted, as it ever did, while gold buys twice as much of everything, silver in¬ cluded, as it did prior to the legislation of 1873. Silver dollars are therefore worth 50 cents in gold, but 100 cents in everything else. The gold dollar, however, is worth 200 cents in everything else but itself, in other words, gold is equal in value 1 to itself. So is everything else. The demonetization of silver has produced two great results, important because pernicious: First, it has ap¬ preciated gold which reduced by one-half the selling price AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 83 of all products, in gold standard countries, diminishing the earning capacity of producers and laborers, diminish¬ ing the home market and impoverishing the country. Second, it has closed the ports of silver countries, in¬ dustrially developing those countries and increasing their exports of competitive goods. Gold monometallism has destroyed those silver nations as our consumers; it has created them our competitors. The gold standard has decreased profits; it has increased debts. The higher the value of gold has risen, the lower the price of products has fallen. The higher gold has risen, the more silver it would exchange for, with which the same amount of the products of silver countries could be procured at their silver valuation as formerly. If the value of 'the imports of these silver countries would fall proportionately to the fall in the value of their exports the silver countries would not sustain the loss that the actual results of gold monometallism has inflicted. But they have not fallen proportionately. The value of Japanese, Indian, or Mexican silver, in gold countries, has fallen 50 per cent., thus requiring the exchange of $100,000 of their money for only $50,000 American or British money which will buy goods that have fallen only 40 per cent in value. Instead of exchanging for $100,000 worth of goods as formerly, these goods now cost him $60,000, so that he is forced to send $20,000 more of silver money, or $10,000 more of gold money in order to get these goods. But the $50,000 gold will exchange for $100,000 of silver money which will buy $100,000 worth of silver products. Thus these countries lose both in buy¬ ing and selling. Rather than suffer this loss, these silver nations have begun to manufacture for themselves, thus closing their ports to the wares of gold countries, becom¬ ing our competitors. No protective tariff has ever proven so invigorating to the industry of countries on a silver basis, as has gold monometallism. It costs about 8 cents a pound to raise Mexican coffee, which is sold for an average price of 18 cents a pound in New York and Liverpool. The Mex¬ ican producer apparently realizes a profit of 10 cents a pound, but in reality he gets much more, for the 18 cents 84 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT in gold when he gets exchanges for 36 cents in “cheap silver/’ which allows him a profit of 28 cents a pound. Mexico, to-day, offers more inducements to labor and capital than the United States. The developments of these silver countries which began about 1873 and has progressed steadily ever since, has progressed wonderfully since the closing of the East In¬ dian mints on June 26, 1893, which reduced the value of silver from 83 to about 63 cents an ounce, or about 25 per cent. This caused the value of the exports of silver .countries to fall more rapidly than the imports increased their losses in foreign trade, thus stimulating domestic manufacturing. In 1873 the number of cotton spindles in Bombay, India, was 450,000; in 1886 they had increased to 1,700,- 000; in 1894 to 4,000,000. In 1874 India exported to Japan and China 3,000 bales of cotton goods; in 1886 220,000 bales. To Europe and England India was selling about 1,000,000 bales annually, and is to-day not only sup¬ plying her own needs, but competing with England. British capital is investing in cotton manufacturing in India, where it will buy twice as much as at home, and where labor is cheaper. India exported less than 1,000,000 bushels of wheat in 1873; ln *886 she exported 40,000,000 bushels; in 1891 over 50,000,000 bushels. This increased exportation is not due to the Suez Canal diminishing the cost of trans¬ portation, for the cost of transportation from the United States to England has fallen vastly more, yet the exporta¬ tion of American wheat has fallen from 150,000,000 bush¬ els, in 1881, to only 55,000,000 bushels in 1891. This re¬ duced cost of transportation of American wheat from 1873 to 1886 was 26 cents a bushel, yet the price fell over 70 cents a bushel, showing that its fall is not due entirely to decreased freights. Our farmers are forced to meet this cheap competition, which is grinding them into poverty. The price of the surplus fixes the price of the whole crop. This surplus we are forced to sell to Europe and will continue to do so under the gold standard for years to come at ruinous prices. Our farmers must not only sell at the prices AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 85 asked for Indian wh'eat now, but we must sell lower than they can possibly do. Our farmers now get 50 cents a bushel; they may expect to sell it for 25 cents if prices continue to fall as they must under a shrinkage of the vol¬ ume of money. They cannot buy as high-price goods or as many from our manufacturers, as if they got upward of a dollar for their wheat. A blow at our farmers is therefore a blow at our manufacturers, and through them at our labor, which must accept lower wages. There is a limit to endurance, a limit to submission: Coxey armies are premonitory of trouble. The result of the demohetization of silver is not only to destroy our foreign market, but to also threaten our home market with the invasion of cheap goods from the silver countries. Protection alone will not suffice; taxation will not retard the industrial development of the silver nations; taxation will not raise the value of silver if it is not remonetized; taxation will not threaten the creditorship of Great Britain. Because Protection will not arrest the downward ten¬ dency of prices; because it will not check the competition of these silver nations it will not even save our home mar¬ ket from their invasion. So long as the value of silver continues to fall more rapidly than the price of commodi¬ ties falls in this country, it will not prevent the importa¬ tion of Japanese goods. If the present low price of products is due to overpro¬ duction, which the gold advocates assert, protection, which increases production, augments the existing sur- " plus, will not prove a remedy, but a curse. But the fall of prices is due, not to overproduction, but to the appre¬ ciation of gold. Any measure that fails to destroy the premium on gold by remonetizing silver and putting it into competition with gold will prove at best only a pallia¬ tive. The disease demands a cure. Protection, unaccompanied by the remonetization of silver, would aggravate the evil, for the reason that the result of protection is to increase industry, which increases the demand for money, which would increase the use of gold and send it to a higher premium than it now com¬ mands. Thus the Protective system, under the gold 86 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT standard, involves the baneful power to reduce the price of property, products and wages by other means than in¬ creasing the supply. Let not the Republican Party imagine that the present troubles is due to a lack of revenue; that may effect the Government, but it has no relation to our industrial de¬ pression. The party must face the question; it must give both bimetallism and protection in order to restore pros¬ perity, else it will be hurled from power, if it attains it. More money is needed; more money must be had; the bondholder has been pampered long enough; the people now require legislation. CHAPTER XVIII. CAN WE GO IT ALONE? Millions of citizens of this great Republic, the greatest Nation on earth, fail to understand why our Nation, with a population of 70,000,000, cannot adopt any kind of a monetary system it desires, without first obtaining the consent of European powers, just as readily and just as successfully as our Nation did when it had a popula¬ tion of only 3,000,000, or less than the population of the single state of New York, Pennsylvania or Illinois. Our people do not believe that there is any greater reason why we should await European assistance to adopt our own financial system because they have a gold stand¬ ard, than we should abandon Republican institutions because they have not yet decided to relinquish their monarchical system. The spirit of Americanism is rising; those who believe that we should do as we please, adopt any policy or sys¬ tem we choose, independently, regardless of what other nations may or may not do are becoming daily more numerous; thousands would support the platform of in¬ dependent action, for no other reason than their convic¬ tion that we are not free unless we act so, and that we should manifest our independence by taking such ac¬ tion. In fact, the only class that affects to disbelieve our ability to establish independent bimetallism, is the very AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 87 class that most dreads its success; that class is the creditor class. “The responsibility of re-establishing silver in its ancient and honorable place as money in Europe and America de¬ volves really on the Congress of the United States. If we act here with prudence, wisdom and firmness we shall not only successfully remonetize silver and bring it into general use as money in our country, but the influence of our example will be potential among all European nations, with the pos¬ sible exception of England. Indeed, our national indebtedness to Europe is so great that if we have the right to pay it in silver we necessarily coerce those nations by the strongest of all forces—self-interest—to aid us in upholding the value of silver as money.”—James G. Blaine, in the United States Senate, in 1878. It thus is evident that Blaine had confidence in the ability ’of the United States to remonetize silver, and to coerce other nations to remonetize it; he believed that our Nation should take the initiative, and let other nations follow. Do we possess the choice as debtors under the Con¬ stitution to pay in what kind of legal money we prefer? The Constitution has declared that both gold and silver shall be money, legal tender for all debts, public and private. The Supreme Court of the United States has decided that greenbacks were legal tender money. By the authority of the fundamental law of the Republic, sanc¬ tioned by the highest tribunal in the land, we, as citizens have the right as debtors to choose the kind of money we shall pay to our creditors, who are our fellow-citizens, and since foreigners have no rights superior to our own citizens they cannot require us to violate our Constitution by depriving us as debtors of that right of choice. No court in the land could compel a citizen of this country to pay his debts in gold, if he prefers and finds it more convenient to pay it in silver or paper. The United States owes Europe fully $5,000,000,000, which it can pay in either gold or silver or paper, in anything that is legal tender money in this country, even when by the terms of the bonds they be made payable in gold. Any Congressional law that violates the spirit and 88 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT the letter of the Constitution by limiting the legal tender quality of money is null and void, and any contract that requires that a debt be payable in any specified kind of money, even if the debtor under the stress of circum¬ stances or otherwise, consents to it, is not a contract, be¬ cause not for a legal consideration; it is null and void as to that provision, that deprives the debtor of his choice of metals at the time of payment. Europe can take our silver or paper money, in pay¬ ment for the bonds they hold, else take nothing, for we have the right to tender any lawful money of this coun¬ try. And if, after accepting silver in payment of our in¬ debtedness, they allow it to go to a discount, they do so at their own loss; if, after taking our silver dollars they allow them to fall in value to 80, 50 or 20 cents each, they merely do so at their own expense* we can stand it if they can. If they repay us in those same depreciated silver dol¬ lars at a discount we merely get higher prices for our products than we expected, thus commensurately aug¬ menting our profits and enriching our Nation. We can force Europe to take the kind of money we prefer to pay our bonds in, else take nothing. After the payment of our foreign debt Europe dares not let such money, whether silver or paper, go to a discount of one single cent. As we owe most of our foreign debt to Great Britain, we possess more opportunity and power to coerce her than any other European nation. If in trade European nations refused to accept any money save gold, they would diminish their market, for they make nothing which the ingenuity of our laborers cannot duplicate and improve upon in quality. Our Nation and its citizens have the sovereign right to pay in the money they wish, and possess the coercive power to which Blaine alluded. But the doubt largely prevails that while silver can be remonetized by inter¬ national agreement between the leading nations the United States alone, cannot against all the other great AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 89 nations succeed, and that to attempt it would produce our financial ruin and destruction. The ability of the United States adverse to the policy of other nations, or without their aid, to remonetize sil¬ ver, depends upon our ability to fix the value of silver the wide world over. If our Congress can by its fiat fix the ratio between gold and silver at 16 to i, thus making the silver dollar consist of 371J grains of pure silver, and the gold dollar consist of 23.2 grains pure, then the legal ratio of gold and silver will be fixed at 16 to 1 all the world over, and the value of both metals determined by the value required at the American mints. If the United States can alone fix the legal ratio at 16 to 1 all the world over, then it can control the com¬ mercial ratio, which is governed by it, for no owner of silver bullion will give more than 16 ounces of silver for one of gold in other countries, when he can get an ounce of gold for precisely 16 ounces of silver in the United States. For the market price to differ from our mint valuation of silver, would be to undervalue silver and force it to come to us. If after our Congress has admitted gold and silver to unlimited free coinage at the ratio of 16 to 1, a variance exists then between the legal and commercial ratio or between the American and Foreign legal ratios, gold would, being slightly undervalued in this country, go to Europe, as it did when there was a difference of 3 per cent, between the American and French ratios. Now, if after the free coinage of silver by our Govern¬ ment the present difference of 50 per cent, existed between the value of our gold and silver dollars, we would lose our gold, but gain silver. While this, result would not occur, still many are con¬ vinced that it would, and that unless the remonetization of silver can be secured by international agreement they are opposed, true friends of silver though they are, to the independent free coinage Of silver by the United States. These thousands think, as many other thousands do, that the free coinage of silver by us now when silver is only worth “50 cents” would drive all of our gold out of the country and produce a panic, and such direful results 90 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT they earnestly seek to avoid. The support of these men can never be won, until the silver in a silver dollar be worth ioo cents in the open market. This cry of the “50-cent dollar,” “cheap money” and “honest money” constitutes the sole strength almost of the so-called “sound money” cause in the United States. The people are being misled by a subsidized press and by purchased talent. The first object of the bimetallists should be to dislodge the gold men from this false and misleading position; they can never be driven from that strategic point until they are deprived of these arguments by making the silver dollar worth 100 cents in the open market, making its legal and commercial value the same. How can this be accomplished? By making the dollar contain more silver than it does at present? Certainly not, for that plan is too absurd and unreliable to merit serious consideration; suppose the amount of silver in a dollar be doubled, with silver worth 64 cents in the mar¬ ket, say the moment it was coined free and used as re¬ demption money, its value would rise to something above 64 cents, say 80 cents, which would necessitate the re¬ coinage of all silver coins, because they would then be worth more in the bullion than in the coin. The result would be that until silver reached its real value, $1.29 an ounce, if this plan be adopted, its value would be con¬ stantly rising in proportion to its increased use, causing the constant recoinage of all silver coins. If the silver advocates can first make the silver in a dollar worth 100 cents in the open market, then they can readily rout the gold men and destroy all opposition to its remonetization. America could then go it alone with¬ out any danger. But the silver men tell us that the present low price of silver is the direct result of demonetization, and that its free coinage would make the silver dollar worth 100 cents. That is perfectly true in theory, and no doubt expe¬ rience would demonstrate it to be perfectly true in fact, but thousands do not believe it, and what’s more, cannot be AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 91 made to believe it, before actual experience proves it to be correct. The remonetization of silver, if it can be successfully accomplished by the United States independently, would be productive of great advantage and prosperity, but if unsuccessful, it is difficult to estimate just how much dis¬ aster the attempt might entail. Millions fear that it would be a dangerous experiment, one not to be adopted save as a last desperate measure. To coin it free now might produce a panic, for it is not necessary that the danger men apprehend be actual, but that the fear they entertain be genuine, and controls their actions; the mere fear, groundless as in reality it might prove to be may cause a monetary convulsion. An act that incites apprehension must above all things be avoided, for we cannot afford to shake public confi¬ dence, disturb business, lose our gold or frighten away European capital seeking investment here, for we need and desire all the money we can get, and don’t propose to lose a cent if we can help it. Is there not some policy that will prove transitional, that is, one that will gradually, swiftly, yet safely reduce the value of gold and advance the value of silver so that their values will exactly balance; a transitional policy that will change prices of property from a low to a high level? Such a policy must be found before silver can be re¬ monetized without awakening apprehension, disturbing business and causing a financial convulsion. Can such a policy be found? First make the silver dol¬ lar worth ioo cents before silver is admitted to free, un¬ limited coinage. But free silver advocates declare that we cannot make the silver in a dollar worth ioo cents, before first ad¬ mitting it to unlimited free coinage. The ability of the United States to fix the ratio of silver and gold anywhere and everywhere in the world at 16 to I; that is, fix the value of silver absolutely at $1.29 an ounce, depends entirely upon whether our country is capable of actively using in its commerce all the SURPLUS SIL¬ VER in the world, but not all the silver in the world. We have a home market whose value is $70,000,000,- 92 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT ooo a year; we could actively use every dollar of the $8,- 000,000,000 gold and silver in the world, for even if our present demand be not equal to so great a volume of money, it would soon become so, because an increased supply of money always increases business activity and the demand for money. But all of the $4,000,000,000 of silver, the world’s stock of that metal would not come to us, for the silver countries could not, and would not part with it except in exchange for products of this country, which*would greatly benefit us, and vastly augment our wealth and prosperity; if India, China, Mexico, Japan or South America gave us their money at a discount in exchange for our products they would increase our profits and their expenses; cer¬ tainly they would not make us a present of their money. Of the $2,870,000,000 legal tender silver money outside the United States $950,000,000 is in India; $750,000,000 in China, $115,000,000 in the Straights Settlements and $68,000,000 in Japan, making $1,983,000,000. These countries have a population of 800,000,000, or $2.50 per capita. European Nations need and use every dollar of silver they possess as subsidiary money, amounting to $630,- 000,000, or $1,000,000,000 of full legal tender silver money, therefore they would not flood our country with it, they could not do so except at a great loss, for silver in this country would be worth in coin and bullion only $1.29 an ounce, while in Europe it is coined on an average, at a value per ounce of from $1.32 up to $1.47. The very fact that has for years prevented the melting of our silver dollars which are worth in the coin 100 cents into bullion which is worth only about 60 cents, prevents and would prevent were we to coin silver free these Euro¬ pean silver coins from being melted into bullion in order to recoin them into American coins at a much lower value. In addition to this difference in their face value, these European silver coins have lost considerable weight by usage, which if melted into bullion for recoinage into our money would pass only at the value of the bullion which would be $1.29 an ounce, losing value because of their AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 93 light weight. Europe will not make us a gift of her sil¬ ver; she owes us no debt, for she is our creditor; she can exchange it for our products at its weight in pure metal, entailing a loss, or increasing our profit if she, allows it to go to a discount and exchanges it for our exports. Thus, if the United States undertook to coin silver free in unlimited quantities independent of the action of other nations, no silver would, or could come to this country but the surplus silver of the world, which probably now, as it probably never did, does not exceed 60,000,000 ounces per year at the highest figure, and probably considerably less, which is a volume so small that we can readily fix its value, and by fixing the value of the surplus silver, we can fix the value of all the silver in the world. In 1894 the world’s product of silver was 168,000,000 ounces, of which 87,000,000 ounces were coined in the different countries; 21,000,000 ounces used in the arts, leaving a surplus of only 60,000,000 ounces. If we can use this surplus silver in our commerce, we can make its coin and bullion value precisely the same, because the market value of money is controlled by its coinage value. If the United States can make the coinage and market values of silver the same, if it can make the legal ratio of gold and silver 16 to 1, then it can maintain the parity of gold and silver at that ratio all over the world, neither silver nor gold would be overvalued or undervalued in this country, neither would leave us, but both would re¬ main in concurrent circulation in this country, because they would be equal in value. Neither gold nor silver would leave us because in foreign countries they would not be worth one cent more than they would be here. But can we use all the surplus silver? Mexico fails because she is not industrially and com¬ mercially strong enough to use all of this surplus. France and the Latin Union were able for 70 years after they changed the ratio, to maintain the value of silver and gold at that ratio because they could use all of it. The United States is to-day industrially and commer¬ cially far more powerful than those countries unitedly ever were, or in fact are now. 04 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT America can do anything, but she would not be un¬ supported in this struggle to remonetize silver, for she would have the support of India, Japan, Mexico, South America, France, the Latin Union and all silver countries, who would gladly assist in maintaining the value of their own money. The coinage of the American product of the silver mines is suggested by some as a remedy, but the coinage of our silver would be insufficient; the coinage and market value of silver that has been produced in the United States, and protected from competition with foreign silver by tariff duties, would be the same, for there would be no surplus in this country, what the arts did not use, our mints would coin as money; but outside of the United States there would be no monetary demand for silver, that is, no coinage of it, so that what the arts did not consume would be surplus, for the mints would not coin it; in the United States the legal and market values, the legal and market .ratios of gold and silver would be ex¬ actly the same, but outside of the United States their val¬ ues, and ratios would not be the same. The surplus silver on the foreign market for which there would be no demand would depress its market price and cause it to differ from its coin value. It is only by opening our mints to the unlimited free coinage of all the silver of the whole world that the United States can control the ratio of silver and gold, for it must fix the value of the surplus silver which would fix the value of all silver. The coinage of the American silver product by the United States would be impotent to thoroughly remonetize silver, because in¬ sufficient; it would remonetize silver in our country, but not in other countries; it would make its coin and bullion value the same in the United States, but in Europe silver would continue to be worth in gold only half its value. The pernicious result of such a law would be that while it would expand the volume of money in this country and increase our industrial activity, it would not open up and conquer for us the foreign markets from Great Britain, because it would not raise the value of silver bul¬ lion to $1.29 an ounce in Europe, as it would do in this country; because it would not double the value of silver, AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 05 it would fail to double the value of British IMPORTS which is essential to crippling British commercial com¬ petition, and destroying the foreign markets of the silver countries for British goods; it would not gain for us the silver markets of the world by our refusal to remone¬ tize their money, taking it at its face value; as it would not capture for us their markets, it would also fail to gain for us the carrying trade of those countries, which is de¬ pendent upon whom they trade with; as it would not double, or even materially advance the low price of In¬ dian wheat, or Argentine wool, it would not lessen the drastic competition our farmers are now compelled, un¬ der the single gold standard, to meet; as it would continue the present gold valuation of silver money it would not retard the industrial development of India, Japan and other silver nations, nor diminish their competition which our manufacturers are already beginning to experience; as it would not reduce or destroy the premium on British gold, it would not affect the creditorship of Great Britain; as the coinage of the American product would not ac¬ complish the above results essential to forcing Europe to remonetize silver it would prove a failure, a makeshift, a delusion and a snare that the silver champions and the advocates of bimetallism should never consent to, nor al¬ low to become a law. If Congress can remonetize silver, great blessings would result from it, but if it failed, as is possible, though not probable, fearful disaster might follow. Is it possible to determine before admitting silver to un¬ limited free coinage whether the United States can use all the surplus silver of the world and gauge our ability thereby to fix the value of silver at $1.29 an ounce all over the world? If this fact can be ascertained before we attempt the unlimited free coinage of silver independently, we can tread on solid ground, possessing the certain knowledge that we can independently remonetize silver before we at¬ tempt it, that we can do so safely, successfully, swiftly, without risking our commerce or our confidence, to our own advantage and aggrandizement, then let us proudly, triumphantly remonetize it. 96 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT But if we ascertain by this same certain policy that we can not remonetize silver without the aid of other na¬ tions, we can avoid the danger involved, risk not a single penny, jeopardize neither our confidence nor our com¬ merce, drive no money out of the country, nor frighten any away, but calmly wait until we can either get assist¬ ance or until we can remonetize silver alone. Before disclosing how we can ascertain' whether we can independently remonetize silver, it is better first to demonstrate that no matter which party, or which faction wins at the polls this year, whether Republican, Demo¬ crat or Populist, whether gold or silver advocates, their . victory is almost certain to be partial and not complete, so that neither party or faction can get what it demands, and must compromise if they get anything at all. CHAPTER XIX. FRACTIONAL LEGISLATION IMPOSSIBLE. NOTHING CAN BE DONE. * The two old parties, the Republican and Democratic, are split wide open, hopelessly and helplessly divided on the financial question; their silver and gold wings will not unite on any straddle; unitedly either party might win, but divided, neither faction of either party can hope for victory except in a three-cornered fight. The Populists, or whatever the Third party may be called, is numerically too weak, without securing the sil¬ ver wings of either or both the old parties, to have any chance of success at the polls. What is to be done? The Eastern, and perhaps sev¬ eral of the Northern States can not be carried by either of the old parties on the independent free coinage of sil¬ ver; the Western, and perhaps most of the Southern States, can not be carried by International Agreement or any disgraceful straddle declaring for “gold, silver and paper money, one as good as the other, and all maintained on a parity with each other,” these States can be carried only on the platform that would lose the former class of States. The silver men are tired of the East promising to treat the metals equally and maintain them on a parity be- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 97 fore election and failing to do so after the victory is won, so they do not propose to accept anything but a flat-footed declaration one way or the other. The Democratic party has the two-thirds rule; unless the silver men can control two-thirds of the Convention they can neither dictate what the platform shall be, nor nominate the candidates, for the gold wing would merely have to have one delegate more than one-third of the number of delegates to the Convention in order to pre¬ vent the adoption of a silver platform and the nomination of silver candidates; the gold men also are at the same disadvantage, for unless they can control two-thirds of the delegates to the Convention that meets at Chicago, they can do nothing. If the Democratic Delegates to the Chicago Convention have the manhood and the backbone of the Democratic Delegates to the Charleston Convention of i860, the Democratic party will split, there will be two conventions, two candidates, or the silver and gold wings of the party will unite with the silver and gold wings of the other party. The Republican party is not embarrassed with the two- thirds rule, for the majority rule prevails in that party, but the prospect of a bitter, unyielding fight in the St. Louis Convention is just as certain to occur as it will in the Chicago Convention. Unless the silver men are cravens they will not yield, but will, unless a silver platform, with silver candidates be adopted and nominated, march out of that Conven¬ tion hall and unite with the silver men in the Democratic and Third party, adopt a platform and name candidates whom all can support. If the gold men of either party, on a gold platform or on an “honest money” platform, win at the polls next November, or in Congress, if the election fall into the hands of Congress, what can they do? Absolutely noth¬ ing, except by the consent of the silver men, for their victory can but be partial, it cannot possibly be complete ; they may secure the House and the Presidency, but the Senate will be silver beyond a shadow of a doubt, and no legislation can be enacted without the silver Senate THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT ••• V T - • _ N ■ * 1 98 first passes a free silver coinage law that meets with the President’s approval and becomes a law. The Eastern manufacturer may as well recognize now as then that the Wilson-Gorman Tariff Law cannot be repealed, that neither the McKinley Law or any other protective tariff law can take its place, unless a free coinage law be first permitted to be enacted. The Eastern manufacturer of shoes or pigiron or calico has no more rights as an American citizen under the Constitution and the Llag than the Western silver miner and farmer; neither is he entitled to any more solicitude, protection and encouragement than the other; and when the Eastern manufacturer who is so exact in his percep¬ tion of right charges that the silver miners have a class interest in the remonetization of silver by increasing their profits at the expense of the people, they should recall that they too have been subjected to the same suspicion, groundless and untrue as it is in both cases. The silver men have the government by the throat, and they intend to hold it so, until they secure the legis¬ lation they demand, which will not be obtained unless the unlikely result occurs of their securing complete power by having both the House and the Presidency. This, while it is not impossible, if all the silver men unite in one party, is most unlikely. If the silver men cannot control the whole Government what do they propose to take? They should not arouse the antagonism of all the people by preventing any legis¬ lation from being enacted, if there is any policy by which they can get the unlimited free coinage of silver inde¬ pendently of the action of other nations, yet in such a way as to absolutely secure sound money. The silver men are not willing either to take the coin¬ age of the American product, or of a limited amount, as under the Bland-Allison Law or the Sherman Law, because either is insufficient; they must accept either a compromise which in all cases is makeshift, else take nothing, for the ‘'sound money” faction will likely control either the House or the Presidency or both, and in any case prevent the passage of a free coinage law. Is there not a policy which, while it prevents either AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 99 faction from securing what it demands in the form it demands, gives them exactly what in substance they re¬ quire; a policy that is not a compromise, for each faction gets precisely the substance which each demands, but secures it in a form that all factions will consent to and support, a policy that the silver Senate could enact, which a “sound money” House would pass without amendment, and which a “sound money” President would sign, a policy which would ultimate inevitably in the independent unlimited free coinage of silver in a few days, weeks or months, while guaranteeing that the money will be “sound” and the silver dollar not worth “50 cents?” What is that policy, which no one, strange to say, simple as it is, has thus far suggested or advocated? It is the policy that furnishes the key to the problem. CHAPTER XX. THE KEY TO THE PROBLEM OF INDEPENDENT AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. Let the Congress of the United States enact that silver shall be admitted to unlimited free coinage, Europe agree¬ ing, or disagreeing, precisely the very moment that the silver in a silver dollar is worth 100 cents in the markets of this country. This law’ would determine before a dollar was coined whether we can maintain independent bimetallism; if we could not, foreign capital seeking investment here would not be frightened away, nor would our gold leave us to go to Europe, for the simple reason that no “cheap silver dollars” could be coined before they became ex¬ actly equal to the value of the gold dollar when it is worth only 100 cents; for what purpose would our gold leave us? It would not be worth a single cent more elsewhere than it would be worth here. If we find that we cannot fix the value of silver at $1.29 an ounce independently, that we cannot use all of the sur¬ plus silver in our commerce, thin let that promise remain on the statute book, and proceed, by other legislation, to so increase our ability to u«e all of it by National devel¬ opment, that we can u«i all of it, then coin it. 100 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT Business would remain undisturbed, for in the mean¬ time foreign capital would come here, enterprise would increase, and our prosperity would be greater and more generally diffused. Money always commands a higher rate of interest and secures greater returns when it is plentiful, when business is brisk, when there is need of it, than when it is scarce and industry languishing. It being assured that silver would not be coined free until worth its face value, European capital would come here, because it could earn more than elsewhere, and earning more here than it could earn elsewhere, it would stay here. This policy, if adopted by the advocates of silver and enacted into law, would dislodge the gold men from their false position of championing “honest money;” this policy would absolutely cut the dust out from under the feet of the advocates of the single gold standard, masquerading as “sound money” men. No silver dollars would be coined until they first be¬ came worth ioo cents; would any gold man dare oppose the passage of such a law? Would he dare to say that sil¬ ver dollars then would not be “honest money,” “sound money?” the law would require that such silver dollars be worth precisely ioo cents; would any advocate of the sin¬ gle gold standard have the hardihood to contend that the silver dollars should be worth MORE THAN ioo CENTS before it can be recognized as “honest money?” No honest man can object to the passage of such a law on the ground that it provides for “a depreciated currency,” that it will flood the country with “50-cent dollars;” he would have to either support it or declare himself openly an enemy of the people by advocating money DISHONESTLY HIGH. The silver men cannot logically oppose this policy which as certainly as the policy they advocate would re¬ monetize silver by securing the consent and support of the other faction, because they have repeatedly claimed that the passage of the Sherman law caused silver to rise from about 70 cents an ounce to $1.20; was still rising until it was ascertained that the silver money coined would not be treated as redemption money, after which it began AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 101 to fall. The advocates of bimetallism hold that the re¬ monetization of silver will undoubtedly restore the value of that metal to $1.29 an ounce just as soon as such a law is passed; that its value has invariably risen whenever the prospect of its complete or even its partial remonetization appeared bright; if this would be the result, is it not as logically true that its value would rise to its coinage value the moment a law is actually enacted that requires its un¬ limited free coinage whenever its bullion price reaches $1.29 an ounce? The silver men contend that the free coinage of silver would make its legal and market values the same for 371 £ grains, or 100 cents’worth; that the United States alone can fix the value of silver at that figure all the world over; then if those statements be correct, as they are, upon what ground can they object to enacting a law that requires its unlimited free coinage, the very moment it becomes “honest money;” that is, the moment its market and legal values become the same? Would not the absolute certainty of its full remonetiza¬ tion which the silver men say will produce such results, accomplish identically the same result? This policy presents several advantages over the one they champion, without sacrificing a particle of the prin¬ ciple they require to be recognized; in the first place, it shows the people that there would be no difference be¬ tween the market and legal values of silver under its free coinage, giving the silver miners no more profit than they now get, for the cost of labor and machinery would be doubled. In the second place, the rise in the value of silver to $1.29 an ounce will absolutely destroy the campaign cries of “honest money,” “sound money,” “cheap money,” and “50-cent dollars;” which constitute the strength of the so- called “sound money cause;” in the third place, this policy would destroy all effective opposition to the full remoneti¬ zation of silver by securing the support of many Congress¬ men who, while friends of silver now cannot be prevailed upon to vote for free coinage in the form it is now de~ manded; by securing the passage of such a law, which a President, whoever he may be, will not dare to veto. How 102 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT can the President explain why he vetoed a law that pro¬ vided for the unlimited free coinage of silver the moment it became “honest money,” the moment it became worth, in the bullion, ioo cents? “Sound money” men may argue, that if such a law was passed, the silver miners would merely “bull’ the value of silver until it became worth ioo cents, so that they could take 371J grains to the mints and get a dollar stamped upon it, for the reason that they would not sell in the market, to Rothschilds for less than $1.29 an ounce, when the United States Government would coin it at that value. These “sound money” advocates may contend that the silver miners will hold their silver bullion, shove the price up till it becomes “honest money,” in order to procure its free coinage, so as to enjoy a dishonest profit It is perfectly true that the silver miners will “bull” the value of silver until it reaches that value required for its coinage, but after securing its free coinage, after obtaining this alleged dishonest profit by finding a per¬ manent market for their bullion at the rate of 100 cents for 371J grains, would they take any less, would they let the value of silver fall a single cent, thus diminishing that dishonest profit? Most of the silver of the world is produced in the three countries, the United States, Mexico and Peru, so that a silver trust could readily “bull” the value of silver. There would be another factor that would powerfully contribute to the rise in the value of silver, if this law was enacted, the speculators beholding an opportunity to buy all the silver they could obtain in order to enjoy the rise in its value, would go into the market to pur¬ chase all the silver available, which the more they sought to get it, the higher its value would climb. The probabilities are that if that law requiring the free, unlimited coinage of silver the moment the silver in a dollar was worth 100 cents, the actions of the silver min¬ ers in holding it until its value reaches that figure, and the bidding of the speculators to get it, that they might get a profit before it did reach that value, would in the course of a few days, weeks or perhaps months at the AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 103 very outside, make it worth that value and thus obtain its coinage. This apparent rise in the value of silver could be greatly- assisted and expedited by the adoption of the following fiscal legislation. As has been shown, silver has not fallen, but gold has risen, therefore any measure that will destroy the premium on gold would actually reduce its value, while apparently advancing the value of silver, thus insuring its earlier free coinage. This promise of Congress to coin silver free as soon as it is worth ioo cents must be accompanied by other legislation that will maintain the parity of the two metals. Parity means equality, and no parity of the values of the two metals, gold and silver, is possible unless each metal has a parity, an equality of right, and a parity, an equality of use. Gold and silver are not treated equally when the mints are open to gold, but closed to silver; when gold is used to redeem all the bonds and certificates, and silver considered too worthless to perform that great function. Both gold and silver must be used as redemp¬ tion money, and both must be admitted to free coinage before they can be at a parity or maintained at it. Gold men claim that if silver is coined free in un¬ limited quantities that it would be impossible for our Government to maintain the metals at a parity, because it would not possess sufficient gold with which to redeem the silver. True enough, if that idiotic and infamous pol¬ icy was continued. Where did Congress or the Administration get the power or authority to treat silver as a mere promise to pay? The Constitution distinctly' declares that both gold and silver are money, good for all purposes and for all amounts, not a mere promise to pay money, but money. After first providing in this law to coin silver as soon as the metal in a dollar is worth ioo cents, Congress should enact that the law of 1873 be repealed forth will) and the bimetallic law of 1792 restored to force. Second—Congress should declare that both metals are legal tender for all debts and dues and must be treated without discrimination. 104 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT The people would exercise their constitutional right to pay in the cheaper metal, thereby destroying at once the premium now on gold. This decreased demand for the dearer, and this conse¬ quent demand for the cheaper money, would diminish the value of gold and advance the value of silver until their values exactly balanced. Oh, but the gold men tell us, to coin silver free and treat it as redemption money would cause gold to go to a premium. This is tantamount to contending that the competition between gold and silver would advance the value of one of the competitive metals. Gold is al¬ ready at a premium of at least ioo per cent.; it could scarcely command a higher premium than that under bimetallism. Third—Congress should enact that the Secretary of the Treasury be required to redeem all the bonds and coin certificates of the United States Government, in what at the time of their redemption happened to be the cheaper money. This would guarantee the equal use of'the two metals, for when equally treated and equally used, they must of necessity be of equal value. This law would be mandatory, the Secretary would be compelled to redeem the bonds and certificates in the cheaper money, and not have, as he is now given by existing laws, the option as to which he considers the more convenient metal, and conclude that the more con¬ venient metal is the one the Government must borrow and pay interest on, instead of the one, of which there are $370,000,000 in the Treasury vaults. Whenever Wall Street and the agents of the Roths¬ childs attempt to rob the United States Treasury of its gold by presenting immense sums of certificates for re¬ demption, the Treasury should be required to exercise the old-fashioned, common sense, stiff backboned method of redeeming them in silver. The Nation needs to-day an Andrew Jackson, a Young Hickory to curb, control and crush Wall Street as “Old Hickory” curbed and crushed the old United States Bank. When our National debt is paid, our National Bank cur¬ rency will disappear, thus contracting the volume of AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. T05 money. In their stead either other bank notes must be issued, involving the creation of a new debt by the sale of bonds, to which the people are always averse, or by issuing greenbacks and declaring them legal tender for all debts and dues. Retain the $346,000,000 of greenbacks now outstanding, and as the bank notes and coin cer¬ tificates are retired and canceled, issue greenbacks in their stead, dollar for dollar. Whenever the Government re¬ quires more money than the increase in metallic money supplies, let it issue greenbacks. Give the people Govern¬ ment money whose integrity and value depends upon the stability and existence of the Government, then the rich would have peculiar reasons for their loyalty in addition to the patriotism they may possess, for they would not seek to overthrow a Government whose destruction would destroy the value of their property. This would stop the “endless chain” system; to issue more bonds, and increase our National bank circulation will not improve matters, but increase burdens. Fourth—The $370,000,000 silver and the $100,000,000 gold dollars now kept in the Treasury vaults to redeem paper money should, after the retirement of outstanding certificates, and the substitution of greenbacks in their stead, be put into active circulation to quicken trade and * invigorate commerce. This would of itself increase prosperity, and since all money, gold, silver and greenbacks would then be money endowed with full legal tender qualities there would no longer be any reason to keep them out of circulation. Why should half a billion dollars be kept on the shelf when business demands it, and men are out of work and starving for the need of it? The very fact that half the money in a country is kept locked up to redeem the other half, discloses, the insanity of such a system, is evidence that more money is needed, else substitutes for it would not be resorted to. Fifth—Congress should empower the Treasury De¬ partment that whenever Europe manipulates the rates of exchange to get our gold or silver, to meet such changes by counteracting variations in the rates of our exchange. Sixth, and last—The number and capacity of our 106 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT mints should be increased so as to enable them, when the free coinage of silver is resumed to coin all the gold and silver of the world produced in a year within twelve months. Thus, at no time would there be any surplus silver or gold on the market to depress its price below the legal value. Should money get too plentiful in this country, its pur¬ chasing power would fall, and the selling price of commo¬ dities would rise, causing our money, temporarily at least, to leave us and to go to Europe, where, because being scarce, it would buy more than it could buy here. To prevent such an exodus of our surplus capital, it should be the policy of our Government to so increase the need and use of money in this country, by internal improvement and development, and by the extension of our foreign trade that we can use all of it and keep its purchasing power up to the proper point. • Free trade does not create new uses, and an increased demand for money in this country, therefore it is inimical to the full remonetization of silver. CHAPTER XXL FREE TRADE VS. FREE SILVER. Free trade is our royal road to ruin; it forges the fetters * of an endless tyranny for us because it increases the power of the nation that demonetized silver to perpetuate its demonetization. Four trials of it demonstrates that free trade destroys American manufacures and depresses our agriculture; that it forces us to buy British goods, to give Great Britain our gold, that it increases British prosperity and diminishes our own. The more foreign products we buy the less home prod¬ ucts we make; the less products we make, the less money we can use at home; the less money we can actively em¬ ploy here, the less able we are to maintain independent bimetallism. Let us do our own work, then we can make our own money. ^Free trade repels capital; protection attracts it. Free trade impoverishes the United States and en- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 107 riches Great Britain; protection enriches the United States and impoverishes Great Britain. Free trade increases the power of Great Britain to main¬ tain the single gold standard; protection diminishes her power to maintain that standard and increases our power to destroy it. The shibboleth free trade and free silver is supremely absurd, to secure the one compels us to lose the other. With what grace can the Democratic Party advocate free silver and free trade, it would involve Democratic leaders in an inextricable tangle. Advocating free trade they have for years been telling us that the protective tariffs has put prices UP 50 PER CENT. HIGHER than they were in 1873, then they tell us that during that same period the single gold standard has put prices DOWN 50 PER CENT. It is free trade vs. free silver; 50 per cent, up vs. 50 per cent. down. Which are the voters to be¬ lieve? Who would extricate the leaders from this Demo¬ cratic dilemma? It is not sufficient that the United States remonetize silver, our Nation must also force Europe to remonetize it. Great Britain can not be coerced into adopting bimetal¬ lism by increasing the volume of her exports; by de¬ creasing the price of her imports; by increasing her carry¬ ing trade; by increasing her creditorship, her wealth, and her power. Great Britain must be crippled, she must be crushed before she can be coerced. The demand for silver money in America can not be increased by the destruction of our manufactures. The more commodities we manufacture, the more money we can and must use. Yet free trade silverites confidently expect to force Great Britain to abandon gold monometallism by aug¬ menting her power to maintain it. They urge our adop¬ tion of free trade which increases the wealth and creditor- ship and power of Great Britain. Instead of destroying our manufactures, we must en¬ courage and develop them. Instead of impoverishing our country, we must enrich it. 108 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT Any satisfactory and permanent solution of the money problem must come from a party advocating protection to American industries in all its branches, protection to the American people, whether that party be the Republican party or a Nationalist party. CHAPTER XXII.- THE ATTITUDE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY ON BIMETALLISM. The Republican Party should be true to its traditions,, it must if it expects to keep close to the hearts of the people and command their support, follow the plume of their matchless leader, James G. Blaine, who declared in the United States Senate Chamber in 1878, during the Bland-Allison Debate: “I do not think that this country, holding so vast a pro¬ portion of the world’s supply of silver in its mountains and its mines, can afford to reduce that metal to the situation of mere merchandise. If silver ceases to be used as money in Europe and America, the great mines of the Pacific Slope will be closed and dead. Mining enterprises of the gigantic scale existing in this country cannot be carried on to provide backs for looking glasses and to manufacture cream pitchers and sugar bowls. A vast source of wealth to this entire country is destroyed the moment silver is permanently dis¬ used as money. It is for us to check that tendency and bring the continent of Europe back to the full recognition of the value of the metal as a medium of exchange.” From this it does not appear that Blaine thought that the United States should await the adoption of an inter¬ national agreement, but believed that we should, and that we could force Europe to remonetize silver. ‘‘What is the attitude of the Republican party toward the question? Beyond dispute the party is committed conclusively to the promotion of the joint use of both the precious metals. It is committed by-The fact (among others) that the Repub¬ lican party represents protection to American interests against European aggression. The Western farmer who is impover¬ ished by gold monometallism, the silver miner whose industry is injured by it, the cotton planter who has his debts enlarged by it, these men are our fellow-citizens. Their prosperity brings prosperity to the Nation. When they can buy, then the great manufacturing industries of the East have an in¬ satiable market. When they suffer, we suffer. When their products are exported at half their value or less, the Nation as a Nation is the victim of a kind of brigandage. The same devotion to our country’s welfare 'which compels the party to AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 109 resist British free trade urges it to oppose British gold mono¬ metallism. Both systems have a common origin. Both have a common purpose—to pluck and to plunder other nations for British advantage. The cause of the Western victims of the single gold standard is our cause. It is the cause of the Eastern manufacturer, who is menaced from the same source with British free trade. It is the cause of the Eastern mer¬ chant, who finds trade active only when the West is rich. The Republican party, then, must stand fast by bimetallism. It must be faithful to its declarations and its principles. It must be firmly allied to the West in the conflict now begun.” —The New York Press, in 1893. CHAPTER XXIII. PROTECTION IS ESSENTIAL TO THE SOLUTION OF THE MONEY PROBLEM. A victorious commercial, financial and political war¬ fare waged by the United States against Great Britain i$ the only possible solution of the vexed monetary prob¬ lem. The British people are not our enemies, they are in fact with us in this struggle which is every day becoming more imminent and certain. It is the Jewish Government of Great Britain which seeks by its financial policy to enslave the world, that is the foe which we must crush. The reign of those international pawnbrokers, the Rothschilds, must end, if the world is to be free. The United States now possesses both the power and the op¬ portunity to dictate the financial policy of Great Britain, to influence it to adopt bimetallism, else hurl the Com¬ mons from power, sweep the House of Lords out of ex¬ istence, and shake the very throne of Britain itself, if it attempts to prevent it. This is not visionary, this is not chimerical, but simple and easy. The United States, by striking British com¬ merce, by capturing its markets with silver nations which constitutes three-fourths, of her foreign commerce, can compel the British subjects to strike at their ballot boxes and force their Parliament to adopt the bimetallic sys¬ tem in order to recover their foreign trade which they would be fast losing. The United States, by maintaining the bimetallic stand- 110 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT ard, can secure the foreign trade of Mexico, Central and South America, India, Japan and China, in fact o'f every silver country on the globe which could buy their im- poits from us at the face value of their money, instead of being obliged to give, as they now do, $2 of their money to procure a dollars worth of British goods; by main¬ taining the bimetallic standard, our country can also cap¬ ture the carrying trade of those countries, for the carry¬ ing trade always follows commerce; by thus depriving Great Britain of most of her foreign markets upon which she depends for subsistence the United States can close the British factories, or depress British wages, in either event starve and force the British laborers into coercing their Parliament adopting the same monetary standard that we would possess in order to reopen their factories, to recover their trade, and procure bread. Their shipping would be prostrate and their sea power crippled, the need of a navy to protect her diminishing commerce would be lessened, and for every importation of foodstuffs and raw materials the British would be compelled to pay double the price they now give. In addition to the great blows struck at British power and prestige, she would as a result lose half of the $10,000,- 000,000 owed her, By the destruction of the premium on her gold. Thus the United States possesses the power to revolu¬ tionize either the British financial system or the British Government, and that, too, under the guise of commer¬ cial and financial competition. This is the hour of destiny; the hour which, while it threatens the greatest disaster in our history if the pres¬ ent financial system be adhered to, also promises the greatest opportunity for national development and ag¬ grandizement ever given the American Republic, by aoandoning that system and establishing the bimetallic standard. The American Republic to-day needs a man, brilliant, able and aggressive, a man fearless and true to the des¬ tiny of the Nation. It needs a Napoleon with his Berlin and Milan decrees, not enforced against British commerce and shipping by AMERICAN BIMETALLISM 111 blockade and bayonet, but made effectual by the advan¬ tages the difference in American and British monetary systems would give us in our relations with silver coun¬ tries. It needs a Blaine, with his policy of Protection, Reci¬ procity, and his brilliant foreign diplomacy, with his vast and matchless conception of a gigantic Pan-Amer¬ ican Federation. Protection and Reciprocity is what the Nation demands, for “Protection is defense, Reci¬ procity is conquest.” Were Blaine living, he would perceive what our other statesmen appear unable to see, that the demonetization of silver, silver money worth in gold countries only half its true value, gives to the United States an extraordi¬ nary opportunity to secure and hold the trade of all our sister American Republics by Reciprocity treaties based upon the recognition by our Nation of their silver money at its face value, provided it is of the same weight and fineness and denomination as our own, now, before this Nation is able to make the silver in our dollar worth ioo cents by the enactment of a law making its coinage com¬ pulsory as soon as it becomes worth that much. In return for accepting the silver money of Mexico and the South American Republics at its face value, which would enable them to buy twice as much with their dollars as British gold monometallism now allows them to do, these countries must negotiate Reciprocity treaties with our Government by which the products of this country, now imported by them from Europe, be admitted under such heavily discriminating duties as to shut out European importations, and give their trade to us. If in their trade with this country our Congress will make the silver money of those countries acceptable at its face value now, it will give those countries an in¬ ducement to buy of us, so that after our Nation succeeds in making our silver dollars worth ioo cents their trade would be held by the discriminative duties in our favor. Their money made legal tender, in their purchases of us they would receive in purchase of their exports As a permanent consideration of the trade advantages they give us, the products they sell and which we must 112 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT buy, we shall agree to buy of our sister Republics duty free, or under discriminating duties, provided the same be imported in American ships. This would perma¬ nently give us both the commerce and the carrying trade of these countries. Thus, by Reciprocity treaties, based on the demoneti¬ zation of silver, the United States can secure the entire import trade of all those American Republics that en¬ tered into such treaties with our Government; the prod¬ ucts of those that refused to give us those advantages over our European rivals to be discriminated against, and their money accepted at only its bullion value. The United States now has the chance to establish a perma¬ nent American trade union, a chance to dictate a uniform monetary standard, a common system of measure and weight and commercial law for the Western Continent. Thus the United States now has the opportunity to blockade against British and European goods the ports of all free America by such Reciprocity treaties ; a “paper blockade” indeed, but for that, all the more effectual than if enforced by bayonets, for it involves financial advan¬ tage to those countries to boycott European goods; it would invoke the resistless force of the Almighty Dollar which governs, as it always does govern, trade relations. It would be a blockade that, while it would not cost us a cent, it would help us as much as it would hurt Great Britain. Let our Nation negotiate Reciprocity treaties on the basis described and capture thereby the markets of the world. The great leaders of both parties are beginning to per¬ ceive that territorial extension and National development and aggrandizement is the true solution of the money problem. Senator Teller of Colorado has declared that we must make our own goods instead of buying them from Europe. Senator John T. Morgan of Alabama, one of the great¬ est statesmen of Ihe present day, if not the greatest, per¬ ceives that we must go beyond that position, that we must annex all strategic islands and countries contigu¬ ous to our country or essential to a control of the seas AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 113 that we can acquire, that we should have annexed Hawaii, and still should do so, that we should annex such West India islands that we can obtain, that we should con¬ struct and control the Nicaragua Canal, as essential not only to our industrial development, but also to our mili¬ tary and naval defense. This is statesmanship. The gallant Foraker of Ohio, whose dash, vigor and brilliancy remind the people of Blaine, recently announced at a banquet, that the United States must not only con¬ struct the Nicaragua Canal at the earliest possible mo¬ ment, but that it must revive the American merchant marine, by discriminating tonnage and ^customs duties in favor of our ships, and greatly increase the size and effectiveness of the American Navy to protect our com merce and our ships. Here is true statesmanship again; we need such leaders to guide us. New England is now entering the third state of her industrial life; first she was seafaring, second manufac¬ turing, and now that Western and Southern competition is proving too much for her in the home market, she perceives that the extension of our foreign trade, and the acquisition of foreign markets, is not only essential to the Nation, but especially so to her, so she is to manu¬ facture for foreign markets and to become again sea faring. This New England influence partially accounts for Blaine's Reciprocity and Pan American Federation poli¬ cies and under its influence as his worthy successor, Thomas B. Reed, is an ardent advocate of Reciprocity, Pan Americanism,- the protection of our shipping inter¬ ests and a vigorous foreign policy. The protective development of our inexhaustible re¬ sources is essential to the solution of the money problem. But the lop-sided protection that has thus far been given the American people, will not suffice, for all classes and all enterprises and industries must be equally protected. Our true policy is to buy absolutely nothing of foreign¬ ers that we can make at home. Protective duties on im¬ ported articles should be made high enough to insure their manufacture in this country, and when that is secured, in fact, while it is being secured, we should, by rigid immi- 114 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT gration laws, also secure their manufacture here only by American labor. This is McKinley’s position, and to it must be attributed in large measure hi's seemingly boundless popularity, which renders his nomination for the Presidency prob¬ able. Such leadership is what the American people de¬ mand. Protective duties prevent competition with the products of pauper labor; now let us go still further, after keeping out the goods these paupers made in Europe, let us keep those paupers out of this country to compete with our laborers on our own soil. The manufacturer has been protected against foreign competition, but given the chance to get cheap labor from Europe, thus while giving American laborers work, giv¬ ing it to them at lower wages than they deserve. Now let the American laborers strike at the ballot box instead of striking at the shops; strike where they would get the encouragement and support of all the friendly classes, instead of striking where they infringe upon other rights and trample upon other interests, arousing their antagonism. Admit no immigrants, but desirable candidates for American citizenship, thus keeping our home market to ourselves, advancing our wages, increasing our con¬ sumption and our wealth and power. Whenever it happens, temporarily at least, that certain of our domestic articles and fabrics are inferior in quality to their competitive imports, let those imports come, so long as they must come, from bimetallic countries, or countries friendly to silver instead of from countries hav¬ ing the gold standard. If we are obliged to import fine dress goods, cloths, laces and silks, let them come from bimetallic France in¬ stead of from gold standard England. We must protect our farm products, too, for what can be raised in the United States should be grown here. We now import annually about 300,000,000 pounds of raw wool, which could just as readily be grown in our own country. If we must import raw wool, then let us import is from silver Argentine, rather than from gold Australia. AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 115 We import ten-elevenths of all the sugar we consume, all of which can be produced by our own farmers, from cane or from beets. If we must import sugar, then let us import it from bimetallic France, rather than from gold Germany. To protect our farmers is to diversify their products, thus diminishing or disposing of our surplus crops which now we must sell abroad, thereby reducing our depend¬ ence on foreign markets. This lop-sided protection, protection on the land and free competition on the sea, must end, for our shipping is essential to our prosperity. Our shipping must be fostered, our merchant marine revived, we must carry all of our own freight, thereby saving fully $300,000,000 a year, which mostly goes now to our commercial rival 'and financial enemy, Great Britain, for carrying our im¬ ports and exports and our passengers, all of which we could just as well carry in our own ships. Our shipping, therefore, must be as thoroughly pro¬ tected as are our land interests, for the entire Nation is benefited by the new markets for our labor^and our prod¬ ucts, which the creation of our merchant marine would give; the whole Nation would be benefited by the gate¬ way to foreign markets for our products that our ships would open, the freight they would save us and the trade they would capture. All this can be accomplished simply by re-enacting the law of 1792, that provided for discriminating duties of ten per cent, in the custom duties and for discriminating ton¬ nage duties in favor of all imported goods from silver or bimetallic countries, provided the same are imported in American ships, built in American shipyards, out of Amer¬ ican material by American labor. The shipping law of 1792, however, made no provision as to such imports coming from silver or bimetallic coun¬ tries. This favoritism and discrimination would take our imports from Great Britain and other gold countries^and give them to silver or bimetallic countries, while at the same time giving all our exporting and importing carry¬ ing trade to our own merchant marine, thus reviving our shipping and extending our foreign commerce. 116 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT If some gold nations retaliate by imposing the same discriminating duties, they can be counteracted by sub¬ sidies. The discriminative tonnage and custom duties could be arranged thus: Suppose the tariff on a certain line of im¬ ports is 50 per cent., these goods if imported from gold standard Great Britain, Germany or Austria, would be ad¬ mitted under the custom duty of 40 per cent., provided they were imported in American ships. This would transfer the carrying trade of our imports from foreign to American vessels. When, however, these same competitive goods come from bimetallic France, or any nation adopting our bimetallic system, or from a country on the silver basis, they should be admitted under a duty of 30 per cent., provided, however, they were imported in American ships. This would transfer our importations from gold to bime¬ tallic or silver countries, thus industrially forcing the for¬ mer class of nations into adopting bimetallism if they desired to continue their trade relations with us. A differ¬ ence of even a small per cent., when prices approach cost, would be sufficient to divert commerce from countries discriminated against to those favored by such a law; a discrimination of 10 per cent, would undoubtedly divert it. The imports, however, even from such favored nations, when imported in American ships, would be made to bear duties sufficiently high tc thoroughly protect our home industries. This distinction should be observed even when goods are imported from the colonies of gold standard countries. Congress should discriminate against the products and the shipping of Canada, and against the Canadian Pacific Railroad, which now seriously competes with and injures our transcontinental railroads, so vigorously and strin¬ gently as to render her industrial and commercial condi¬ tion so deplorable, and her political situation dependent thereon, so intolerable that to find relief, progress and prosperity, she will be forced to come under the Stars and Stripes. The prevailing irritation, distrust and enmity due to the unnatural separation of the United States and Canada should end by their union. We want no North¬ ern menace to our peace; we want no Northern fetter AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 117 upon our destiny. The annexation of all of British North America would secure our Alaskan possessions, make the Great Lakes domestic waters, complete our coast line and carry our territory to the Northern Pole. This would be, as it should be, as it must and will be. It would be necessary to construct a great navy to protect our shipping in event of war, and as a preserver of peace. Our coasts and harbors should be thoroughly fortified and protected. If, after all these measures of National development, we are still found to be too weak industrially and commer¬ cially to use all of the surplus gold and silver of the world; if we are still unable to make the silver in a dollar worth ioo cents, necessary to its free coinage, then let us still further increase the earning power of money in the United States by gigantic internal improvements that our fiat can fix its value and the ratio of gold and silver at 16 to i. Let our Congress devise a scientific method of irriga¬ tion for the West; let it deepen our waterways; let -it con¬ struct great post roads and canals; let it connect the Mis¬ sissippi and the Lakes; let it connect, by a canal, Chicago with Toledo; let it deepen the Erie canal so that a con¬ tinuous inland waterway from New York to New Orleans may provide a highway for commerce and a protected route for our ships in time of war. Let our National Government construct the Nicaragua Canal and control it, so that not only will it be of mercan¬ tile service and military advantage to us, but that the tolls may fill the coffers of our National Treasury. CHAPTER XXIV. THE AMERICAS FOR THE AMERICANS; THE PAN-AMERICAN FEDERATION. The desire to secure bimetallism, which the “sound money’’ advocates profess, is confession that gold mono¬ metallism must and should be abandoned. Instead of this great Nation pursuing the undignified, weak-kneed, vacillating policy of awaiting the dilatory adoption of international bimetallism by the signatory powers, during which time the value of silver will bob up and down in exact proportion to the prospect of the 118 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT Nations agreeing to remonetize it, it should take the proud, brave, determined course, to remonetize it by the strength of its own colossal powers at all hazards. If it be deemed that our policy would be more quickly followed by France and the Latin Union, if we adopted their ratio of 15 J to 1, we should do so, by increasing the size of the gold coins. This would secure a uniform ratio all over the world, and guarantee the concurrent circulation of both gold and silver in the United States. Our Nation is rapidly outgrowing its now narrow limits; it is the manifest destiny of our Republic to ex¬ pand until it embraces every foot of territory on the Western Continent from pole to pole. The doctrine promulgated by James Monroe is being outgrown by our Nation. The Olney Doctrine is more suited to our imperious spirit and purpose: “THAT THE FIAT OF THE UNITED STATES ON THE WESTERN CONTI¬ NENT, IS LAW.” That’s the doctrine to nail to the mastheads of our ships and defend with arms, if needs be. True both the Monroe and the Olney doctrines nega¬ tive and contradict our own Declaration of Independence that a country has the inherent right to choose its own form of government, by contending that no European Nation can secure additional territory on the Western Continent, by arms, by purchase, nor by the expressed wish of any American country to become a European colony. This doctrine is, however, essential to our free¬ dom and to our prosperity, and must be maintained. Again, these nations can never be fully and fitly de¬ veloped except under the control and guidance of the United States, which should establish a protectorate over them, guaranteeing the integrity of their territory against all comers. We proudly term ours a “Government of the people, for the people, and by the people,” but is it true? does it deserve that reputation? If the question of the recog¬ nition of Cuban independence was submitted to a popu¬ lar vote to-day, ninety-nine men out of a hundred would vote to make that island free and independent. Can it then be claimed that the National Democratic Adminis- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 119 tration, or the Republican Congress that denies or delays that recognition reflects public sentiment, that it is a Government of the people? Gold to-day refuses free¬ dom to Cuba; gold to-day preserves the peace of Europe. No European nation would dream of declaring war be¬ fore first consulting the Rothschilds to negotiate a loan. The Money Power recognizes the fact that if Cuba is recognized as independent, or even as a belligerent power, that the hot-headed Spaniards might declare war against the United States, the result of which if she did, even if it did not force our Government to admit silver to unlimited free coinage in order to get money enough to conduct the war with, that our gold would either leave the country, else commanding such a high premium that it would sneak out of sight and refuse to fight, which would force us to a silver basis, thereby removing all ob¬ jection to the free coinage of silver. There is not enough gold to do business with in time of peace, much less to fight with in war. War would destroy Gold Monometal¬ lism, therefore Cuba remains enslaved. Make her free; place her star in the firmament of our flag; annex her, for she strategically commands the Gulf of Mexico and the Nicaragua Canal when it is constructed, and is es¬ sential both to our peace and safety. The Gulf of Mexico and the Carribean Sea is the Mediterranean of the Western Continent, and is the destined theatre of the most intense commercial, indus¬ trial, social and political activity in the Western Hemi¬ sphere; its waves will be whitened with commerce, its ships ladened with the products of industry and skill, its shores crowded with great ports and cities, and its seas dominated by the genius, energy and principles of our Nation. The present moment is the destined one to realize the dreams, hopes and ambitions of Blaine, to establish a vast Pan-American Federation. The United States can, by taking the initiative, and let¬ ting other nations follow, capture the trade of the silver countries of the Old World and the New, for the reason that they will not give $2 of their money to get a $1 worth of British or European goods, when they can procure 120 THE KEY TO INDEPENDENT the same quantity and quality, if not better goods from us for half the money, accepting their money at its face value. When we buy of these nations, instead of our money buying 200 cents’ worth of their products, our dollars will buy only 100 cents’ worth, as is honest and just. As those silver nations are not sea-faring, we would carry their commerce in our ships. The United States can now establish a great Pan Amer¬ ican Federation by declaring that the silver and gold money of these American Republics shall be treated as legal tender money in our country, provided they are of the same weight and fineness as our coins are required to possess; this would give us a chance to dictate an Amer¬ ican bimetallic standard for the Western World. The United States, constituting the most powerful com¬ mercial and industrial factor of this Federation, could readily induce these American nations to adopt our bi¬ metallic system. The advantages to be derived from improved facilities of commerce would also induce them to agree with us to adopt some metric system of measures and weights, the French. Self interest would also influence these nations to learn our language and adopt uniform commercial laws. The trade of the world would be ours, France, Ger¬ many, and the Latin Union would immediately follow our example and adopt bimetallism, for not to do so, would be to lose their foreign trade. Silver would be remonetized. The United States would be the industrial and commercial center of the world, and since money could then earn more in America than in Europe, the surplus capital of the Old World wgjuld seek investment here, and once here, we could compel it to stay here by making it earn more here than it could earn anywhere else. Our Nation would also be¬ come the financial center of the world. Great Britain would be compelled to adopt bimetallism, or be crushed; in either event, she would lose half the debt due her, for the premium on her gold would be de- AMERICAN BIMETALLISM. 121 stroyed, her gold monopoly would be dead, and the world would be free. As gold would fall in value, the values of silver and property and the wages of labor would rise; Great Britain would be 'compelled to pay double price for all her foodstuffs and raw materials, her silver markets, three- fourths of her foreign market, would be captured by America; her industry would be dead, her carrying trade destroyed, her creditorship would cease, her commercial, maritime and financial domination would be ended. Great Britain stands on the threshold of her destruc¬ tion, caught in the gold 1 trap she sprung for other nations. It merely depends upon us to choose whether we wish to destroy her creditorship, and substitute for her gold monometallism our American bimetallic standard; it de¬ pends upon us whether we wish to capture the markets of the world, to acquire the domination and supremacy of the seas; it all depends upon us whether we wish to create a Pan American Federation and become the com¬ mercial, industrial, financial and political center of the world. WE have the opportunity, we possess the power, by bold, energetic, brilliant diplomacy and leadership to in¬ dependently remonetize silver. Without waiting for the help of other nations, without cringing, crawling, or begging, without dishonor, but with increased prestige and power, wealth and prosperity, without lowering or tarnishing the Stars and Stripes, our Nation, the United States of America, should imperiously, proudly lead the nations of the Old World and the New, establish a Federation of American Republics, and grasp the destined sceptre of the World’s sovereignty to wield it for the enlightenment, the progress, the improvement and the welfare of the down-trodden and oppressed peo¬ ples of all nations and all climes. FINIS,