Experience proves that the gold bugs have been badly beaten at their own game, or else they were not trying to make money scarce and dear, and the great champion of 16 to 1, and all advocates of the free silver fallacy have been lying about them. $228,000,000 LOANED TO FOREIGNERS THIS YEAR. Foreign loans taken by United States investors during the year 1900 are as follows: 10,000,000 February 28, Russian Trans-Siberian loan. $30,000,000 ... 15,000,000 .II5,000,000 28,000,000 20,000,000 September 14, Swedish government loan. 10,000,000 Total .... .$228,000,000 This fact proves so conclusively that those who predicted such fearful results if McKinley should be elected and the gold standard established did not know what they were talking about. It is inconceivable that intelligent voters should now trust to their judgment on the money or any other question of public policy. All of these foreign loans are specifically payable in gold. If New Orleans and other cities in this country expect to sell bonds payable in "current funds of the United States," at par bearing 3 per cent interest, they must make it certain that "current funds of the United States" and gold shall be convertible at par. Failing in this, they will not be able to sell their bonds on these terms. Gold is the only standard that makes money plenty and cheap. Those who vote in favor of the free silver candidate will vote for making money scarce and dear in the United States, as it is in all free silver countries. STABILITY IN THE UNIT OF VALUE INSURES PROSPERITY-A NATURAL LAW OF MONEY. Few persons realize the influence of the unit of value. upon every monetary transaction. The pocketbook nerve is the most sensitive indicator of industrial and financial conditions known. The unit of value measures, but it does not determine value. Its stability is entirely dependent upon the fact that it shall always mean the same thing. A copper, silver or gold unit of value can all have equal stability by a simple adoption of them and never permitting the continued use of the adopted standard to be questioned. The paramount issue in monetary affairs is certainty. A fixed number of pounds of copper, ounces of silver or grains of gold legally declared to be one dollar, and the unit of the monetary system of the United States, would perform the function of a measure of value equally well, provided the commercial value of the metals was equally stable, omitting convenience. But the moment a change in the unit is seriously discussed its stability is impaired. A change in the unit, no matter for what cause made, or in what direction, will unsettle business by causing uncertainty. If a change is decided upon unsettled conditions will prevail until the necessary adjustments have been made, after which certainty will exist in exact relation to the stability of the value of the unit. The ideal for which all sagacious nations strive is to secure a unit of value to which they can give the stability of an unchangeable law, and the value of which will change the least in estimation of the commercial world. In the monetary system of the United States the measure of the money unit is twenty-five and eighttenths grains of gold of standard fineness. All values. are stated in dollars, but the language means so much gold. No matter what is bought or sold, the price represents as many grains of gold, at the rate of twenty-five and eight-tenths grain per dollar, as there are dollars. The unit never changes, because it is always so much gold by weight. The value of the unit may change, because its fixed weight of gold may not always be held in the same estimation by the commercial world. The liability to change on this account, however, is not appreciable, because the units of the monetary systems of every commercial nation are measured by grains of gold. This fact makes a grain of gold the true unit of value for the commercial world. In computing the value of all obligations, -prices or money in international transactions one grain of gold is invariably the common denominator. This makes the value of gold changeless and gives absolute stability to the value of the unit of all monetary systems, the unit of which is measured by grains of gold. Certainty is the positive pole of the magnet that controls the movements of the capital of the world. Where there is greatest certainty there money is invariably cheapest. Where money is cheapest wages are highest and all commodities appreciate in price, because high wages expands the market to the extent to which a raise in wages expands the purchasing power of the masses. This is a natural law of money which cannot be changed by any human enactment. The law is just as true when stated in the reverse. Uncertainty is the negative pole of the magnet that controls the movements of the capital of the world. Where there is greatest uncertainty there money is invariably dearest. Where money is dearest wages are lowest and all commodities depreciate in price because low wages contract the market to the extent to which a fall in wages contracts the purchasing power of the masses. The monetary history of the United States during the last eight years is a record of experience which should clearly demonstrate the immutability of this law of money to the understanding of all persons. It should make it as impossible to develop a theory of finance before them, not in accord with it, as it would be for a person unable to apply the simple rules of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division to convince them of his ability to keep accounts. Every person who has borrowed money, sold his labor or any commodity produced by him; every person who has bought or sold anything during the last eight years, has experienced the effect of uncertainty in the first instance and of certainty in the second. If he is capable of rightly interpreting his experience he is able to convince himself, if he did not before know it, that all the teachers of the doctrines of the free silver propaganda are either ignorant of this natural law of money or they are guilty of voluntary error. No person having this intelligence can honestly support a cause he knows to be wrong. The question of the stability of the measure of the money unit should now be closed to debate. Approved by the intelligence of the nation, it should stand as unquestioned as the nation's honor. CALAMITY AND THE GOLD STANDARD. The people of this country must have very short memories if they do not remember the prophecies of Bryan and his followers, during the campaign of 1896, who proclaimed from one end of the country to the other that dire calamity was sure to follow the defeat of the cause of free silver. Of all classes most to be punished for permitting themselves to be crucified on a cross of gold the farmers of the country were selected as the ones to be hardest hit. The gold stand |