The Forum

July, 1895.

Sound Currency the Dominant Political Issue.

By William Salomon

Mr. William Salomon, born in Mobile, Ala., in 1852, is a member of the firm of Speyer & Company, one of the leading international banking houses in New York City.  He was a staunch supporter of Mr. Cleveland in 1892 and a member of the Committee on Currency of the Reform Club.

It was in 1891, the year before the last national conventions, that Mr. Cleveland wrote his famous letter on the importance of maintaining the stability of the currency, and the dangers menacing it through existing and threatened legislation.  His unpopularity with the Democratic organization in New York was well known.  It was well understood that the choice of the State Convention would fall upon Mr. Hill.  In contrast to Mr. Cleveland, the views of Mr. Hill on the subject of silver, and how far the United States might safely go in "protecting" it, were not surely known, and Mr. Hill was not at pains to make any clear statement on the subject.  Consequently a large number of influential men in the city of New York and in the State felt obliged to exert all their energies for the nomination of Mr. Cleveland and the defeat of Mr. Hill at the National Democratic Convention in 1892.  It is safe to say that most of the men who took part in the "anti-Snapper" movement knew very little about the wickedness charged against the existing State organization, and bore little or no personal animosity toward the leaders.  They did know, however, that the managers of the Democratic organization had shut their eyes and ears to the sentiment of the State upon a question which they deemed vital to the interests of the State and country.  With a right regard for the views of a vast majority of the Democratic party in New York, the regular State Convention was under obligation to choose a man whose utterances were clear and unmistakably on the side of a maintenance of the stability of the currency. [gold standard]

The dangers threatening the country from an overthrow of the existing basis of values, which, it was recognized, would result from the triumph of any but a "sound-money" [gold] candidate, inspired vast numbers of men to go into a party organization which was to claim the field against the so-called Hill-Murphy-Sheehan machine.  It was well understood that a reform of the tariff was to be the nominal issue of the campaign, and that all the changes were to be rung upon that theme, but enthusiasm for a reform of the tariff would not have produced for the "anti-Snapper" movement "the sinews of war."  What did produce them was the conviction that the triumph of the Democratic party, with Mr. Cleveland at its head, would mean a repeal of the purchasing-clause of the Sherman Act.  A large number of the men who joined actively in the work of organization, though also tariff reformers, could not have afforded to make the numerous self-sacrifices necessary in taking an active part in a canvass on any but such a vital issue as that of the maintenance of the integrity of the currency.  The work of these men, happily, was well rewarded, first in the National Convention in Chicago, and subsequently in Congress, by a repeal of the purchasing-clause of the Sherman Act.

The nomination of Mr. Cleveland might be called a mere tempest in a tea-pot, compared with the battle to repeal the purchasing-clause of the Sherman Act.  This required the calling of an extra session of Congress in the summer ---and after the whole people had had an object-lesson in the threatened dangers.  The severity of this object lesson in every part of the country is too well known to need much comment.  Surely men who had lived to see the financial crises of 1873, 1884 and 1890 were convinced that the crisis of 1893 surpassed all the others combined in its duration and in the extent of its damage.

The expedient of issuing clearing-house certificates adopted by the banks, which it is well understood is fraught with great danger, and possibly cannot be defended from the standpoint of strict right, reached its maximum use, which is some evidence of the extreme proportions that the panic of 1893 assumed.  It may be said that it was only these indisputable proofs of the almost irrevocable ruin threatening the commercial and industrial institutions of the country which ultimately drove an unconditional repeal of the purchasing-clause of the Sherman Act through the Senate, where "silver" Senators, guided only by their personal advantage, for weeks kept legislation at a deadlock.

---[100million silver coins and silver certificates issued against deposited silver caused a money panic !!!  And, according to this piece of dog excrement, "silver" senators were the self-serving ones, not the advocates of bank paper.....]

The clouds which hung over the country's finances were scattered none too soon.  The United States had already pledged its credit to keep more than half a milliard dollars of silver money, besides its "legal-tender" issue, on a parity with gold.  Its means to do this rested only upon its high credit and the conviction of the people that it would be used to prevent a parting of gold from silver.  The relatively small amount of gold in the Treasury would vanish quickly if a breath of suspicion rested upon the Government's willingness to replenish the store, if need be, and even with this confidence, already two sales of interest-bearing obligations have been necessary to renew the legal minimum gold-reserve of one hundred million dollars.

____________________
George Blumenthal, director of Lazard brothers, on February 28, 1913, before a House committee:

"If you will look it up you will find that it was only because the income of the Government was not sufficiently large that bonds were issued during Cleveland's administration, but it did not suit the New York bankers to make that clear, because they wanted a certain law repealed, and it was repealed, and it was probably a very good thing that it was."

Extra Session of Congress
for the purpose of eliminating silver

Whereas the distrust and apprehension concerning the financial situation which pervade all business circles have already caused great loss and damage to our people, and threaten to cripple our merchants, stop the wheels of manufacture, bring distress and privation to our farmers, and withhold from our workingmen the wage of labor;  And whereas the present perilous condition is largely the result of a financial policy which the executive branch of the Government finds embodied in unwise laws which must be executed until repealed by Congress:  Now, therefore, I, Grover Cleveland, President of the United States, in performance of a constitutional duty, do by this proclamation declare that an extraordinary occasion requires the convening of both Houses of the Congress of the United States at the Capitol in the city of Washington, on the 7th day of August next, at 12 o'clock noon, to the end that the people may be relieved through legislation, from present and impending danger and distress.

All those entitled to act as members of the Fifty-third Congress are required to take notice of this proclamation and attend at the time and place above stated.

Given under my hand and the seal of the United States at the city of Washington, on the.30th day of June, in the year of our Lord 1893, and of the Independence of the United States the 117th.

[Seal.] By the President:  Grover Cleveland.
---[A fall-down drunkard, a railway lawyer]

At 12 o'clock and 47 minutes p.m., Mr. O.L. Pruden, one of the secretaries of the President of the United States, appeared below the bar, and said:

Mr. President, I am directed by the President of the United States to deliver to the Senate a message in writing.

The message was received from the secretary, and handed to the Vice-President [Adlai Ewing Stevenson (1835-1914); Illinois, D; pro-silver].

The Vice-President.  The Chair lays before the Senate the message of the President of the United States, which the Secretary will read.

The Secretary read the message, as follows:

To the Congress of the United States:

The existence of an alarming and extraordinary business situation, involving the welfare and prosperity of all our people, has constrained me to call together in extra session the people's representatives in Congress, to the end that through a wise and patriotic exercise of the legislative duty with which they solely are charged, present evils may be mitigated and dangers threatening the future may be averted.

Our unfortunate financial plight is not the result of untoward events nor of conditions related to our natural resources;  nor is it traceable to any of the afflictions which frequently check national growth and prosperity.  With plenteous crops, with abundant promise of remunerative production and manufacture, with unusual invitation to safe investment, and with satisfactory assurance to business enterprise, suddenly financial distrust and fear have sprung up on every side.  Numerous moneyed institutions have suspended because abundant assets were not immediately available to meet the demands of frightened depositors.  Surviving corporations and individuals are content to keep in hand the money they are usually anxious to loan, and those engaged in legitimate business are surprised to find that the securities they offer for loans, though heretofore satisfactory, are no longer accepted.  Values supposed to be fixed are fast becoming conjectural, and loss and failure have invaded every branch of business.

I believe these things are principally chargeable to Congressional legislation touching the purchase and coinage of silver by the General Government.

This legislation is embodied in a statute passed on the 14th day of July, 1890, which was the culmination of much agitation on the subject involved, and which may be considered a truce, after a long struggle, between the advocates of free silver coinage and those intending to be more conservative.

Undoubtedly the monthly purchases by the Government of 4,500,000 ounces of silver, enforced under that statute, were regarded by those interested in silver production as a certain guaranty of its increase in price.  The result, however, has been entirely different, for immediately following a spasmodic and slight rise, the price of silver began to fall after the passage of the act, and has since reached the lowest point ever known.  This disappointing result has led to renewed and persistent effort in the direction of free silver coinage.

Meanwhile, not only are the evil effects of the operation of the present law constantly accumulating, but the result to which its execution must inevitably lead is becoming palpable to all who give the least heed to financial subjects.  This law provides that in payment for the 4,500,000 ounces of silver bullion which the Secretary of the Treasury is commanded to purchase monthly, there shall be issued Treasury notes redeemable on demand in gold or silver coin, at the discretion of the Secretary of the Treasury, and that said notes may be reissued.

It is, however, declared in the act to be "the established policy of the United States to maintain the two metals on a parity with each other upon the present legal ratio or such ratio as may be provided by law."  This declaration so controls the action of the Secretary of the Treasury as to prevent his exercising the discretion nominally vested in him, if by such action the parity between gold and silver may be disturbed.  Manifestly a refusal by the Secretary to pay these Treasury notes in gold, if demanded, would necessarily result in their discredit and depreciation as obligations payable only in silver, and would destroy the parity between the two metals by establishing a discrimination in favor of gold.

---[ Yes;  that clause caused problems, servants of banks and bank-paper forced it into the act.  In your drunken stupor you should call for the repeal of that clause, not the purchasing part of the act. ]

Up to the 15th day of July, 1893, these notes had been issued in payment of silver bullion purchases to the amount of more than $147,000,000.  While all but a very small quantity of this bullion remains uncoined and without usefulness in the Treasury, many of the notes given in its purchase have been paid in gold.  This is illustrated by the statement that between the 1st day of May, 1892, and the 15th day of July, 1893, the notes of this kind issued in payment for silver bullion amounted to a little more than $54,000,000, and that during the same period about $49,000,000 were paid by the Treasury in gold for the redemption of such notes.

---[ As opposed to gold sitting idly in bank vaults while 3 to 50 bank-notes circulate.  Silver certificates are issued dollar for dollar, free of cost & interest, outside the control of bankers;  bank-notes are issued 3-50 dollars for dollar, each of them collecting interest, their number completely controlled by bankers. ]

The policy necessarily adopted of paying these notes in gold has not spared the gold reserve of $100,000,000 long ago set aside by the Government for the redemption of other notes, for this fund has already been subjected to the payment of new obligations amounting to about $150,000,000 on account of silver purchases, and has as a consequence, for the first time since its creation, been encroached upon.  We have thus made the depletion of our gold easy, and have tempted other and more appreciative nations to add it to their stock.  That the opportunity we have offered has not been neglected is shown by the large amounts of gold which have been recently drawn from our Treasury and exported to increase the financial strength of foreign nations.  The excess of exports of gold over its imports for the year ending June 30, 1893, amounted to more than $87,500,000.

Between the 1st day of July, 1890, and the 15th day of July, 1893, the gold coin and bullion in our Treasury decreased more than $132,000,000, while during the same period the silver coin and bullion in the Treasury increased more than $147,000,000.  Unless Government bonds are to be constantly issued and sold to replenish our exhausted gold, only to be again exhausted, it is apparent that the operation of the silver-purchase law now in force, leads in the direction of the entire substitution of silver for the gold in the Government Treasury, and that this must be followed by the payment of all Government obligations in depreciated silver.

At this stage gold and silver must part company and the Government must fail in its established policy to maintain the two metals on a parity with each other.  Given over to the exclusive use of a currency greatly depreciated according to the standard of the commercial world, we could no longer claim a place among nations of the first class, nor could our Government claim a performance of its obligation, so far as such an obligation has been imposed upon it, to provide for the use of the people the best and safest money.

If, as many of its friends claim, silver ought to occupy a larger place in our currency and the currency of the world through general international co-operation and agreement, it is obvious that the United States will not be in a position to gain a hearing in favor of such an arrangement so long as we are willing to continue our attempt to accomplish the result single handed.

The knowledge in business circles among our own people that our Government can not make its fiat equivalent to intrinsic value, nor keep inferior money on a parity with superior money by its own independent efforts, has resulted in such a lack of confidence at home, in the stability of currency values that capital refuses its aid to new enterprises, while millions are actually withdrawn from the channels of trade and commerce to become idle and unproductive in the hands of timid owners.  Foreign investors, equally alert, not only decline to purchase American securities, but make haste to sacrifice those which they already have.

It does not meet the situation to say that apprehension in regard to the future of our finances is groundless and that there is no reason for lack of confidence in the purposes or power of the Government in the premises.  The very existence of this apprehension and lack of confidence, however caused, is a menace which ought not for a moment to be disregarded.  Possibly if the undertaking we have in hand were the maintenance of a specific known quantity of silver at a parity with gold, our ability to do so might be estimated and gauged, and perhaps in view of our unparalleled growth and resources, might be favorably passed upon.  But when our avowed endeavor is to maintain such parity in regard to an amount of silver increasing at the rate of $50,000,000 yearly, with no fixed termination to such increase, it can hardly be said that a problem is presented whose solution is free from doubt.

The people of the United States are entitled to a sound and stable currency and to money recognized as such on every exchange and in every market of the world.  Their Government has no right to injure them by financial experiments opposed to the policy and practice of other civilized states, nor is it justified in permitting an exaggerated and unreasonable reliance on our national strength and ability to jeopardize the soundness of the people's money.  This matter rises above the plane of party politics.  It vitally concerns every business and calling and enters every household in the land.

There is one important aspect of the subject which especially should never be overlooked.  At times like the present, when the evils of unsound finance threaten us, the speculator may anticipate a harvest gathered from the misfortune of others, the capitalist may protect himself by hoarding or may even find profit in the fluctuations of values;  but the wage-earner ---the first to be injured by a depreciated currency and the last to receive the benefit of its correction--- is practically defenseless.  He relies for work upon the ventures of a confident and contented capital.  This failing him, his condition is without alleviation, for he can neither prey on the misfortunes of others, nor hoard his labor.

One of the greatest statesmen our country has known, speaking more than fifty years ago, when a derangement of the currency [by banks] had caused commercial distress, said:  "The very man of all others who has the deepest interest in a sound currency and who suffers most by mischievous legislation in money matters, is the man who earns his daily bread by his daily toil."

These words are as pertinent now as on the day they were uttered, and ought to impressively remind us that a failure in the discharge of our duty at this time must especially injure those of our countrymen who labor, and who, because of their number and condition, are entitled to the most watchful care of their Government.  It is of the utmost importance that such relief as Congress can afford in the existing situation be afforded at once.  The maxim "He gives twice who gives quickly," is directly applicable.  It may be true that the embarrassments from which the business of the country is suffering arise as much from evils apprehended as from those actually existing.  We may hope, too, that calm counsels will prevail and that neither the capitalists nor the wage-earners will give way to unreasoning panic, and sacrifice their property or their interests under the influence of exaggerated fears.  Nevertheless, every day's delay in removing one of the plain and principal causes of the present state of things enlarges the mischief already done and increases the responsibility of the Government for its existence.  Whatever else the people have a right to expect from Congress they may certainly demand that legislation condemned by the ordeal of three years' disastrous experience shall be removed from the statute books as soon as their representatives can legitimately deal with it.

It was my purpose to summon Congress in special session early in the coming September that we might enter promptly upon the work of tariff reform, which the true interests of the country clearly demand, which so large a majority of the people as shown by their suffrages, desire and expect, and to the accomplishment of which every effort of the present Administration is pledged.  But while tariff reform has lost nothing of its immediate and permanent importance, and must in the near future engage the attention of Congress, it has seemed to me that the financial condition of the country should at once and before all other subjects be considered by your honorable body.

I earnestly recommend the prompt repeal of the provisions of the act passed July 14, 1890, authorizing the purchase of silver bullion, and that other legislative action may put beyond all doubt or mistake the intention and the ability of the Government to fulfill its pecuniary obligations in money universally recognized by all civilized countries [gold].

Grover Cleveland

Executive Mansion,
August 8, 1893.

Bills Introduced.

Mr. Hill introduced a bill (S. 1) to repeal certain sections of the act of July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of silver bullion and the issue of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes;"  which was read the first time by its title.

Mr. Hill [David Bennett Hill (1843-1910), N.Y., D; studied law, admitted to the bar; in 1892 was defeated by Cleveland for the democratic nomination].  I ask that the bill be read at length and referred to the Committee on Finance.

The bill was read the second time at length, and referred to the Committee on Finance, as follows:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, etc., That sections 1, 3, and 4 of the act of July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of silver bullion and the issue of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes," are hereby repealed.

Sec. 2.  This repealing act, however, is not to be construed as an abandonment of bimetallism, but it is hereby declared that the policy at using both gold and silver as the standard money of the country shall be established, and to the accomplishment of that end the efforts of the Government shall be steadily and safely directed.

Mr. Stewart introduced a bill (S. 2) to restore the right of coinage;  which was read twice by its title, and referred to the Committee on Finance.

He also introduced a bill (S. 3) to supply the deficiency in the currency;  which was read the first time by its title.

Mr. Stewart.  I ask that the bill be read at length.  It proposes to provide temporary relief, and I should like to make a short explanation of it.

The bill was read the second time at length, as follows:

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives, etc., That the Secretary or the Treasury be, and he is hereby, directed to issue silver certificates of the character and denominations as now provided by law equal in amount to the silver bullion in the Treasury purchased under the act of July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of sliver bullion and the issuance of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes," in excess of the amount necessary, at its coining value, to redeem the Treasury notes issued under said act, and to use the same, or so much thereof as may be necessary, to provide for any deficiency in the revenues of the Government, and to use the balance of such certificates in the purchase of United States 4 per cent bonds at the market price thereof, not exceeding 12 per cent premium on the face value of such bonds;  and the Secretary shall, as fast as practicable, coin such excess of silver and gold the same for the redemption of the certificates provided for by this act.

Sec. 2.  That the Secretary of the Treasury be, and he is hereby, further directed to issue $100,000,000 of United States legal-tender notes of the character and description of the United States legal-tender notes now outstanding, and purchase with such notes United States 4 per cent bonds, at the market price, not exceeding 12 per cent premium on the face value of the bonds so purchased, and the bonds purchased under the provisions of this act shall be held in the Treasury as security for the redemption of the Treasury notes issued under this act.

Mr. Stewart [William Morris Stewart (1827-1909), Nevada, R.]  I should like to call the attention of the Finance Committee to this bill.  My effort in drawing it has been to give immediate relief, without involving the discussion of the whole financial question;  on the one hand without involving the discussion of increasing the circulation of the national banks, against which both Houses have so frequently voted, and also without involving the question of supplying additional currency by restoring the laws of free coinage as they existed until 1873, because the condition of the country is such that before measures so important as either of those could be determined, much harm would take place.  Before the recommendation of the [drunkard] President could be considered and discussed here, many worthy citizens would be ruined and much injury would result to the whole country.

Now, I do not propose to inquire into how this panic came, or whose fault it was.  There is no time for that now.  When the house is on fire we must put out the flames first.  There is a currency famine in the country.  Banks are closing their doors, the masses are being thrown out of employment, and before any relief can be reached great distress will occur.  The repeal of the Sherman act may or may not do good.  I think it would do great harm and add much to the present financial trouble, but that may or may not be true.  We know very well if we could put out some currency for immediate use it would be a great relief.

There are $49,000,000 of silver bullion in the Treasury which is subject to be coined and silver certificates issued for it.  They have been coining part of it and issuing silver certificates, but there is no authority in the Treasury Department to issue the certificates until it is coined.  This bill authorizes the Department to issue certificates immediately for the amount they have on hand and coin it afterwards.  There is $49,000,000.  Then the bill further provides for the issuance of $100,000,000 of greenbacks, as they are called;  Treasury notes, and purchase bonds, and put the bonds in the Treasury and hold them as security for the notes.  The notes can be retired with these bonds at any time hereafter.  If this could be done nearly $150,000,000 of money would be furnished to the country and it would give immediate relief.

My information is that the savings banks have a very large amount of 4 per cent bonds which they hold as investments.  It is impossible for them to convert those bonds into currency.  They have been compelled to require sixty days' notice before they can pay their depositors.  That is creating great distress and great alarm.  If they could convert their bonds immediately into currency and relieve the stringency it certainly would give us time to think over the matter and mature something that will meet the judgment of the American people.

I do not think that this is a time for angry discussion.  What ought to be done ought to be done deliberately.  What I propose is that we shall give immediate relief and then consider the general proposition, and it seems to me that we should not stand here and discuss the question while the country is in such a terrible state of panic.  It appears to me that it would be unpatriotic for any man to get up any discussion before immediate relief is given.  The silver men do not believe that they can allow the act of 1890 to be repealed because they think that is monometallism, and they will have to struggle against it.  They believe that that would be the end of silver coinage forever.  They can not give up that act and you can not expect them to do it.  But we do not want to be placed in a position where we must contend for what we believe should be contended for.  We do not want to be charged with doing anything to hinder relief while the country is suffering as it now is.  I appeal to the Senate if this is not the right scheme, to adopt some scheme to get out currency at once, and then we may, if possible, stop this panic and give prosperity to the country.

These are mere suggestions.  If this bill is not in the right form, any temporary measure that will give immediate relief, so that we can discuss these questions calmly, is what I am in favor of.  I call the particular attention of the Finance Committee to this scheme and ask them to examine it and adopt it, or some scheme of this nature, that does not involve the whole money question, but which will get out immediate currency and stop the panic.  I call upon the committee, as patriotic citizens, to lend their aid to that first before we take up the general question of finance.

Silver.

Mr. Wilson of West Virginia [William Lyne Wilson (1843-1900), W.V., D;  studied law, admitted to the bar].  Mr. Speaker, I desire to offer a bill for the present consideration of the House.

The bill was read, as follows:

An act to repeal a part of an act, approved July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of silver bullion and the issue of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes."

Be it enacted, etc., That so much of the act approved July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of silver bullion and issue of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes," as directs the Secretary of the Treasury to purchase from time to time silver bullion to the aggregate amount of 4,500,000 ounces, or so much thereof as may be offered in each month at the market price thereof, not exceeding one dollar for 371.25 grains of prue silver, and to issue in payment for such purchases Treasury notes of the United States, be, and the same is hereby, repealed;  but this repeal shall not impair or in any manner affect the legal-tender quality of the standard silver dollars heretofore coined;  and the faith and credit of the United States are hereby pledged to maintain the parity of the standard gold and silver coins of the United States at the present legal ratio, or such other ratio as may be established by law.

Mr. Bland.  Now, Mr. Speaker, I offer the bill that I send to the Clerk's desk.

The bill was read, as follows:

A bill (H.R. 2) for the free coinage of silver, and for other purposes.

Section 1.  Be it enacted, etc., That from and after the passage of this act all holders of silver bullion to the amount of $100 or more, of standard weight and fineness, shall be entitled to have the same coined at the Mint of the United States into silver dollars of the weight and fineness provided for in the second section of this act.

Sec. 2.  That the silver dollar provided for in this act shall consist of 412.5 grains of standard silver.  Said dollars to be a legal tender for all debts, dues, and demands, both public and private.

Sec. 3.  That the holder of the silver dollars herein provided for shall be entitled to deposit the same and to receive silver certificates in the manner now provided by law for the standard silver dollars.

Sec. 4.  So much of the act of July 14, 1890, entitled "An act directing the purchase of silver bullion and the issue of Treasury notes thereon, and for other purposes," as requires the monthly purchase of 4,500,000 ounces of silver bullion, be and the same is hereby repealed.

Mr. Bland. Mr. Speaker, I regret to be called upon to discuss this question without previous preparation, when we have just reached an agreement to take it up.  I further regret that any gentleman on our side of the House should see proper to read in this presence one part of our platform and to retreat from that part, above all others, which contributed to the vote that gave him a seat in this House.  I regret that any Western man should turn his face toward the East and his back to the West.

We understood, Mr. Speaker, what that platform meant.  The whole Democratic party voted against the Sherman bill, and so far as I am personally concerned, I did what little my ability permitted me to do to prevent its passage in this House;  but the so-called Sherman law passed, and a better law having been repealed by its passage, it is now the only law on the statute books looking to the use of silver as money in this country.

I know, Mr. Speaker, that the gold-standard elements, the very elements that are in opposition to the free coinage of silver, secured the passage of that act.  I knew they would demand its repeal the moment they saw the opportunity.  A promise to repeal that act was put in the platform at Chicago, I suppose, to satisfy that element of the Democratic party that wants no law upon the statute book for the coinage of silver.  But following that, and in the same paragraph, a part and parcel of it at least, was the promise made at Chicago by the Democratic party for the use of both gold and silver as money in this country, with equal privileges at the mints of our Government.  And speaking for myself and for the people whom I have the honor to represent, they understood at least that the free coinage of silver, in accordance with our platform, necessarily repealed the Sherman law;  and it would. [Applause.]

The two laws can not exist together.  They are inconsistent, and that part of the platform that pledged us to the free coinage of silver necessarily meant the repeal of the Sherman law by a free-coinage bill.

I want, Mr. Speaker, to call attention to this phase of the situation.  We have here different propositions that will be voted upon, submitted in pursuance of the Chicago platform, if you please to call it so.  Gentlemen may choose their ratio.  They have an opportunity at least to express their own opinions by their votes in this House and by their speeches, and to state what they mean by the free coinage of silver and the Chicago platform.

It is not my privilege nor my purpose to call in question the sincerity of any member upon this floor or to undertake to criticise his attitude;  but I do want to call attention to the fact that we are proposing, as I consider it, to try in good faith to conform ourselves to the platform on which we were elected in legislating upon this question.

Why, it is said we have met here under peculiar circumstances, in the midst of a financial crisis.  We are asked by the opposite side to legislate in haste.  We are asked to forego a part of our duties.  We are asked to legislate by piecemeal, and to take our chances in the future.

I want to say, Mr. Speaker, that the great voting masses of the people of this country may get into a panic themselves when election day comes around.  The people will not regard our proceedings in the light that gentlemen wish them to view those proceedings.  You may proceed in a panic, you may believe that some legislative act is necessary here to stop a panic, and you may vote for it without due consideration;  but every vote cast and every word uttered will be reviewed by our constituencies, not in a panic, but in cool deliberation, and you will be held accountable for what you do, whether you deliberate or not.

It is said that history repeats itself, and it seems that the Democratic party is especially the victim of repeating history in some way.  When the people intrusted our party in 1884 with the administration of the Government, when the Democratic House of Representatives was chosen, I remember full well, and I see around me gentlemen who remember it as I do, for they were here at that time, that before the inauguration of the President of the United States whom we had elected, the emissaries of Wall street swarmed the lobbies of the House and this Capitol, just as they did last winter, demanding what ?  Demanding the repeal of the so-called Bland act.

Precisely the same proceedings that we had here last winter.  We were told that it was the wish of the Executive-elect that that act be repealed, as we were told last winter.  We were told that it was his opinion and the opinion of his advisers that this country was coming then to the single silver standard if we did not repeal that law.  We were threatened with a panic, with gold coming to a premium.  That House was forced to a vote upon that subject before we adjourned at that time, as we were practically last winter;  but it voted the proposition down by a tremendous majority.  During the following summer the New York papers, as they have been this summer, were filled with predictions of gold premiums and panics.

The New York Herald, one of their leading papers, had every day in its columns "We are still coining the 70 and 75 cent dollar" as a standing advertisement of a panic.

Some time in September or October, before the meeting of Congress, these generous bankers in New York, who say that they control the finances of this country, and what they demand must be acceded, made arrangement with the than Secretary of the Treasury by which they were to withdraw $10,000,000 of subsidiary silver coin and to place in the Treasury of the United States $10,000,000 of gold, in order to secure and maintain gold payments, advertising to all the country that the bankers of New York had come to relief of the Federal Treasury with $10,000,000 of gold to maintain the public credit.

It was done, Mr. Speaker, to terrorize the people of this country and, if possible, to bring about a panic such as you have today, and they know it.  And we met in something of a financial panic;  not so severe as it is now, however.  The whole country was stirred on the silver question.  We met in Congress and the question was debated.  The result of it all was the refusal to repeal the silver law by over a two-thirds vote of that House;  and the panic vanished.  That was the end of it.  When they ascertained that the free people of this country, through their representatives, could not be driven as a herd of buffaloes on the Western plains into a panic, to trample themselves and those depending upon them, they ceased.

The howl against silver and the panic stopped.  The country continued in its usual prosperity, whatever that may be.  We kept on coining these 70-cent dollars, and no disturbance was made of it, practically, for four years.  The Democratic party in the House maintained it against all assaults.  But when, unfortunately, our friends on the other side got the power, they enacted another law, repealing the law of 1878.

That law, Mr. Speaker ---the Sherman law--- I denounced in an article in the North American Review, about two months after it was enacted, as a "Janus-faced" statute.  A law that provided for the purchase of 4,500,000 ounces of silver bullion per month, on which Treasury notes should be issued at the market rate of the purchases;  that these notes should not be kept in circulation in excess of the cost price of the bullion;  that the bullion was to be coined for the redemption of the notes, and that it further provided that in the discretion of the Secretary of the Treasury the notes should be redeemed in gold, in order to keep a parity between the two metals.

The face of the gold part of it was turned to the East ---the gold standard;  the other part, to redeem in silver, looked to the West;  and in the statute was included with the purchase of bullion and coining it into money and the redemption of the notes in the resulting coin it would in some respects, at least, be in harmony with the idea of ultimate bimetallism.  But I predicted in that article, with the Administration then in power, the purchase of silver would probably go on and the law be executed until after the next Presidential election, and if an Administration hostile to silver was elected, gentlemen who gave it their support would be very sick of their bargain.

Now, Mr. Speaker, I have no defense to make of that law, further than this:  We are told by the Herschel committee that investigated the subject of suspending the coinage in India that the repeal of this act, the so-called Sherman act, would cause a heavy decline in the price of that metal.  I will send to the Clerk's desk and have read the portion of that report I have marked.

The Clerk read as follows:

Moreover, a strong agitation exists in the United States with respect to the law now in force providing for the purchase of silver.  Fears have been and are entertained that there may come to be a premium on gold, and strong pressure has been brought to bear upon the Government of that country with a view to bring about an alteration of that law.  In December last a bill was introduced in the Senate to repeal the Sherman act, and another to suspend the purchase under it.  Whether any such measure will pass into law it is impossible to foretell, but it must be regarded as possible;  and although in the light of past experience predictions on such a subject must be made with caution, it is certainly probable that the repeal of the Sherman act would be followed with a heavy fall in the price of sliver.

Mr. Bland.  Mr. Speaker, there is another portion of that report that I will not have read at present, but it is to the same effect.  It predicts a fall in the price of silver when we repeal the Sherman act of probably 6 pence per ounce, and it is said, sir, that it was the apprehension that the Government of the United States would suspend the coinage of silver, would repeal this law that induced the British Parliament to recommend to the Government of India the suspension of the coinage of silver at the mints of India.  We understand that India, while it is said to have a government of its own, is simply governed by a council of Englishmen appointed for that purpose.  I said the British Parliament, Mr. Speaker, but I made a mistake.  The British Parliament had nothing to do with this measure, and they are even now beginning to criticise it.  It was the British Council for India.

Now, sir, we are asked here deliberately to repeal this law, and I want to call the attention of my friends on this side of the House, who proclaim themselves to be friends of free coinage at a reasonable ratio --- I want to call their attention to this point and to ask them this question:  Why do you gentlemen insist that you will repeal this law and send silver down probably 15 cents an ounce before you fix the ratio ?  Is that an act friendly to silver ?  Can any gentleman here face his free-coinage constituency and defend his vote subtracting from the value of silver 15 cents an ounce before he votes to fix the ratio ?  I dare him to undertake it.  He cannot do it.

It may be convenient to follow the recommendations of the President, but the President does not elect the members of this House.  We do not hold our commissions from the Executive, and I am afraid that if some of us undertake to act here upon that line, when our present commissions expire we shall have all the leisure that we want to study the silver question in peace and quietness at home. [Laughter.]  For myself I feel it to be a conscientious duty to carry out my convictions on this subject, and I owe it to my constituents to represent what I believe to be their interests.  Why are we rushed in here and asked to repeal the only law that sustains, for the moment, at least, the value of silver, before we fix the ratio ?  There is no consistency in it;  none whatever.

The claim is not sincere that the President expects hereafter to recommend bimetallism, for he does not do it in his message, and that claim misrepresents his position.  He recommends the reverse.  The concluding paragraph of the message means, if it means anything, that after you shall have totally demonetized silver by repealing this Sherman act, you will be required to go further in the same direction;  and I make a prediction here and now, and, my friends, I want you to watch the proceedings of Congress in these coming weeks of this extra session, or of the next regular session, to see whether I am right or not.

My prediction is that in order to carry out the recommendations of that message we shall be called upon to sell bonds to procure gold.  For what ?  To redeem all our pecuniary obligations, according to the very language of that message in that money which is recognized by the principal nations of the world.

Why did not the President say "gold" ? [Laughter.]  We know what his language means. [Laughter.]  You are asked to load up the Federal Treasury with gold, to redeem every pecuniary obligation of the Government with gold, although the standard silver dollar is the identical dollar on which bond obligations were based when they were issued, because they called for coin of the standard value at the time of their issue, and that was the standard.

But now, I repeat, we shall have to redeem all this bullion, all these Sherman notes, in gold;  we shall have to sell bonds to get gold to redeem all our greenbacks, all our silver certificates, and we will be compelled to carry our silver dollars as so much dead weight of bullion in the Treasury, so that we might as well dump them into the Potomac.  That is what all this means.  In other words, every piece of paper money issued in this country to-day, every silver certificate, every greenback, every bond, every Sherman note, is to be redeemed in gold, and we must procure the gold for their redemption.

What, then, are you to do with your silver bullion and with all your silver dollars, together about $500,000,000 ?  They are to be demonetized as a base metal, and you know it.  I am talking to intelligent gentlemen who have read that message, and there is not an intelligent gentleman here who has read it who can misunderstand it.  Why should you go on, then, to try to deceive yourselves and your constituents on this subject ?  There is no silver in that message, and gentlemen on the other side will simply do themselves and the subject justice if, hereafter, in the course of their debate, they will leave silver out of it, because they are proposing a measure in which there is no consideration whatever for silver.

Mr. Speaker, it may be necessary, and probably is, that I go somewhat into the discussion of the silver question on its merits.  I have alluded to these preliminary matters which have been thrown in, and have tried to state that no legislation which we can enact here is going to relieve the panic.  This panic has been brought about for the express purpose of repealing this law;  there is no question about that.  We were threatened last winter with a gold premium.  I stated then on this floor, and I state now, that there is no gold premium.  On the contrary, I believe the people are now paying a premium for silver and silver certificates.  We were urged that we must issue more bonds, that if we did not we were to have a panic.  All the newspapers, of the East especially, were advertising a panic if we did not issue bonds.  We did not issue them.  The Secretary of the Treasury was threatened with a panic if he did not comply with the demand, and he refused.

Those who were interested in getting up this panic began to refuse loans, to cramp, to draw in currency.  Many of the banks which had been engaged in booming real estate, or in other questionable transactions, and were consequently weak, began to fail.  Stocks, called industrial stocks, that had been watered in Wall street, cordage trusts, lead trusts, whisky trusts, railroad stocks that had been watered, began to tumble down to something like reasonable rates, and you had a panic.  Banks which were weak began to fail, and the people began a run on banks which were strong.  The whole country became alarmed.  People began to take their money out of the banks and put it into safe-deposit vaults or into their safes at home.  It is said they ought to let their money remain in the banks.  Well, probably they ought to do so;  but what is the difference ?  The banks are afraid to let the money go out if they have it.

Now, the panic has come;  and those who conspired to bring it about have got more than they bargained for.  The idea is that we can relieve this panic by the repeal of the Sherman law.  Why, Mr. Speaker, I say right here (and history will bear me out in the statement) that while there was some alarm in the country before, yet the moment the British Government demonetized silver in India, then the panic began in earnest ---not before;  that precipitated this panic in its present shape.  We all understand that.  In this way desolation was brought into many of the States of this Union, and men who had before been prosperous and happy were by the thousands sent as tramps throughout the land.

All parts of the country have felt the effects.  It is this fight upon silver that has precipitated this panic;  and the repeal of the Sherman law will only intensify it, not relieve it.  The panic will be relieved when everything gets so low that people see they can make money by buying;  when they begin to buy, prices will go up;  and when everybody is buying, money will come from its hoarding places and you will have some relief.  In no other way will relief come.

Gold is coming to us to-day.  Notwithstanding we are told the people across the water are afraid to invest here for fear that we will not pay in gold, yet these people are sustaining prices today and sending here all the money that they can spare.  There was a panic in gold-using Australia that has bankrupted that whole people and sent terror to the banks all over England.  We know that gold can not be obtained there except by paying for it;  yet it is coming here.

Talk about a premium on gold;  here is the Treasury of the United States that is open to the plunder of every speculator in the civilized world.  He can take his Sherman note or his greenback or any other Government currency there and get gold without cost.  Did you ever notice the names of these gentlemen in New York who are shipping gold abroad, or bringing it back ?  Every one of those names that I have seen has a foreign termination;  every one of those gentlemen, so far as I am advised, is an agent or branch bank of some bank across the water.

If you go to the Bank of England to get gold for export, you must pay a premium on it;  if you go to the Bank of France to get gold for export you must pay a premium on it.  The case is the same with every other banking house in Europe;  no gold can be obtained there without paying a premium.  But here is the Treasury of the United States professing to be so helpless that it can not prevent every gold speculator from robbing the Government of its gold.  Our Treasury will not pay out the silver which it might pay.

The Bank of France will pay out silver, or will charge a premium on gold if it is wanted for anything but domestic use.  But the Treasury of the United States, instead of paying out gold and silver in equal quantities and thus preserving its gold (if it is necessary to preserve it, though I see no necessity of preserving it, for all our money is at a premium to-day), lets everybody go there and get as much gold as he pleases.  Why not pay out the silver when we have more of it than we have of gold, or pay out gold when we have more of it than of silver, and thus protect ourselves ?

It is because the Administration is hostile to silver;  and thus it is surrendering this country to the Shylocks of the Old World who have made war upon it.  The aristocracy of western Europe has absolutely tabooed silver in those countries;  driven it away from there.  Here it finds its only resting place.  The last fight for the white metal is to be made here in this country and in this House, my friends.  Will you stand by it now, or will you let the Shylocks come and have their way ?  It is for you to determine.

I think, Mr. Speaker, that we can trust the people of this country on a question of as vital importance as this.  The question is now before us.  This is its last resort.  Will you virtually demonetize the money of nearly 70,000,000 of people, with a vast empire of 3,000,000 of square miles, a people thirsting for money to open up new railroads, to establish new factories, to operate new places of business, to inaugurate new industries;  70,000,000 of people demanding money, twice what we have to day, a new people, a new country, a free people;  or they ought to be free whether they are or not ?

Are you to give up the fight and let this vast body of our wealth go to ruin ?  I do not believe it.  We know well enough that if we repeal this law and give nothing for it, the people of this country will regard it as a total demonetization of silver, which it will be so far as this Congress is concerned, without any question.

Now, my friends ---and I do not care whether you are Democrats or Republicans, or who you are, but I appeal to you, especially as Democrats--- when in 1890 in nearly every State of this Union the Democratic party in its platforms demanded free and unlimited coinage of silver, when you embodied it in your great Chicago national platform, when the Democratic party has, for years, stood before the House and the country as the bulwark in defense of the white metal, in the face of all of these things are you now to desert the cause and surrender the fight ?  Can you afford to do it ?  Will you go to your people and tell them that you are not able to carry out the pledges of your platform, the promises upon which you were sent here, or any part of it, except that which resulted in the total demonetization of silver and the sacrifice of their interests ?

What does free coinage of silver mean ?  It means that the holders of silver bullion, at some ratio to be fixed in the bill, may go to the mints of the Government and have it struck into the legal-tender money of the country and deposit the dollars so coined, if the holder so desires, and have a certificate issued to him in place of it.  What is the effect of unlimited coinage of silver in this country, and I invite your attention to this particularly, because it is a question of vital importance ?  It means that the silver coins of the United States, at whatever ratio is fixed ---and I want the present ratio that we have now, 16 to 1, maintained precisely as it is---, it means that the silver of the world can come here in exchange for what we have to sell.

Yes, it means that the silver of the whole world can come here.  But they say that we will be flooded with the world's silver, that it will be dumped down upon us.  Now, let us see about that for a moment.  It means that anyone with 16 ounces of silver can come here from any part of the world, or with 1 ounce of gold, and he can buy your grain, he can buy your house and lot, he can buy your manufactured product, and buy the property and commodities of all sorts that you have to sell with either the one or the other;  that is to say, he can buy just as much with his 16 ounces of silver as with his 1 ounce of gold.

With the billions upon billions of property existing in this country to-day, and being produced in this country every year, we simply offer to exchange that which we have in abundance on a basis of 1 pound of gold as the equivalent of 16 pounds of silver.

We invite, then, the world to come with its silver and make the exchange.  No nation now, it is true, offers in exchange for silver the gold at any fixed ratio;  consequently all the silver that is coined is used in the countries where it is coined.  And why ?  Because no great power offers to exchange commodities for one metal or the other at any fixed ratio.  That is the only trouble with silver to-day.

Now, it must be remembered that France gave an example to the world in this regard, having kept its silver on a parity with gold for a period of seventy years on a ratio of 15½ to 1.  It said to the nations of the world, "Come with your gold and your silver, 15½ ounces of silver or 1 of gold, and you can buy all of our salable property in France and you can pay us in silver or in gold, just as you choose, on that basis."  And according to the report of the British royal commission of 1888 on that subject, France was enabled to maintain the parity of the two metals at that ratio, for the reason that she had property enough to effect exchanges on that basis.  We are in the same condition.

What is it, then, that you are asked to do ?  It is that we, the Government of the United States, we as a people say to all the world, especially the silver-using people, all of the Asiatic nations and the Great Indies, come here with your white metal if you choose to come, and trade with us on the basis of 16 to 1 and buy your commodities from us at that ratio.  When you do that, will not the silver-using people of the world come to our shores to make their purchases rather than go to the European powers, where they demand a ratio of from 22 to 25 ?  There can be no doubt of the answer to that question.

You at once undermine and sap the prosperity of western Europe.  You will divert from them all the trade of every silver-using country in the world, because you offer to sell those people property and commodities here that are better, and on better terms, than they can get anywhere else in the world.  You say their silver will come here.  Suppose it does.  It will go back again, because here is the flood gate that is opened for gold and silver to come and to go with the tides of trade, of free exchange, in this the greatest country the world ever saw.  It will come and it will go, and so it will continue;  because we have opened up the mint, we have opened sluice for the dam that now blockades the silver tide.

Do you suppose England could stand that for a moment ?  Certainly not.  What has made the manufacturers in Manchester, England, the strongest bimetallists in the world to-day ?  Simply the fact that they must sell their commodities in India for the India rupee.  They are thus interested in the value of that silver rupee.  They want to maintain it;  and if all the manufacturing products of western Europe that are sent here and sold to us are sold for silver, as they must be, or gold at our ratio, do you not see how quickly you will convert them all to bimetalism ?  Thus you will segregate all the industrial inhabitants of western Europe from those who live on fixed incomes;  the aristocracy, the bondholders, and the coupon clippers.  That is all there is about it, and we want to segregate from.

You see, then, that when we do this in this country western Europe must come to our standard or abandon commerce with all silver-using countries, and with us.  Mark that.  We are the best market in the world for manufactured European products.  They can not live without this market, and they can not keep this market unless they recognize and take our silver at the same value that we take it;  and they know it.  I know that the gold owners in that country and this ---the bond-holders and bankers, those who are living on fixed incomes, and who are living on interest, and whose business it is to loan money and to have that money increase in value from year to year--- they fight this proposition as a matter of course;  but I do not think they ought to do it, for ultimately I think they would be benefited, as would the industrial people of the world.  They ought not to fight it.  They know what I state is truth, that if this country gives free coinage of gold and silver at a fair ratio it settles the question for the world and drives the world to bi-metallism instead of gold mono-metallism.  They know that, and hence their eagerness and determination to prevent it.

It is a fight between the standards;  and this great country must settle it, and you, my friends, must think about settling it here.  It is a serious question.  It is not only a serious question for the American people, but we are appealed to by the oppressed in the Old World, those who have not the voice that our people in their sovereignty have.  The oppressed of the Old World are appealing to us to settle for the world this great question, and to settle it not for men who are seeking advantages in the stock markets, not for men who are seeking advantages in bondbolding, in interest drawing, in money lending, in seeking to have money increase in value every day and every year, but for the great toiling and producing masses of the other countries as well as our own, for whom it is our proud province here to think about and to legislate.  They are in a panic, my friends.  I want to remind you of that, and they will remind you of it when you go home if you are not reminded of it now.  The people are watching this thing.  They understand that the battle to be fought here is the battle of the standards the world over, and the man who fails now they will brand as a traitor to the cause which is intrusted to his hands.

Now, Mr. Speaker, in this line of my remarks I wish to have read from the Clerk's desk an extract from the Parliamentary Report to which I have referred.

The Clerk read as follows:

191.  The explanation commonly offered of these constant variations in the silver market is that the rise or depression of the price of silver depends upon the briskness or slackness of the demand for the purpose of remittance to silver-using countries, and that the price is largely affected by the amount of the bills sold from time to time by the secretary of state for India in council.

But these causes were, as far as can be seen, operating prior to 1873, as well as subsequent to that date, and yet the silver market did not display the sensitiveness to these influences from day to day and month to month which it now does.

192.  These considerations seem to suggest the existence of some steadying influence in former periods, which has now been removed, and which has left the silver market subject to the free influence of causes, the full effect of which was previously kept in check.

The question therefore forces itself upon us:  Is there any other circumstance calculated to affect the relation of silver to gold which distinguishes the later period from the earlier ?

Now, undoubtedly, the date which forms the dividing line between an epoch of approximate fixity in the relative value of gold and silver and one of marked instability, is the year when the bimetallic system which had previously been in force in the Latin Union ceased to be in full operation;  and we are irresistibly led to the conclusion that the operation of that system, established as it was in countries the population and commerce of which were considerable, exerted a material influence upon the relative value of the two metals.

So long as that system was in force we think that, notwithstanding the changes in the production and use of the precious metals, it kept the market price of silver approximately steady at the ratio by law between them, namely, 15½ to 1.

When once the conclusion is arrived at that this was the case, the circumstances on which we have dwelt as characterizing the period since 1873 appear amply sufficient to account for the fall in the price or silver, tending as they all do in that direction;  and the fact that on any particular day the supply of silver and of council bills may be large while the need of remittance is small, and vice versa, would explain the constant fluctuations in the price of silver which have manifested themselves in recent years.

193.  Nor does it appear to us a priori unreasonable to suppose that the existence in the Latin Union of a bimetallic system with a ratio of 15½ to 1 fixed between the two metals should have been capable of keeping the market price or silver steady at approximately that ratio.

The view that it could only affect the market price to the extent to which there was a demand for it for currency purposes in the Latin Union, or to which it was actually taken to the mints of those countries, is, we think, fallacious.

The fact that the owner of silver could, in the last resort, take it to those mints and have it converted into coin which would purchase commodities at the ratio of 15.5 of silver to 1 of gold, would, in our opinion, be likely to affect the price of silver in the market generally, whoever the purchaser and for whatever country it was destined.  It would enable the seller to stand out for a price approximating to the legal ratio and would tend to keep the market steady at about that point.

194.  It has been urged that during the earlier of the two periods which we have been contrasting, the conditions which existed from time to time were favorable to the maintenance of the legal ratio;  that the great influx of gold towards the middle of this century found France with a large stock of silver, and that this silver, owing to exceptional circumstances, had a ready outlet to India.

But we do not think this affords an adequate solution of the problem without taking into account the existence of the bimetallic system.  It may be true that the circumstances referred to were conditions which helped to make the bimetallic system operative.  But as we have observed before, circumstances and conditions of a like nature have been more or less operative both before and since 1873, and yet the effect on the relative value of the two metals has been very different.

195.  It is said that the altered circumstances since 1873 would have rendered it impossible to maintain silver at the former ratio, even if the Latin Union had not abandoned the free mintage of silver, and that sooner or later the bimetallic system must have broken down and its steadying influence have ceased.

To estimate the force of causes without adequate experience of their effects in the past is a matter of extreme difficulty.  But even if it were true that the Latin Union would not have been able down to the present time to preserve silver from falling below the legal ratio, this does not prove that the views which we have propounded as to the causes of the former stability of the gold price of silver and or its present unstable condition, are incorrect.

Whether silver would ultimately have fallen to its present price, and whether the Latin Union could now, by reversing its action and reopening its mints, restore silver to its former gold value, and reestablish the former condition of stability, are questions very material to another part of the case, but the determination of which is not essential to the particular point with which we are now dealing.

Mr. Culberson.  Mr. Speaker, as the time of the gentleman from Missouri is about to expire, I ask unanimous consent that he may be allowed to use such time as is necessary in order to complete his argument.

The Speaker pro tempore (Mr. Outhwaite in the chair).  The gentleman from Texas asks unanimous consent that the gentleman from Missouri have such time as he desires in which to complete his argument.  Is there objection ?

(After a pause.)  The Chair hears none, and it is so ordered.

Mr. Bland.  Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Texas and the House for the courtesy.

If the gentlemen have given attention to the statement just read, I think they will attach all the importance to it that it deserves, especially as I say that it has been promulgated by twelve experts appointed by the British Parliament, one-half of whom were gold monometallists and among the ablest financiers of Europe, and I desire to read a brief extract when the document is returned to me.  But I want to call attention to the principle they state.  They admit that France was enabled to maintain silver on a parity with gold at the ratio of 15½ to 1.  They admit it, state it, and gave the reason why.  It is admitted by Herschel, the gentleman who was chairman of this committee that secured the demonetization of silver in India, and it is also admitted by Goschen, both of whom are monometallists.

Now, what was the principle laid down ?  They say in so many words that France had fixed the ratio at 15.5 to 1 and that France had told the nations of the world "you could come herewith your gold and your silver and you can buy all that France has, and you can buy as much for 15.5 ounces of silver as you can with 1 ounce of gold."  France was able to do that because it was an important country.  The report cites the Latin Union, but we all know that France is substantially the Latin Union.  It was because it was a country of sufficient power to make those exchanges by which it could keep the parity between gold and silver the world over;  because the world could come there and exchange it for property at that rate;  and why ?  Why, they say no matter where anyone had silver bullion, wherever it be in the world, the owner would not take any less at that spot for it than he could get in France, less the cost of transportation, and he could hold it for that value.

Now, we frequently hear it said that if we adopt a ratio of 16 to 1 and coin silver, it will have no effect except in this country;  but if it is coined at that ratio it will affect silver everywhere, because the world would know that they could take it at that rate and get that amount for it in the United States.  Now, I will read from the report of that commission:

The fact that the owner of silver could, in the last resort, take it to those mints and have it converted into coin which would purchase commodities at the ratio of 15.5 silver to 1 of gold, would, in our opinion, be likely to affect the price of silver in the market generally, whoever the purchaser and for whatever country it was destined.  It would enable the seller to stand up for a price approximating to the legal ratio and tend to keep the market steadily about that point.

Why, the gold monometallists here tell us that it will run the gold out of the country.  Those monometallists, whom I have read from, do not say that, and it is not true.  They say you will exchange commodities for it, that you will buy commodities for silver and gold at a fixed ratio;  and because the holders of the silver anywhere in the world can come here with it and exchange it for commodities, silver will be used as much as gold at a fixed ratio;  and it will not matter whether they pay in silver or gold.  Then you will see the parity between gold and silver restored and maintained at this rate.  France did it, in a territory not so large as the State represented on the floor by my distinguished friend who did me the honor to have my time extended, having 38,000,000 of people.

Now, I say, Mr. Speaker, the contention that we lose our gold, and that we have got to exchange gold for silver, does not hold good.  It is put on the broad proposition of a nation which produces enough wealth;  and where is the nation under the shining Sun that compares with this growing country of ours in population and increasing development ?  I believe that I may yet live to see this country with nearly 100,000,000 inhabitants, increasing, as it does, at the rate of over a million and a half annually.

Many now born, by the time they are voters, will compose part of a nation containing perhaps 125,000,000 of people, with unsurpassed energies, with a genius nowhere equaled, and with a vast territory upon which those energies and that genius can operate.  But a short time ago when you looked across the Alleghany Mountains you beheld the western wilderness roamed only by the savage and the wild beast.  To-day it is teeming with its millions of civilized people, the great Mississippi Valley, and when you cross the Mississippi you just begin to enter the great domain of this country of ours, for more than two-thirds of it lies beyond the Father of Waters.  And, Mr. Speaker, it is that two-thirds of our territory, rich as it is in gold and silver, embedded together in the same deposits, in the same mountains, so that you can not extract the one without extracting the other ---it is that portion of our territory that would give us the money that we need, the money of the world, good money, hard money, Democratic money [laughter and applause]--- a country that the civilized world must look to for its future monetary supply if it is to continue on what is called the hard-money basis.  And yet we are to-day asked to do what ?  To lay the blighting hand of confiscation upon the millions of people inhabiting that country, to turn them out as tramps upon the land, merely to satisfy the greed of English gold.

Oh, my God, shall we do such a thing as that ? [Applause.]  Will you crush the people of your own land and send them abroad as tramps, will you kill and destroy your own industries, and especially the production of your precious metals that ought to be sent abroad everywhere ---will you do this simply to satisfy the greed of Wall street, the mere agent of Lombard street in oppressing the people of Europe and of this country ?  It can not be done, it shall not be done !  I speak for the great masses of the Mississippi Valley, and those west of it, when I say you shall not do it ! [Applause.]

Any political party that undertakes to do it will, in God's name, be trampled, as it ought to be trampled, into the dust of condemnation now and in the future. [Applause.]  Speaking as a Democrat, all my life battling for what I conceived to be Democracy and what I conceived to be right, I am yet an American above Democracy. [Applause.]  I do not intend, we do not intend, that any party shall survive, if we can help it, that will lay the confiscating hand upon Americans in the interest of England or of Europe.  Now, mark it.  This maybe strong language, but heed it.  The people mean it, and, my friends of Eastern Democracy, we bid farewell when you do that thing. [Applause.]

Now, you can take your choice of sustaining America against England, American interests, and American laborers and producers, or you can go out of power.  We have come to the parting of the ways.  I do not pretend to speak for anybody but myself and my constituents, but I believe that I do speak for the great masses of the great Mississippi Valley when I say that we will not submit to the domination of any political party, however much we may love it, that lays the sacrificing hand upon silver and will demonetize it in this country.  For myself I will not support such a policy here or elsewhere, but will denounce it, and as a Democrat I will denounce it as un-Democratic and un-American, and will ask the people of this country to condemn it as they ought to have condemned the so-called Democrats engaged in it as the agents, the tools ---I withdraw that word, but I will say as the representatives, unintentionally, of the money power and the moneyed interests, and not of the masses of the American people. [Applause.]

Gentlemen, you can not hold the Democratic party together on that line.  You can not pledge yourselves to bimetallism in your platform and ignore it in your legislation.  We pledged ourselves in the first place to tariff reform, and the people had a right to expect us to deal with that first.  In my part of the country we were told to let silver alone;  that we already had a law on that subject.  They said to us:  "Do not disturb that question, but take up the tariff;  we are united on the tariff [laughter on the Republican side];  let us take up the tariff and reform and reduce it;  the tariff is doing us great injury, let us attend to that first."  We thought that declaration was sincere and we thought the first thing to be taken up was the repeal of the McKinley bill.

Well, now, my people of the Mississippi Valley believed that you would let silver alone, that you would not try to demonetize it, that you would let it stand where it is;  they believed the tariff would be considered first.  But when you come to say that you are going to demonetize silver, let me tell you that this is a bigger question than the tariff or anything else.  This battle of the standards is a world-wide question.  The question is whether we are to be put upon a gold standard;  and that question is one which in importance is away beyond the year by year regulation of your revenue.

We voted the ticket in good faith;  we expected that the platform would be carried out as was promised ---that we would have tariff revision, and that when we came to the money question it would be regulated according to the Chicago platform, that we should have the free coinage of silver, which in itself would destroy this makeshift.  But lo and behold, we find that we were tricked, that we were deceived. [Laughter.]  And I use that language advisedly.  I believe it was not intended by our Eastern Democratic friends that tariff reform should be considered first, but their main, if not their sole, object was to put their hands upon silver and demonetize it and let tariff reform take care of itself afterward. [Laughter.]  And here we are, just in that situation.  Reduce the tariff 25 per cent, yet make money in gold 25 per cent more valuable, the tariff remains as great a burden as ever.  It takes the same quantity of wheat, corn, pork, and cotton to pay it as before.

Now, I tell you I am not going to submit to it.  You may pass your bill and do these things;  but if you do, we are going to cut loose from you.  You may go ahead, but you will never trick us again.  I am speaking for my people.  Do not charge me with being a radical or a fanatic or with indulging in threats.  I speak the sentiment of the masses of the people I represent, and they are resolved upon the policy I have stated.  I would not say so if it were not true.

Now, Mr. Speaker, as I have already stated, the silver question, as now presented, is not the question we have had presented to us in the past.  It is true that in what has been called the Bland coinage act we passed in this House a free coinage bill (I mean not in this particular body, but in the House of Representatives) by a large majority ---by a two-thirds vote.  But when it went to the Senate there was engrafted upon it a provision requiring the purchase of at least $2,000,000 worth of silver each month and not exceeding $4,000,000 worth and its coinage into standard silver dollars.  That was a bullion purchase bill.  But mark the distinction:  It required every dollar of that bullion to be coined into money as fast as purchased;  and it required the issue on that money of certificates redeemable in silver.  To that extent the measure was in the line of bimetallism.  The only difficulty was the limitation as to the amount.  But the present law repealed that law.

You do not propose now to put us back to where we were when you repealed that act, which was adopted as a compromise measure providing for the purchase of from two million to four million dollars worth of silver per month.  You propose to wipe out the act of repeal and to leave us where ?  You propose to remit us to the demonetizing act of 1873, which in all my section of country the Democratic party on every stump has denounced as the monumental fraud of the nineteenth century.  Here is a Democratic House proposing to go right back to that act.  When you do so, you will be guilty of a greater fraud than that act itself.  I speak advisedly when I say that if the Democratic party, after all the pledges it has made in regard to silver in its platforms, national and State, should take the country back to its condition under the act of 1873, you will have consummated the monumental fraud of the nineteenth century, because we never expected much from Mr. Sherman or his party;  they never made many promises, as we have.  If we now violate in the light of day every pledge that we have made, we shall be convicted of insincerity, of betraying the people who sent us here, of bowing our necks meekly to the yoke of Wall street.

If Democracy means anything, it is that those who come here from the people to represent them should carry out their pledges in good faith.  It does not mean that we are to pass an act which (though some people say it will stop the panic) will put a yoke upon your constituencies for probably centuries to come.

I spoke of the British royal commission as having laid down the principles by which bimetallism was maintained in France;  and I contend that this Government can maintain it upon the same principles, and at the ratio of 16 to 1.  Yet the House will have the opportunity to vote on different ratios.  My objection to changing the ratio is, in the first place, that the ratio of 16 to 1 is that which now exists.  It is the ratio of the standard silver dollar, which is still the standard silver dollar that it always was.  It is the law of the land and basis of equities between debtor and creditor.

Some gentlemen say that gold is the unit of value and the standard.  What was meant by the unit of value was simply that the dollar was the unit of account from which we should reckon both down and up ---down into fractions and up into multiples.  It was merely the unit of account for Government accounts and private debts and everything computed in dollars and cents.  That is what it meant. And that unit was to be coined in silver.  That was the original act.  Whether the unit of value as it appeared in the act of 1873 was intended to mean anything more than the unit of account, I do not care.  If it was, then, according to that construction, the silver dollar was the unit of value until 1873.  It was the only dollar authorized and coined until 1849, when the gold dollar was authorized to be coined.  But the silver dollar was the unit.

Now, in the act of 1878, the title reads "An act for the coinage of the standard silver dollar and to restore its legal-tender character."  The context refers to the act of 1837, and the coining of the dollar authorized there with the same superscription, which is the same standard dollar, the silver dollar, that has been identically the same in all of the history of our country.  That act restored that standard as the standard dollar, and displaced the gold dollar.  There is no question about that.  We do not coin the gold dollar at all to-day.  It is prohibited to be done at the mints, and the only dollar that is coined is the silver dollar;  and I repeat, sir, I deny that the gold dollar is the standard of value.

When we resumed specie payments and came from the midst of the greenback circulation to coin payments, we emerged with a standard silver dollar coined at the mints, and had been for nearly a year.  In all of our business obligations, in all of our contracts since the resumption of specie payments, we refer to the standard silver dollar.  We have been coining them, and our contracts rest on silver as well as on gold.  But you want to eliminate them altogether and put everything on a gold basis.  But I repeat, sir, I deny the assumption that the gold dollar is the standard.  I assert that the silver dollar is now, as it has always been, the unit of value in this country, and therefore that the unlimited coinage of silver will place bullion silver at par at the mints and in the world's markets equally with gold, according to the Chicago platform.  It must necessarily do it, and we will comply with the platform and its pledges by coining our silver at a ratio of 16 to 1.  For you must take notice that all of the silver in circulation in the world to-day, coined with reference to any ratio to gold, is about 15.5, or below that amount.  Four billions of silver money is in circulation at a coinage ratio of about 15.5, while ours is 16 to 1.  We have departed so far from the coinage ratio of the world as to go above 15.5.  But why ?

What reason is there for going above 16 to 1 ?  I say, sir, and the statistics will demonstrate the fact, that if you go back for the last twenty years and compare the production of gold with that of silver, that the ratio of production will be found to be about 15.5, or between that and 16 to 1.  Of course within the last four or five years the production of silver has increased, but you must take, in making comparisons of this character, long periods and not a few years.  Take then, for this purpose, the production of silver for the last twenty years or since the price of silver has begun to fall, and the comparative production of the two metals is about 15.5, or something below 16 to 1.

There is, then, no reason why we should change the existing ratio, except we admit in order to change the ratio that restoring silver to its proper and legitimate function will not restore its value.  No country has been trying to do it for the last twenty years, and I want this country to try it. [Applause.]

Here is a country which, in the direction of its resources, is larger to-day than France, England, and Germany thrown together.  I say that advisedly.  I do not mean that it is larger in population, for we have not got the population.  I do not mean greater in its visible wealth, for we have not that;  but I do mean in our resources to be developed, in our demands for money as a new people.  They are old and effete and worn out, and doomed to particular habits.

We are progressing and demanding money every day.  Every new factory that is started in this country is a direct demand upon the monetary supply, and a contraction of the currency to that extent.  Every railroad that is built is a demand upon your volume of money, and a contraction of the currency to that extent, as compared to everything else.  Every farm that is opened is a new demand for money, and a contraction of the volume of currency;  and here we are opening up vast territories, and we ought to open up more still.  All these things demand money and must draw upon the present supply, and to that extent the currency is contracted, as compared to everything else.

Now, you can not do business on a contracted currency in this country.  So that I say we are not to be compared with those people;  and when you compare us, in the way of new demands, new developments, in population to be increased, we are greater than all of them combined;  and when a gentleman admits that France and England and Germany, or two of them or all of them, could fix the ratio, they admit that this country can do more than all of them together. [Applause.]  There is no question about that.  You admit all the argument there is in it when you admit that much;  and here is a commission composed of the most eminent experts of the Old World, a gold commission which admits that France did this thing, and practically admits that France could still do it if she wanted to.

We have been befogged upon this subject.  We have been misled and misrepresented.  It is difficult to get a silver argument into the subsidized press of this country, and it seems that nearly all the metropolitan papers are included in that term.  They will talk about nothing but banks and bonds and gold, and they control practically the press;  but the great argument is to come at last, and will come unless you settle it here.  It will not stop, but it will be settled.

But if you say we are not able to fix the ratio at 16 to 1, we have offered other propositions.  I have stated that I will not vote against a free-coinage bill because the House may fix a ratio that I do not like.  I do believe, and I admit the proposition, that the fixing of the ratio is a fair question for discussion and debate;  but I do assert that, as a constitutional question, free coinage is enjoined by the Constitution, notwithstanding the learned argument of the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Rayner] to the contrary. [Laughter.]  The Constitution inhibits any State in this Union from making anything a legal tender except gold and silver, and it confers upon Congress the sole power to coin money and regulate its value.

Now, does that mean that a State shall make nothing a legal tender, and that Congress will refuse to make anything a legal tender ?  If the States have conferred a power upon Congress, the exercise of which is necessary to the life of the States, I say it is treason to the States to deny that right as a legal proposition.  The States have given up the power to coin money and to make legal tender, and have conferred that power upon Congress.  If Congress refuses to exercise this power which is necessary to the very existence of the State, it is, so to speak, disunion.  We ought to give back, then, to the States the power to coin money and regulate its value and to make legal tender.

Now, Mr. Speaker, here we are.  No State in this Union can coin money or make anything a legal tender except gold and silver.  We are denying to them a privilege conferred by the Constitution of this country, which says they may make gold and silver a legal tender.  Yet we will not coin it, will not conform to the Constitution and do our duty.  Not only that, but "coin money" means an automatic supply.  One of the arguments that you can adduce in favor of coin money in place of paper money is that coin money can not be overissued, and that is the most important distinction.

Another argument is that it is not so easily burned up.  The metals are not so easily destroyed.  Many other qualities pertain to it which it is not necessary to explain;  but the great thought underlying all is that the supply of gold and silver is limited by nature, that contracts are based upon the stock on hand, accumulated for ages, as the world has grown up in business;  that the values of contracts are fixed by the money of the world thus accumulated, and that the annual supply is so small in amount compared with the vast stock on hand ---hardly 1 per cent a year--- that you can not impair the equity of contracts by largely inflating the volume of money, nor very seriously disturb property values by lowering the value of the money by a large supply.

But here we want to interfere with that automatic supply.  When we have free coinage and the mints open, the production of gold and silver supplies the volume in the manner I have stated;  for you make all the stocks of gold and silver on hand and all that comes in the future a part of the possible monetary supply.  Nature limits the supply, so that we can not overissue it if we want to.  Very good;  but some wise people about twenty years ago thought that this continuing supply of gold and silver was interfering with those holding bonds and drawing interest, and living on fixed incomes.  They thought the production of silver was going to be largely increased, and would probably lower the value of both gold and silver as money, and hence they undertook by legislation to prevent the automatic supply of money and to inhibit the coinage of one of the precious metals in order to protect the volume of money from that increase.

Now, we had better be on a paper system than a system like that.  If we are to regulate the volume of money by prohibiting the coinage of one of the metals, why not abandon the metals altogether and go to paper at once ?  We are asked to believe that the contention is true that we do not need much money anyhow, because 90 per cent of the business of the world is done on credit.  Why not 100 per cent, and get rid of money altogether ? [Laughter and applause.]

The time has come, my friends, when credit goes very slow and a little money very much faster.  There is always a day of liquidation, and you must have the money.  But, as I said before, if 90 per cent is credit money, why not a 100 per cent ?  Let us print credit money, but let that money rest upon the credit of the Government and not upon the credit of some bankers in London or Wall street.  There is about 90 per cent of the American people who do not know anything about credit.  They have to do their business on a cash basis.  They must have money.  The concluding part of our bill provides that the dollar coined, whatever it may be, may be deposited and a silver certificate issued on it, as now provided by law;  so that if you reach a ratio of 18, 19, or 20 to 1, you still have the same right to a certificate that you have to-day.

Mr. Heard.  I rise to a point of order.  There is so much confusion in the House that we cannot hear the gentleman speak.

The Speaker.  The House will be in order.

Mr. Bland.  Now, Mr. Speaker, in closing this argument and as stated, an argument entirely without preparation ---not expecting that I would speak to it at all to-day--- I wish to say that the time has come when we will have to decide whether or not this country is to come to mono-metallism or bi-metallism.  I think it is the duty of this House, and especially of my associates, to settle this money question, and to settle it on the lines I have pointed out, not by piecemeal, and not by a repeal of an act that sustains the value of silver before fixing the ratio, not to demonetize silver and then undertake to restore it afterwards;  but we have time now to arrange, according to the principles of bi-metallism, a measure in conformity with our promise to the American people;  and we ask our friends on the other side of this question ---our Democratic friends on this side, who are so eager to get rid of the Sherman law, so called, and which I do not defend upon any other principle than that it is the only law which sustains silver until we can fix the ratio--- I ask them to come in all fairness and enable us to carry out our pledges to restore bi-metallism to this country.  If you do not, yours is the responsibility, not ours. [Loud applause.]

Mr. Pence [Lafayette Pence (1857-1923) Colorado, Peoples Party (populist), one-time representative;  studied law, admitted to the bar].  Mr. Speaker, were it not for the extraordinary interest of the people who have sent me here, in the solution of this question and in the termination of this discussion, I certainly should not presume, a new member, and here upon the first day of the discussion, to take advantage of the opportunity given me by grace of the Speaker of the House.  But there is not a district, saving and excepting only the district of my colleague from Colorado, whose people, old and young, all of them, will watch with as much concern the developments of the next fourteen days.

I was sorry, Mr. Speaker, to note the tone and words of the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Rayner] who opened this discussion;  sorry to see him carry here what we have seen carried now so long through the columns of the metropolitan press, a disposition to treat those of us in Western districts who happen to live in the rugged hills where silver is digged, as if we were foreigners or aliens.  I do not exactly gather the reason why the gentleman from Maryland should speak of the Treasury Department acting the part of a pawnbroker to the silver miners of Colorado and Nevada.  Mayhap the gentleman knows more of pawnbroking than I do;  I know but little.  Maybe it was because as I thought then, the sign that is hung out is a golden sign, and the strife within is to deliberately, constantly, always, Jew down the men who bring the silver to them.  That that has been the policy of the present Department is now beyond doubt.

It seems to me, Mr. Speaker, that the gentleman might have passed by any such allusion as he made to those who have builded up the empires of Colorado and Nevada.  It is true that the people of Colorado mine silver, and, under the law since 1873, are compelled to sell it and can not coin it.  It is true that they must come with it as a commodity, and not as a coin metal, and it is because the people of that section have come to understand that the platform promises were what the gentleman from Maryland called them, "glittering ketch words" ---I suppose "catch words" was intended--- that within the last twelve months there has been there, not only within the canyons among our hills, but upon all the broad acres of our prairies, an assertion in line with the feeling of political independence which has wiped old party lines and distinctions absolutely out of existence, and not a man there but stands ready to give some reason for his action and for the faith that dwells in him.

Mr. Speaker, some of us in Colorado had been Democrats until, from the gallery of this House, a year ago last March, we witnessed a scene in the Fifty-second Congress, a Congress with an overwhelming Democratic majority, pledged to the remonetization of silver according to the "glittering catch words" of its platform ---until, I say, we saw that House of Representatives assembled in this Hall and saw that it required the vote of the gentleman who was then and is now Speaker to make a tie, to prevent the untimely death of the Stewart silver bill which had passed the Senate.  That was what put to more serious thought those of us who had been Democrats all our lives and had never learned how to scratch a ticket.  That, followed by the acts which came later in the year, was what drove us out of the Democratic party.  And I am here to bring to the serious attention of the members of this House the reasons of the political uprising which occurred there, and to trace it, if I may in the short time allotted to me, directly and distinctly to this issue.  It was not due to the issues that have been mentioned in the Democratic or the Republican press, not to the tariff issue, and above all, not to the issue spoken of by the New York Sun, which claims that the Democratic party came into power because Mr. Reed of Maine had been a Czar [Laughter.]

Mr. Speaker, in 1884, when the silver issue was first formally presented before the people, the Democratic party declared its position in unequivocal terms, and at that time every Democrat in the land, East and West, accepted its declaration as standing for the remonetization of silver.  The scene here to-day is strange enough to attract the attention of every thoughtful voter.  Is it possible that the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Rayner], uttering the sentiments he does, and the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Bland], uttering the sentiments he does, were both elected last fall upon the same identical platform ?  [Laughter and applause.]

Yes;  since 1884 and the departure that was inaugurated between November, 1884, and March, 1885, just such incongruous possibilities have sprung up within the lines of the good old Democracy.  When the Democratic party in 1884 met in convention it declared itself in this language:

We believe in honest money, the gold and silver coinage of the Constitution, and a circulating medium convertible into such money without loss.

That meant the remonetization of silver at its old ratio, and it was so accepted by the producers of this country, and the party that had lost its power and its prestige in 1860 was reinstated at the other end of this avenue;  but, before the inauguration of March, 1885, that platform had been deliberately slapped in the face and spat upon.  What followed during the four years of the first Cleveland administration ?  Not one sincere effort, so far as the Administration was concerned, to remonetize silver.  When in 1888 the party convention met, we found that the Democratic party, not being brave enough, not having temerity enough, to go before the American people and again present Mr. Cleveland upon a silver platform, was absolutely silent upon that question, and the Republican party, which it seems to me has been, for many years, working one side of the street, while the other fellows worked the other ---the Republican party declared:

We have always recommended the best money known to the civilized world, and we urge that an effort be made to unite all commercial nations in the establishment of an international standard which shall fix for all the relative value of gold and silver coinage.

No, Mr. Speaker, I mistake.  I have read the language of the Republican platform of 1884;  but in 1888 the Democratic platform having been, as I have said, silent on the silver question, the Republicans declared their position in this language:

The Republican party is in favor of the use of both gold and silver as money, and condemns the policy of the Democratic Administration in its efforts to demonetize silver.

Mr. Speaker, it is not my purpose here or now to go one step farther in allusion to political parties or to take part in a partisan discussion.  Anything like that would be farthest from my purpose to-day.  Elected last fall by a people as brave, as buoyant, as hopeful as any constituency which ever in any day has honored any member of this House, I know that now their industries lie prostrate, pinned to the earth by the course of the present Administration;  by the course of the past Administration;  by the surrender, past and present, of those who had been elected upon silver platforms and silver pledges.  I certainly would be guilty of a violation of my duty to them if I should at this time go into any partisan discussion which might be calculated to alienate from the silver forces one single positive or negative man, one single positive or negative vote.  And inasmuch as the Democracy dominates in this House ---inasmuch as, according to all reports which we have been able to obtain, the bulk of the vote in favor of silver must come from that side--- I desire to recall to them the words of one or two of their own statesmen.  Inasmuch as the doubt which exists, exists as to how votes shall be cast by members of the majority of this House who were elected last fall upon the platform adopted at Chicago, I want to remind them of some words of their own people.

May I be permitted to read, without sending to the Secretary, the words of that statesman who, when unfettered and free, standing the manly representative of an independent constituency, uttered the words of wisdom with which he has always been gifted and which, until lately, have been accompanied by a courage equal to their wisdom and patriotism.  Mr. Carlisle upon this floor, in 1878, used the words which I am about to read.  And how came he to use them ?  Let me recite one or two explanatory circumstances.  Senator Stanley Matthews had introduced at the other end of the Capitol the resolution known as "the Matthews resolution," which recited the nature of the legislation that governed the issue of various bonds, and concluded with this language:

Be it resolved by the Senate, (the House of Representatives concurring therein,) That all the bonds of the United States issued or authorized to be issued under the said acts of Congress hereinbefore recited, and payable, principal and interest, at the option of the Government of the United States, in silver dollars, of the coinage of the United States, containing 412½ grains each, of standard silver;  and that to restore to its coinage such silver coins as a legal tender in payment of said bonds, principal and interest, is not in violation of the public faith, nor in derogation of the rights of the public creditor.

At that same time this House had under consideration important matters in this same line.  The gentleman who so long and bravely has borne the silver standard ---the gentleman who preceded me in this discussion--- "Silver Dick" Bland, as we love to call him in our country--- was at that time chairman of the coinage committee which had in preparation a free-coinage bill.  The Matthews resolution, which had passed the Senate within a few ours after its introduction by a vote of 43 to 32, came to this House, and three days afterward it was passed by this House without debate, by a vote of 189 to 79.  Mr. Carlisle voted for the resolution, and when a few days afterward, on the 21st of February, 1878, the Bland coinage bill was under consideration in this House, he, then untrammeled and free, a leader and not a follower, a sender of messages, not a bearer, used these words:

I know that the world's stock of precious metals is none too large, and I see no reason to apprehend that it will ever become so.  Mankind will be fortunate indeed if the annual production of gold and silver coin shall keep pace with the annual increase of population, commerce, and industry.  According to my view of the subject, the conspiracy which seems to have been formed here and in Europe to destroy by legislation and otherwise from three-sevenths to one-half of the metallic money of the world, is the most gigantic crime of this or any other age.  The consummation of such a scheme would ultimately entail more misery upon the human race than all the wars, pestilence, and famine that ever occurred in the history or the world.  The absolute and instantaneous destruction of half the entire movable property of the world, including houses, ships, railroads, and all other appliances for carrying on commerce, while it would be felt more sensibly at the moment, would not produce anything like the prolonged distress and disorganization of society that must inevitably result from the permanent annihilation of one-half of the metallic money of the world.

At that time the Democratic side of the House applauded these words.  Do they stand ready to applaud these words now ?  Do they believe that Mr. Carlisle uttered a truth, or do they propose, under the use of what one of the gentlemen from the State of New York, in a recent article in the North American Review, spoke of as the "use of all the means in the hands of the Administration" ---do they propose, under such pressure now, to follow in the surrender that the Secretary of the Treasury himself has  made ?

I do not believe, Mr. Speaker, that all the trust that has been placed by the people in the promises of the two great parties has been entirely misplaced.  I do not ---and shall not until the last moment and under compulsion--- accept the declaration now made, that the President having construed the platform of 1892, all those who were aligned with him last fall must accept his construction.  It is true that his message was not an entire surprise to the people of the West.  We had here and there for some time been noting the signs of the times ---trying to determine what the indications were and what must inevitably be the result of this discussion and of the action of the Administration.

While Mr. Harrison was President, Mr. Carnegie contributed to the columns of the North American Review his famous article upon the "ABC of money," and seemed to speak for many when he said that, though a life-long Republican and a life-long protectionist, if in the next campaign (that was the campaign of 1892) there should be upon one side a candidate who was a single gold-standard man and a free-trader, and upon the other a high protectionist in favor of the double standard, he, Andrew Carnegie, the owner of fortunes which we had supposed were chiefly gained through protection, should support the free-trade gold-standard man.

Is it any wonder that we were put to thought, to serious thought ?  But last fall the Chicago platform in our section, as in all of the wheat, cotton, and corn States of this Union, had received that construction which has been placed upon it by the gentleman from Missouri [Mr. Bland] here to-day, and not the construction placed upon it by the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Rayner], and we still believed that it was possible that the promise was to be kept.  Many hesitated and doubted, and those who had been for life allied with the Republican party, turned to the Minneapolis straddle of last year and claimed that it must be accepted as meaning the coinage of silver.  If that be true, where are the members of this (the Republican) side of the House who used to maintain that construction ?  What proportion of them are to be found maintaining by their vote to-day the position maintained by their representatives in the corn and wheat States in last October and November ?

A little time passed by, Mr. Speaker, and we first took serious alarm this summer.  We still had hoped against hope, and even now hope, perhaps, against hope.  But last June when from the pen of the gentleman [Mr. Cockran] who now leads, as I understand, the New York Democracy in this assault against silver in this country ---when he, in the North American Review, in his article on the financial outlook, said to the world and to us that---

The recent utterances of the President and of the Secretary of the Treasury, however, appear to settle the question that the present Administration is determined to use all the means at its command to maintain a gold standard

And when further he said---

The question of free coinage of silver by the United States may be excluded from consideration, as nobody deems the passage of such a law within the limits of possibility during the present Administration

Well, indeed, might those who had hoped as against hope have become terrorized with fear and apprehension.  And since that utterance of last June, followed by this construction which Mr. Preston, Acting Director of the Mint, placed upon the Sherman law of 1890, an encouragement thereby was given to the English creditors, who in the nature of things desired a gold standard in this country, little by little the hopes of our people have been cast down, and not, Mr. Speaker, until within the last forty-eight hours have the hopes of any of us been revived.  And why ?  Because we have found upon consultation with members of this House, upon both sides of it, that they appreciate and realize the fact that the people who sent them here, sent them with the expectation that under no conditions and under no circumstances would a surrender on this vital principle be made to such a message as that which has been sent to us by Mr. Cleveland;  and that the people ---I do not mean the bankers who meet every night and flood us with petitions, nor the committees of boards of trade, but I mean what George Wilson, of Missouri, calls "the fellows who follow the mule in the corn rows under the hot July and August suns"--- I mean that these people still believe that this House of Representatives, equal in dignity with the body that sits in the other end of this Capitol, equal in power, closer to the people, fresher from their midst, will not sooner hang out the white flag of surrender than will the gentlemen of the higher body at the other end of the building.  And within two weeks the people will have come to know whether that conclusion is well founded or otherwise.

I say, then, Mr. Speaker, that we have renewed our hopes because the members of this House can not fail to recall, when once reminded of it, that nowhere, at no time, at no State convention within the limits of the United States, except once in the State of Massachusetts two years ago, has the Democratic party ever presumed to declare for the single gold standard now urged by the President.  No member of the House in the majority, and but few in the minority, and none in the smaller minority to which I belong, came here with any other expectation upon the part of the people who sent them than that silver would be raised, not stricken down;  elevated, not made prostrate;  and that the standard dollar which has been the Republican dollar, which has been the Democratic dollar, which has been the dollar of all the people, should receive, not the cold shoulder, but the bright and warming and beaming smile of the members on all sides of this question.

Is there any member here from a wheat or cotton State who feels that he can go home and explain to his people that he did a patriot's duty and well fulfilled the commission with which he was intrusted when he suddenly, without notice to his constituents, surrendered to the call of the gold-standard men ?  It may be that there are those who can.  I mention this, not as a threat, but as a simple reminder to the members of this House that the same voters who sent us here last fall by their suffrages certainly have not all of them become forgetful of the conditions upon which we were sent.  They have not all of them failed to regard the understanding upon which we were honored and trusted.

Upon what theory, I ask, can a Republican minority, by a preponderance of its votes or by any considerable number of its votes, find justification before the people of this country in carrying out the behest and command of a Democratic Administration ?  Upon what line or theory are they to explain when they go home next time that their duty was patriotically performed and that their pledges were fulfilled ?  It is strange ---and we have regarded it as strange since this discussion originally began--- that to-day, not perhaps amongst the members of this House, and I will not say so, but in the columns of the metropolitan press, Democratic and Republican, we find the same men who, upon the tariff question, have for years and years besought the American people to stand out against England, and England's pauper conditions, and to maintain here under our own bright Stars and Stripes an American policy, now most active in trying to prevail upon the members of this House, by their editorial utterances, to surrender absolutely any idea of America having any policy of her own upon the money question.

We find this true in the press of both of the great parties, and why does it happen ?  How does it happen that those who were so jealous of the American plan and the American policy, who have so roundly denounced the attempt of the Democracy to surrender to the Cobden Club and to the free traders of England and to bring our poor laboring men into competition with the pauper labor of Europe, how does it happen that now and here upon this question of greater importance you protest that we must wait upon England, that we must not remonetize until England consents, and that when we remonetize we must do so at a ratio which meets with the approval of England ?

What !  Wait upon England to fix the ratio for us ?  With one twenty-fifth of the population of Earth, producing two-fifths of the silver, shall we yield the entire vantage that comes thereby to them ?  Just as well say to them that by arbitrary law, final and irrevocable, we would go into international commission with England and Germany to determine what should be the price of the wheat, the corn, and the cotton;  for, as they need the one they need the other, and like as they must have the one they must have the other.  But we find this condition of affairs:  We find, according to the claims that are made, a considerable proportion of the Republican minority standing ready to do that which they never would do for a President of their own selection ---ready to surrender.

Let me say to the gentlemen from the West and South that in the East we find no difference.  When this vote comes, two weeks from now, unless the political denomination of each member is designated, when you go down the call of the "ayes" who support the message of the President, how are you to tell the Eastern Democrat from the Eastern Republican ?  According to prophecies made, you will find them standing together;  and I maintain, now and here, to the members from the West and South, that there should be that same degree of vigor and energetic organization for the protection of our people that you find down here, east of the Allegheny Mountains.

Regardless of party, Democrats and Republicans alike, you should find a determination and a purpose to redeem now, in Washington, the promises that were made out in Illinois and Tennessee and Iowa last September and October.  Unless that is done, the reckoning that must finally come ---mentioned now in no sense as a threat--- must be one that will call upon the members of those sections for a plain and candid explanation of the reasons for the surrender now contemplated by the bill introduced by the gentleman from West Virginia [Mr. Wilson].

I say, why is it, Mr. Speaker, that, regardless of party, we find the Eastern and Northeastern members of this House united ?  Because, according to the course of the financial legislation ever since the war, every benefit has been diverted to them and every burden has been shifted upon our Western people.  And when I speak of our Western people I allude now only to those who dwell in the mining States.  Those who dwell in mining States went into the vastnesses of those hills, into that wilderness upon the very frontier of what you gentlemen in your old-time geographies marked as the Great American Desert, and by their energy and pluck they have there builded up an empire of wealth.  They went there under what protection of the Federal law ?  They went there under the protection of a law that had been upon our books since the days of Washington, Hamilton, and Jefferson.  Never once had that policy been interfered with.  Never once had any of the people asked that it be revoked.  Never once under any circumstances had there been any body, commercial or otherwise, asking for the repeal of that law.

Now, the transaction done in this House in 1873, according to all the testimony from members of both political parties then here represented, was done covertly and secretly by fraud;  and the people who had settled that section, who had developed the mines of that country, who had produced the silver necessary for the money uses of this land, had no notice in the world that the doors of the mints at Philadelphia, New Orleans, and Carson were to be suddenly, without notice, without demand from anywhere, closed against their product.  It is not necessary now and here, or at this day, to review any of the testimony as to the manner of the demonetization of silver.  We all know to-day that there lives but one man, and he the senior Senator from Ohio, who pretends that the demonetization act was demanded by anybody, or that anybody except himself understood it to be a demonetization act.  And from that time, as soon as the people understood that silver had been stricken down or assaulted, an effort has been made by the people of this country to secure from one or the other of the great political parties a promise that has been made in each successive campaign for its remonetization.

Mr. Speaker, I do not know ---of course, no man can tell now--- how many there will be to follow the course of the eminent gentlemen who but a few years ago stood upon this floor and advocated the remonetization of silver and who to-day are members of the President's official family and seem to be committed against that policy.  It is hard and difficult, at this stage of the proceedings to reach any determination;  but I have said, and say again, that the people in whose behalf I speak upon this floor still are gathered together to-day in their homes and idly around the furnaces where the fires have been compelled to expire.  In that Commonwealth which possessed but six months ago a degree of wealth equal to any State in this Union, they are bracing each other up to-day with the expression of hope that in this body there will be found enough and more than enough to stand against the message of the President, and to stand for the fulfillment of the promises that have been made, to stand courageously and valiantly in behalf, not of the creditor class, but of the debtor class of this land, and here finally to say by their votes that the time has not yet come when one branch of this Government can be compelled by another, or driven by another, or persuaded or cajoled by another into an act which will add to the amount of the indebtedness of every debtor and add to the credit of every creditor, whether on this, or upon the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.

Let me ask of the gentlemen from the New England States, while it is to your plain advantage to increase the value of the dollar, while it is to your advantage to make it so that it will take more of wheat and more of corn and more of the products of every kind of the broad acres of the West with which to buy it, whether that product is purchased or taken in the payment of a debt:  Can you afford as Americans, can you afford as the fathers of the boys and girls who went into our country and there raised the flag and extended the wealth and the territory over which it waves ---can you, because of the pitiful percentage of advantage you will get, vote for a policy which gives the bulk and the majority of the increase of credit to those who have no citizenship or interest in this land ?

It is true, as we look upon it in the West, that Boston will get its share of the benefit of sustaining the law which the President seeks.  It is true that New York will also;  but after all, London, England, will have four-fifths of it.  Can you, Representatives from the New England States, afford as patriots, as Americans, for the pitiful share of advantage you will secure, join in the demand of England for the legislation that is here proposed ?

Why do I suggest this ?  Mr. Speaker, only a year or two ago we in the West heard, as you did in the South and East, the proclamation of the "Plumed Knight," who was then upon his visit in France.  I believe, and we remember that the cable carried to us and to you the account of the vast increase of the wealth of this land, and we joined and shared in the pride and satisfaction that came to us when that eminent leader of his party pointed out that we not twice more, but five times more than any other nation upon the face of the globe, had increased our wealth from 1880 to 1890;  and so we had.

We found an aggregate wealth of sixty billions to sixty millions of people;  and a simple arithmetical calculation gave us the average for every man, woman, and child in arms in the country at $1,000.  I do not know what the facts were in Massachusetts.  The average there may have been all right, but in Iowa, Colorado, and some other States, the average was not found to turn out exactly right.  The aggregate was all right, but a further study was had and the same census upon which our pride in the West had been founded, the same sworn returns, reports, and statistics which had filled us with satisfaction and joy, pointed out to us that within that decade the increase in wealth of Massachusetts alone had been $569,000,000.  Five hundred and sixty-nine millions !  If that were true, what must be the increase of wealth in the broad, rich acres of Illinois and of Indiana ?  Well, the same statistics brought us to a realization of the fact that Nebraska, and Iowa. and Illinois, and Indiana, and Louisiana, and Mississippi, and Alabama, and Georgia, and North Carolina, nine empires of rich acres, teeming with industrious men and women, containing fifty-eight times as many acres as Massachusetts, fourteen times as many people to start with in 1880, and twice as much assessed value, the census, I say, brought us to a realization of the fact that the whole nine of these great empire States had gained in wealth in the same period but $559,000,000.  Massachusetts alone had gained ten millions more than the entire nine !

These are the facts and figures, gentlemen of the House of Representatives, which have been studied in the humble cottages and homes of the western plains and hills.  These are the conditions which the people there will no longer hesitate to rebuke.  It is no wonder that Mr. Carnegie, standing not only for a protected class but for the creditor class, for the class that holds the evidences of indebtedness over all the productive sections of this country, the class that holds the State and county and town and city and township bonds of every agricultural State and levies the first tribute as an interest charge that is levied upon the people's toil ---it is no wonder that he should say that if he were compelled to relinquish either the dimes which came to him through protection or the dollars which came to him through infamous and imbecile financial legislation, he would hold on to the dollars and say good-bye to the dimes.  It is no wonder that he should say that in 1892, if put to a selection between a free-trade gold-standard candidate and a high-protection double-standard candidate, he would support the free trader.

Mr. Speaker, the gentleman from Maryland [Mr. Rayner] spoke of the Sherman law as one that had brought crisis and disaster upon this country by its enforcement.  The trouble has been that at no time since its enactment has either the letter or the spirit of that law been enforced.

It seemed very strange to us that any bill, which purported to provide for either the purchase or the coinage of more silver, should be called by the name of the "Sherman act."  It seemed anomalous to us that a bill sometimes called a silver bill should at other times be called the Sherman bill, and it took some time and some research to discover why the Senator from Ohio, whose position on this subject has always been understood, should in 1890 have voted for and supported a measure which provided for the use or the purchase of more silver than was provided for under the Bland-Allison act.  It, of course, was found to be the proviso in that bill, which permitted the Secretary of the Treasury, after a fixed date, in the exercise of his discretion, to practically terminate and cut off all coinage of silver.  It was not because the law provided for the purchase of four and one-half million ounces of silver per month as against $2,000,000 worth under the Bland law that the Senator from Ohio gave it his support.  It was because after a fixed time ---the 1st of July, 1891--- the Secretary of the Treasury, in the exercise of his discretion, was given authority to cut off entirely the future coinage of silver, and that was done.  It was that proviso in the bill that secured the support of the Senator from Ohio.

Mr. Speaker, it is not, and it has not been at any time, the extent of the use of silver, but the kind of the use of silver, to which our people have objected.  When Mr. Harrison last fall spoke of an enlarged use of silver, in line with his policy of purchasing it at the lowest possible price and as a commodity, the objection upon our part was not to the extent of the use, but to the kind of use.  Upon the floor of the Senate in 1850 and odd, when there was a discussion upon the repeal of the Missouri compromise act, Mr. Benjamin, of Louisiana, spoke in feeling terms against an arbitrary law that would prevent him from carrying into the State of Missouri the beloved family servant that had dwelt with him for years;  and the Senator from Ohio, Mr. Wade, in answering him, said:

The law and we do not protest against the Senator carrying with him his colored servant into the State of Missouri.  What we protest against is his selling her after he gets her there. [Laughter.]

Mr. Speaker, as I have said, it is the kind and not the extent of the use of silver that we complain of;  and we believe, as sincerely as any class of citizens ever believed in a political tenet, that the rehabilitation of silver will be as directly and positively to the advantage of all the producers on all the acres in the West and South and to the laborers in the East as it will be to the advantage of the silver miners in the mountain States.

As to figures and statistics touching this matter, I shall trust to my colleague and others who may follow me in this discussion to advise the House.  Without detaining the House further, I thank it for its attention. [Applause.]