“Does any one know this poor fellow?” asked the Good Samaritan, addressing the crowd which had quickly gathered at the scene of the accident. “His mind seems to have become an absolute blank, and——”
“Trust official! Trust official!” shouted the assemblage in one voice. “Out of his head and thinks he’s on the witness stand!”
The Philosophy of Money
BY J. B. MARTIN
One of our Ohio martyred Presidents, James A. Garfield, in delivering a speech in Congress, the last one, I believe, uttered this sentence: “Whoever controls the volume of money in this country will be absolute master of its industries and commerce.”
A truer sentence was never uttered in our House of Representatives. But to see clearly and forcibly its truthfulness and effects, one must have a proper idea of what money is, by what power it is created, the factors or elements of money, and its functions and use.
Briefly stated, money is the debt-paying instrument in all civilized nations, whose people are actively engaged in making contracts, buying and selling. Every contract creates a debt, hence the necessity of a debt-paying instrument.
Barbarous nations resort to barter; that is, giving one product or commodity for another, and yet with all of our boasted civilization we have men—some prominent ones too—who claim that money is a commodity.
I propose dealing in facts, as they are the stern sentinels of truth. Every nation enacts laws compelling its citizens to tender certain things, variously called “dollars,” “pounds,” “francs,” etc., as the only legal means of payment of debts and taxes. This is the vital point of the whole money question. Law, and law alone, makes money. Let us see what money is, and how it comes into existence.
Our gold, silver, and paper coins; also our nickel and copper coins, are really made up of three distinct factors or elements, each of which may, and often does, exist independently of the other two. This fact is one of the central truths concerning money.