of Congressional life. At Falls City and Tecumseh still larger numbers had gathered. At Table Rock we were met by a reception committee from Lincoln. This committee was composed of men and women of all parties. Although the weather was threatening, the people of Lincoln were present at the depot to welcome us, and from the train to our home the noise was deafening. The day's demonstration was concluded with a parade, a speech from the balcony of the capitol and a reception within. As the mayor and many prominent Republicans took part in this reception, I was careful to avoid political issues. I said in part: Lincoln Speech. I am proud tonight to be able to say of those who are assembled here: These are our neighbors. I beg to express to Republicans, Democrats, Populists, Prohibitionists-to all of all parties, the gratitude which we feel for this magnificent demonstration. I say we, because she who has shared my struggles deserves her full share of all the honors that may come to me. This scene tonight recalls the day, nine years ago this month, when, by accident, rather than design, I first set foot within the limits of the city of Lincoln. I remember the day because I fell in love with the city, and then resolved to make it my future home. I came among you as a stranger in a strange land, and no people have ever treated a stranger more kindly than you have treated me. I desire to express tonight our grateful appreciation of all the kindness that you have shown us, and to give you the assurance that if, by the suffrages of my countrymen, I am called to occupy, for a short space of time, the most honorable place in the gift of the people, I shall return to you. This shall be my home, and when earthly honors have passed away I shall mingle my ashes with the dust of our beloved State. This is no political gathering. I see here the faces of those who do not stand with me on the issues of the day; but I am glad that love can leap across party lines and bind in holy friendship those whose judgments dwell apart. I thank the Mayor of this city for the charity which he has shown today. I thank those of all parties who are willing for a moment to forget political differences and join in celebrating the fact that at last a Presidential nomination has crossed the Missouri river. Mileage on First Trip. From Chicago to Odin, Ill., over Illinois Central Ry.......240 miles From Odin to Salem, Ill., over B. & O. S. W. Ry.. From Salem to Centralia and return. 6 66 .... 70 66 From Salem to St. Louis, Mo., over B. & O. S. W. Ry.. Total number miles traveled first trip.... ..830 miles coin in the world is $4,000,000,000; that the total stock of gold coin is approximately the same, and that if the total stocks of silver and gold were each melted into a solid mass, the silver mass would be about sixteen times as great in weight as the gold mass. We also answer that today the relative production of the two metals is approximately in the same proportion. We must establish by law some relation of value between the two metals. And we propose to value silver as it will stand after restoration to equality of privileges with gold, and not while it is discredited by unequal laws. The restoration of bimetallism is apparent. It will not only give the world an increasing volume of currency, proportioned to the increase of population and to the extension of business, commerce and enterprise, but it will do away with the dislocation of exchanges that has existed between the gold-standard and silver-standard countries, a dislocation which has immensely stimulated the production of silver-standard countries in farm products, and which is about to stimulate their manufacturing production, to the injury of the gold-standard countries. Our wheat fields and our cotton fields have already felt the force of silver-standard competition, for the prices of Oriental and other silverstandard countries-always stable in silver-have declined in gold, just as gold has appreciated. The Indian wheat grower receives today just as he did twenty years ago, an ounce of silver for a bushel of wheat; he sells it for that price to the Liverpool importer, who also offers to the American wheat grower an ounce of silver, which, formerly worth $1.20 in gold, is worth today only 65 cents. The result is that the American wheat grower receives in gold half of what he received in 1873. And so it is with cotton and other farm products. The value of our exportable products with which we pay our debts has constantly declined, in gold the balance of trade is against us, and it must be paid in gold. We propose by restoring the old gold price of silver to restore old gold price of our farm products, and to change the balance of trade with a favorable instead of an adverse balance. That this ought to be accomplished every one admits. The Republican party, by its plea for international adjustment, admits that the gold standard is a bad thing, and that of bimetallism a good thing; but it claims that bimetallism can only be restored by international action. I shall not dwell long on this aspect of the question. It is sufficient to say that the Republican party limits our negotiation to the leading commercial nations, and those, of course, are known to be England, France and Germany. While the agricultural and manufacturing classes of those countries are friendly to bimetallism, and while parliamentary resolutions favoring bimetallism have been passed in each, there is no indication that the executive department of any of those governments is in any way using its diplomatic powers to accomplish it. The fact is that the executive department of importance, including our own, is directed in its financial policy by the gold monopoly. While France indicates a friendliness for bimetallism, and while Germany in a measure has relaxed its hostility, both declare that they will not act without the co-operation of England, and England, through the ministry of both her political parties, has declared her unalterable purpose to adhere to the gold standard. The reason is apparent. The great advance of gold monometallism has given England the control of the credits of the world. Her people now own bonds of other countries to an amount aggregating many times the total gold stock of the world. England is built up. Her narrow limits will not permit much increase of population. Her local property cannot be much increased in value. By her manufactures and her extended commerce she has invaded every country with her forces of industry and enterprise, and she has accumulated the gold of the world, and she now loans it over and over again to the countries from which she has made profit. Her wealth consists mainly of credits; and the creditor class has become the dominating power. England has always been a class-governed country. The land-owning class, once so controlling, gave way to the manufacturing class under the leadership of Cobden; and the corn laws prostrated the agricultural interests. The manufacturing class has now yielded to the creditor or banking class, which today dominates the councils of England, fixes her policies and enters her decrees. The friends of bimetallism stood expectant when Balfour came into power. They have only recently realized that shackles have been upon his limbs, and that he is powerless to aid the cause which he so brilliantly advocated. What arguments can we use to abate England's purpose? That the amount of gold in the world is too limited for the world's business? Her answer is that her people own almost all the gold in the world; that they have enough and a plethora, and out of their abundance loan it to other nations on bonds and mortgages. Will you say that gold appreciates, and that products have diminished in value? Her answer will be that she desires its appreciation. Will you say that the appreciation of gold has stimulated the production of silverstandard countries, and that their competition has lowered the gold price of all farm products? Her answer will be that she raises but little of these; that she buys, and that the cheaper she buys the better. Should we point to the land-owning class in England, the burdens of which have become almost intolerable, her answer will be that some interests must suffer in pursuing a great national policy, and that the English government will stand as heretofore, for the interests of the governing class of the country, the class which subordinates every subject of domestic and economic policy to the desire of maintaining a constantly increasing control over the products of labor throughout the world by a system which makes her a controlling power in peace and war; a partner without risk in all enterprises, and the absorber of the profits of world-wide production. To this policy of enlightened selfishness no man who knows the controlling motives of both nations and individuals can oppose rational objections. We do not object to English policy on English sod. We object to an English policy on American soil. England's wealth consists of gold; our wealth consists of property and products. England is a creditor nation; the United States is a debtor nation. England is interested in having money dear and products cheap. We rely on good prices for our products in order to pay our foreign debts. England proposes to pursue a policy which will increase the value of the gold that she owns. Ought not we to pursue a policy which will increase the value of the property we own and of the products which we export? Do the imitators of the English policy in this country realize that there is a difference in interest between the buyer and the seller, between the creditor nation and the debtor or producing nation? What should be our policy? Why, to increase the use of silver and in that way increase its values so as to restore its old parity with gold. We find that the dislocation between gold and silver has given the advantage in production to countries that are not on the gold basis; that their farm products (whose prices are stable in silver although reduced in gold), are competing with ours in foreign markets to our own disadvantage, and that their manufactured products, produced at a labor cost stable in silver, but reduced in gold, offer a menace in the future to our home manufactures, protected though they be by tariff laws. We have at stake the interests of the great debtor nation of the world; of a nation yielding the greatest amount of farm products in the world-farm products on which we rely for the payment of our foreign debts and the prices of which have been driven down in gold as silver has fallen. The Republican party proposes to confine our bimetallic negotiation to but three countries-England, France and Germany-whose interests as gold owning and creditor nations are directly opposed to our interests, while it ignores the numerous debtor and producing nations with which an effective alliance might be made for the increase of the use of silver. Where is the gold of the world? Refer to the Mint Director's report and you will find that of the four thousand million dollars of gold in the world, all of which, if melted would occupy a cube of only twenty-two feet, one-half is actually located in England, Germany and France. Look at the registered list of bonds and mortgages and you will find that the other half though scattered in other countries, is tied by the string of bond or mortgage to those three creditor countries so that it may be drawn away at any time from debtor countries, thus prostrating their business and imperiling their finances. So that instead of devoting their time to uninterrupted productions of wealth, their energies are wasted trying to catch gold on the fly. Think of it! One-half of the gold of the world actually needed for the local business of those three countries, hardly discernible in the vast area of the earth's surface, and yet our monometallic friends tell us that the other half is sufficient for the business of the rest of the world, occupying a vast area of country and having a population twelve times as great as that of the three combined. All agree that the competitive use of silver in the world's exchanges should be restored. The Republican party proposes that we shall limit our negotiations only to the beneficiaries of the gold monopoly and that we shall not apply to the victims of that monopoly for assistance or aid. Was monopoly ever beaten down by such methods? Was monopoly ever impaired by persuasion addressed to the monopolist? In transportation the victims of monopoly resort to a competitive road. In the public lighting the victims resort to a competitive gas or electric light company; but according to the doctrine of the Republican party the victims of the gold monopoly who so greatly outnumber the beneficiaries of that monopoly are not invited to join the ground for common defense and protection, but in place of that the United States, the victim suffering most of all, stretches out the hands of diplomatic persuasion to the countries whose monopoly it seeks to break down. Had the Republican party proposed in its platform-instead of confining its Negotiations only to three countries that have a plethora of metallic money-to call a conference of the debtor and producing nations of the world whose stocks of metallic money (both gold and silver) are small and which have been compelled to issue large amounts of depreciated paper money because of the scarcity of metallic money, we would then have a contemplated arrangement with countries whose absorbing capacity for silver would be great. The first step, however, toward such a union is the courageous action of this country. Let that action be taken and we will have the intelligent co-operation of Russia, Austria and other European nations that have made ineffectual attempts by the accumulation of gold to provide for gold redemption, all of whom know that their accumulated gold would slip out of their boundaries like water out of a sieve if gold redemption were attempted. For it is a singular fact that there is not a debtor country in the world that has been able to maintain gold payments of its paper money, except our own, and we accomplish it only with bond issue, which in reality constitutes the premium paid for gold. But enough of international conference. It has simply been used as a club to beat down national action on the silver question. Are we not, gentlemen, exaggerating the difficulties of the task before us? Remember that in order to restore silver it is only necessary to absorb the current product of the mines. The accumulated stock is in the shape of coin bearing the stamp of various governments, and it is absurd to assume that the owners of such coin will send it here simply to receive the American stamp. Silver coin it is and silver coin it would remain. There is no surplus anywhere in the shape of bullion, for the bullion in the Treasury vaults is constructively coined and is represented by silver certificates and Treasury notes now in circulation. The current product of the mines is now all absorbed in current uses-in the arts, in coinage and for other purposes. Any demand that we create would be a new demand, and would have a tendency to increase the value of the current product. But we are told that increase of value will increase production. Of course, no man can foretell what the production of silver will be, but the best test of the limitation of the future is the limitation of the past, and we all know that all the silver coined in the world-the result of operation of silver mining for ages-can be put into a cube of sixty-six feet. The world has never produced enough of metallic money. The fact that today over one-fourth of the money of the world is uncovered paper money proves this. Now, what increased use can you suggest for silver in this country that will increase the value of the product of the mines? Our per capita circulation is currently stated to be $22 to $25. Our population is increasing at the rate of over two millions a year. It would take between $50,000,000 and $60,000,000 a year to maintain the present per capita so long as the population increases at that rate. But is a per capita circulation of $25 sufficient? Such a per capita circulation might be sufficient for a credit nation like England, whose area is limited, whose population is dense, whose exchanges are easy and whose ability to increase her coin reserves is made easy by the great debts owing to her people. But certainly it is not sufficient in a vast debtor country like this, with its immense area, its scattered population and its limited methods of exchange. If we should increase our per capita to $30 we would have to coin $70,000,000 a year for five years. |