I will read a cable dispatch recently addressed to me by Mr. Henry H. Gibbs, formerly governor of the Bank of England, and now president of the Bimetallic League of Great Britain:
London, May 6.—The friends of silver deeply regret the death of Senator Beck, whose services in the cause of monetary reform are warmly appreciated on this side of the Atlantic. The bimetallist party of the United Kingdom, now including over one hundred members of the House of Commons, attach the greatest value to the debate about to commence in your illustrious chamber. We fully recognize not only that the support afforded to silver by your legislation during the last twelve years has helped the protect the industrial world from an acute monetary crisis, but also that the debates in Congress have served more than all else to educate our people to recognition of the important issues involved. We believe also that the increase and coinage of silver contemplated by Congress will restore, wholly or considerably, your coinage rates, and will thus make international settlement of this complex question comparatively easy. We anticipate further and with much confidence, that the advance in the price of silver which must follow your action will stimulate both the export and the other trades of your country, and, while tending to the prosperity of your agricultural classes, will also assist the manufacturing industries of the United Kingdom and the whole body of our wage-earners.
Mr. Moreton Frewen, of London, an able writer on economic subjects, whose recent work on the "The Economic Crisis" I commend to the careful perusal of Senators, says:
It may, indeed, be affirmed, without fear of contradiction, that legislation arranged in the interest of a certain class, first by Lord Liverpool in this country, and again by Sir Robert Peel at the instigation of Mr. Jones Loyd and other wealthy bankers, which was supplemented recently by simultaneous anti-silver legislation in Berlin and Washington at the instance of the great financial houses—this legislation has about doubled the burden of all national debts by an artificial enhancement of the value of money.
The fall of all prices induced by this cause has been on such a scale that while in twenty years the National debt of the United States quoted in dollars has been reduced by nearly two-thirds, yet the value of the remaining one-third, measured in wheat, in bar iron, or bales of cotton, is considerably greater—is a greater demand draft on the labor and industry of the nation than was the whole debt at the time it was contracted. The aggravation of the burdens of taxation induced by this so-called "appreciation of gold," which is no natural appreciation, but has been brought about by class legislation to increase the value of the gold which is in a few hands, requires but to be explained to an enfranchised democracy, which will know how to protect itself against further attempts to contract the currency and to force down prices to the confusion of every existing contract.
Of all classes of middle-men, bankers have been by far the most successful in intercepting and appropriating an undue share of produced wealth. While the modern system of banking and credit may be said to be even yet in its infancy, that portion of the assets of the community which is to-day in the strong boxes of the bankers would, if declared, be an astounding revelation of the recent profits of this particular business; and not only has the business itself become a most profitable monopoly, but its interests in a very few hands are diametrically opposed to the general interests of the majority. By legislation intended to contract the currency and force down all prices, including wages, the price paid for labor, the money owner has been able to increase the purchase power of his sovereign or dollar by the direct diminution of the price of every kind of property measured in money.
UNFULFILLED PROPHECIES.
During the debate on the limited coinage bill, not content with abuse of the advocates of the measure; with flimsy criticism of it and specious arguments against it, its opponents in and out of Congress indulged in diverse prophecies and predictions. They pictured forth the lamentable results that would follow its passage, and the direful consequences that would ensue from an increase of the circulating medium of the country. Among the results confidently predicted were the following: that the silver would not circulate at all, and again that it would circulate to the exclusion of gold, which metal, we were informed, would flow out of this country with a velocity and in a volume theretofore unknown; that we should be unable to redeem our paper money in gold; that we should be precipitated into a silver vortex; that an inflation of the currency would follow, which would ruinously raise prices of all commodities and that this inflation would result in an unprecedented contraction. We were charged with forcing upon the public creditors a dollar worth only ninety cents. We were warned that the passage of the bill would indefinitely postpone the refunding of the public debt, and would lower the price and impair the value of our national securities. It was charged that we were setting on foot a new and irrepressible conflict between two great sections of the country—the East and the West. We were charged with uttering a debased coin; with lowering the standard of American credit; with tarnishing the integrity and honor of our country before foreign nations, and with unprecedented moral turpitude in setting an example of flagrant and shameless national dishonesty.
The men of the far West, and of the Pacific slope especially, were the particular targets of this abuse. They were denounced by some as "lunatics," by others as dangerous and unworthy demagogues, because, as was charged, their constituents, if not themselves, were directly interested in the restoration of the ancient right of silver to full recognition as one of the money metals. For their benefit resort was had to every epithet which the English language afforded. In holding them up to public scorn the rich and varied vocabulary of odium and opprobrium was exhausted.
These prophecies of disaster were united in by the professors of political economy in all the Eastern colleges, by the President of the United States, by the Secretary of the Treasury, by the leading American newspapers, by the principal public men and journals of Great Britain, if not of all Europe; and, of course, by all bankers, money-lenders, and professional financiers the world over.