"The statements made by Mrs. Emery about the contraction of our currency are not only misleading but they are absolutely false. She states that in 1868 $473,000,000 of our money was destroyed, and in 1869 $500,000,000 of our money passed into a cremation furnace, and in 1870 $67,000,000 was destroyed. Now these statements are absolutely false. What she calls money in these paragraphs was the most burdensome form of interest-bearing securities, treasury notes bearing seven and three-tenths per cent. interest, and compound interest notes. These were the chief and most burdensome items of the public debt. They were paid off in the years named and were never at any time for more than a single day money in circulation. When issued they were received as money, but, as interest accrued they became investments and were not at all in circulation.
"These statements of Mrs. Emery are palpable falsehoods, which if stated by a man would justify a stronger word. It is true that in 1866 Mr. McCulloch, Secretary of the Treasury under the administration of Andrew Johnson, wished to bring about resumption by contraction, and a bill was passed providing for a gradual reduction of the greenbacks to $300,000,000, but this was very soon after repealed and the greenbacks retained in circulation. I was not in favor of the contraction of the greenbacks, and the very speech that she quotes, in which I described the effects of contraction and the difficulty of resuming, was made against the bill providing for the reduction of the greenbacks.
"The next 'conspiracy' to which she refers was the first act of General Grant's administration 'to strengthen the public credit.' A controversy had existed whether the 5-20 bonds could be paid in greenbacks. I maintained and still believe that by a fair construction of the loan laws we had a right to pay the principal of the bonds as they matured in greenbacks of the kind and character in existence when the bonds were issued, but I insisted that it was the duty of the government to define a time when the greenbacks should be either redeemed or maintained at par in coin, that this was a plain obligation of honor and duty which rested upon the United States, and that it was not honorable or right to avail ourselves of our own negligence in restoring these notes to the specie standard in order to pay the bonds in the depreciated money. This idea is embodied in the credit-strengthening act.
"The fifth 'conspiracy' of what she calls 'this infernal scheme' was the refunding of the national debt. This operation of refunding is regarded by all intelligent statesmen as of the highest value, and was conducted with remarkable success. At the date of the passage of the refunding act, July 14, 1870, we had outstanding bonds bearing five and six per cent. interest for about $1,500,000,000. By the wise providence of Congress, we had reserved the right of redeeming a portion of this debt within five years, and a portion of it within ten years, so that the debt was, in the main, then redeemable at our pleasure. It was not possible to pay it in coin and it was not honorable to pay it in greenbacks, especially as that could only have been done by issuing new greenbacks far beyond the volume existing during the war, and which would at once depreciate in value and destroy the public credit and dishonor the country. We, therefore, authorized the exchange, par for par, of bonds bearing four, four and a half, and five per cent. interest for the bonds bearing a higher rate of interest. The only contest in Congress upon the subject was whether the new bonds should run five, ten and fifteen years, or ten, fifteen and thirty years. I advocated the shorter period, but the House of Representatives, believing that the new bonds would not sell at par unless running for a longer period, insisted that the four per cent. bonds should run for thirty years. Greenbackers, like Mrs. Emery, who now complain that the bonds run so long and cannot be paid until due, are the same people who insisted upon making the bonds run thirty years. It required some ten years to complete these refunding operations—of which the larger part was accomplished when I was Secretary of the Treasury—and they resulted in a saving of one- third of the interest on the debt. So far from it being in the interest of the bondholders, it was to their detriment and only in the interest of the people of the United States.
"The next 'conspiracy' complained of is the alleged demonetization of silver. By the act revising the coinage in 1873, the silver dollar, which had been suspended by Jefferson in 1805 and practically demonetized in 1835 and suspended by minor coins in 1853, and which was issued only in later years as a convenient form in which to export silver bullion, and the whole amount of which, from the beginning of the government to the passage of the act referred to, was only eight million dollars, was, by the unanimous vote of both Houses of Congress, without objection from anyone, dropped from our coinage, and in its place, upon the petition of the legislature of California, was substituted the trade dollar containing a few more grains of silver. A few years afterwards, silver having fallen rapidly in market prices, Congress restored the coinage of the silver dollar, limiting the amount to not exceeding four million nor less than two million a month, and under ths law in a period of twelve years we issued over 400,000,000 silver dollars, fifty times the amount that had been coined prior to 1873. And now under existing law we are purchasing 54,000,000 ounces of silver a year; so that what she calls the demonetization of silver has resulted in its use in our country to an extent more than fiftyfold greater than before its demonetization.
"In spite of this, in consequence of the increased supply of silver and the cheapening processes of its production, it is going down in the market and is only maintained at par with gold by the fiat of the different governments coining it. Now the deluded people belonging to the class of Mrs. Emery are seeking to cheapen the purchasing power of the dollar, in the hands of the farmer and laborer, by the free coinage of silver and the demonetization of gold. Silver and gold should be used and maintained as current money, but only on a par with each other, and this can only be done by treating the cheaper metal as subsidiary and coining it only as demanded for the use of the people.
"The seventh 'financial conspiracy' is the pride and boast of the government of the United States, the restoration of our notes, long after the war was over, to the standard of coin; in other words, the resumption of specie payments. This measure, which met the violent opposition of such wild theorists as Mrs. Emery, has demonstrated its success, in the judgment of all intelligent people, not only in the United States, but in all the countries of the world. There is no standard for paper money, except coin. The United States postponed too long the restoration of its notes to coin standards. Since it had the courage to do this under the resumption act, on the 1st day of January, 1879, we have had in the United States a standard of gold with coins of silver, nickel and copper, maintained at that standard by the fiat of the government, and paper money in various forms, as United States notes, national bank notes, gold certificates, silver certificates, and treasury notes, all at par with gold.
"To call this a 'conspiracy' or an 'infamous plot' is a misnomer of terms which will not deceive any intelligent man, but it is rather the glory and pride of the people of the United States that it not only has been able, in the past thirty years, to put down a great rebellion and to abolish slavery, but to advance the credit of the United States to the highest rank among nations, to largely increase the currency of the country, to add enormously to our productive interests, and to develop the resources of the mine, the field, and the workshop, to a degree unexampled in the history of nations. Intelligent people, who reason and observe, will not be deceived or misled by the wild fanaticism and the gloomy prophecies of Mrs. Emery. Temporary conditions growing out of the failure of any portion of our crops will not discourage them; the exaggerations of the morbid fancy will not mislead them.
"A candid examination of the great financial measures of the last thirty years will lead people to name what Mrs. Emery calls 'the seven financial conspiracies' as the seven great, wise and statesmanlike steps which have led the people of the United States, through perils and dangers rarely encountered by any nation, from a feeble confederacy with four millions of slaves, and discordant theories of constitutional power, to a great, free republic, made stronger by the dangers it has passed, a model and guide for the nations of the world.
"As for Mrs. Emery's criticisms upon me personally, I do not even deem them worthy of answer. She repeats the old story that I was interested in the First National Bank of New York and gave it the free use of the people's money. This is a plain lie, contradicted and disproved over and over again. I never had the slightest interest in the bank, direct or indirect, and, as the public records will show, gave it no favors, but treated it like all other depositaries of public money and held it to the most rigid accountability; nor have I in any case derived the slightest pecuniary benefit from any measure either pending in or before Congress since I have been in public life.