CHAPTER XXI.

THE HONEST DOLLAR.

In his first message Grant called attention to the fact that "among the evils growing out of the Rebellion, is that of an irredeemable currency. It is an evil which I hope will receive your earliest attention. It is a duty, and one of the highest duties, of government, to secure to the citizen a medium of exchange of fixed, unvarying value. This implies a return to specie basis, and no substitute for it can be devised."

In 1875 a law was passed containing the clause, "On and after the first day of January, Anno Domini eighteen hundred and seventy-nine, the Secretary of the Treasury shall redeem, in coin, the United-States legal-tender notes then outstanding, on their presentation for redemption at the office of the Assistant Treasurer of the United States, in the city of New York, in sums of not less than fifty dollars."

Most extraordinary pressure was brought to bear upon the President, to induce him to withhold his signature from the Resumption Bill.

Many of Grant's warmest personal friends were ardent inflationists. Eminent bankers, leading

merchants, men with the care of great railroad enterprises, by petition, by personal appeal, by letter, and by telegraph, warned him of ruin to the country by forcing resumption.

Prominent Republicans doubted the policy of naming a day when we should redeem. It was derided as a party dodge and a visionary scheme. Not for one moment did Grant waver. He felt that if the occasion slipped by, it might not come again. The bill was right. The vital interests of the country demanded that we should come back to financial sanity. The honor of the people could only be maintained by redeeming their outstanding pledges. By his act the bill became law, and because of that act resumption is now an accomplished fact. It was among the last acts of special importance in his administration, and was the consummation of a recommendation made by him in his first state paper. It was the finality of the war currency; and by this act the American people once more had a circulation convertible into specie, the honest, constitutional money of "their fathers."

We are to-day- because we had Grant for President regarded by the world as an honest. nation. Our credit is second only to that of England.

We are not, however, out of danger. Formidable agencies are at work to take from us our "good name" for honesty. Stripped of sophistry, the "greenback" agitation was a crusade of dishonesty.

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There is in kind, no difference of morality de tween the act of the highwayman who takes a purse after presenting his pistol and the act of a voter who scales a debt by dishonest legislation The motive in both cases is to get that which belongs to another: it is the method only that varies. The champions of cheap money are, just now, beaten; but the area of dishonesty has not been contracted, its activities are not lessened.

Twelve States have repudiated more or less of their debts. Eleven of them are Southern; one. to its shame, is a Northern State. Nearly a third of the Republic has upon it the stain of dishonor.

Capital and labor are very far from being upon the terms of amity needed for their common interest. We are separating into classes; habits are changing; feelings of bitterness, strange to this country, are being manifested, and the breach between the "well-to-do" and the ill-provided-for is widening.

Late immigration brings us more agitators and less agriculturists than formerly.

Commercial integrity is more and more inclined to find its incentive rather in the maxim that "honesty pays," than in the principle of accountability to a higher than earthly tribunal. Every large town and city with us has resorts where levelling and agrarian ideas fester and spread, and the ignorant voter is receiving a street and shop education tainted with the socialism of Germany and the nihilism of Russia. The

thin end of the communistic wedge is labelled *cheap money" Cheap monet i alargus bed money. Said Grant, in one of his messages, “A poozer direna will always drive the better out of circulacion. Wich paper a legal tender, and at a discount, gold and silver become articles of merchandise as much as wheat dr cörtön. The surplus will find the best market.”

What we nood in this county is thorough primary discussion, face to face with the people, on the elementary principles of political economy. The delusion that there is an east that or short cut out of the inequalities of human conditions is as cruel in its effect as it is false in its start. Opportunity for each and all to get out of the world all they can, by all ways and means except immoral, selfish, and illegal ones, is the central principle of our government. There is a moral obligation to use means, power, and talent for the common good; but to regulate morals is beyond the province of law.

We are soon to be in a political controversy over the function of silver as money.

Silver, when coined, is constitutional money but a silvet dollar can be a lie or a truth. Silver payment can be just or unjust. It is tight to tee silret in a right way; it has value, and should be nood for what it is worth. It may be wise for us to co-operate for the recognition by all nations of silver as money, when coined.

The silver issue will enter into the coming

grave national campaign of 1880, and the Democrats and inflationists will "pull together." In their hands the volume of silver is to be carried to the point of utmost depreciation. Their cardinal point is cheap money, or money that will float."

To cheapen silver is to raise prices, and they are for high prices. It will enable the debtor to pay his creditor in a less value than the latter had a right to expect. To make ninety, eighty, or sixty cents in payment do the work of one hundred cents of contract, is to the expansionist a "consummation devoutly to be wished.”

The Republicans of the country are to join issue on the silver fight. They will deal with this metal as they did with the war-currency, — justly. It will be their object to make silver as they made the "greenback," as "good as gold," so that silver and paper alike shall represent an honest dollar.

It was fourteen years prior to the passage of the Resumption Act that Grant had left the humble tanyard at Galena, to respond to the call of his country.

He had, by what some regard as destiny, but others more reverently hold to be the guidance of Providence, been permitted to do great deeds and to receive great honors.

With the aid of his trusted generals and his loyal legions, he had carried the flag of the nation. through all the vicissitudes of war, and had brought