OCR Text |
Show THE ARGUS. 3 Police Board against another, incidentally reflect ing upon the council, was also seriously consid- ered and adopted at the last meeting. These investigations are of the same general character. While President McKinley is a firm believer in the curative properties of a constantly increasing tariff, he knows that the recent convalescent tendencies of the agricultural districts are due to other causes entirely. He says that whatever trade improvement is noticeable in the East may be attributable to the tariff bill that Senator Cannon voted against, but in speaking of the rise in prices which has been held up to the farmers of the in region as an object-lessofavor of a high tariff and in contradiction to the claims of the silverites, President McKinley says : The cause of the present boom in the West is undoubtedly due in a great measure to the large crops and high prices caused by the failure of crops in other countries. Prosperity And the President. trans-Mississip- n pi This seems to be the correct view of the case. There is not only a phenomenal wheat crop in this country, but a foreign market for every bit of surplus our farmers are able to spare. The European wheat crop for 1897 will fall greatly below that of 1896. Thus, says a goldbug paper, the farmers of the United States are sure not only of a good price for their cereal in this country, but will also be able to obtain almost their own figures for their exported wheat. The agricultural department will shortly issue a special bulletin, giving, the outlook for this falls crops in European countries, with particular reference to the wheat output. This statement will be of the utmost importance to our grangers, as it will accurately gauge the markets of the world for this product and will determine just what the American producers can demand for their wheat. From the information thus far obtained by the department, it is very clear that the Europern and South American crops of wheat this year will be considerably less than they were in 1896. This much is certain, but the department has not yet received sufficient data to enable it to give positive figures as to the total yield. Another good feature for the farmers of the United States is that the countries which raise some wheat, but not enough for their own consumption, are this year reporting unusually short crops, so that they will have to import considerably more wheat in 1897 than they did in 1896. The same condition is true of the countries which usually export a large quantity of their yearly product. These countries will therefore be able to send to districts less of their the other cereals this year than heretofore, all of which will result to the advantage of the United States. wheat-consumin- g necessary to hear the agricultural report of France in order to complete the statistics upon which the department will base its advice to the farmers of this country. Last year France ranked next to the United States in wheat production, having a round total of 337,000,000 bushels, against 427,000,000 for the United It will be States, which topped the list. France has experienced unfavorable weather for a considerable portion of this year,' however, and the department is positive that her output will fall far short of last years figures. In fact, advices received from the foreign agent of the department state that so far as the harvest has thus far advanced the results are very unsatisfactory, the grain being poor both as to quality and quantity. Russia last year was third in wheat production, harvesting 300,000,000 bushels. The reports from that country are also unfavorable for a big crop this year. And eo it seems that President McKinley is disposed to be more modest and honest in his claims for the tariff law than many of his newspaper supporters are. Every time a farmer sells a load of wheat an administration organ claps its hands and exclaims : Behold the prosperity we bimetallists hold the notion that by the concurrent action of the leading commercial countries of the globe gold and silver can be made to circulate side by side as standard money and that by this means the value of gold would be dragged down and the value of silver pulled up until they met at a common level. Like the American free silverites, they start out with the assumption that gold is constantly rising in value, and they maintain that the way to counteract this tendency is to lighten the strain on gold, as Mr. Bryan expressed it last fall, by admitting silver to free and unlimited coinage, the same as the yellow metal, at some ratio far below the market value. They seek, in other words, to dilute and weaken the existing standard by watering it, so to speak, with a cheaper metal. WThat is this but repudiation, pure and simple? Assuming international bimetallism to be workable, how would it differ in principle from the scheme which Mr. Bryan have given you. But the Tribune has figured it out that, under the most favorable circumstances, at present prices, the western farmer and his wife, on an average, receive but 42 J cents per day for their joint labor. If that is his boom, his share of prosperity, what indeed must be his portion in adversity? Is it any wonder that mortgages cover his home and debt hangs to his feet and arms like the chains of slavery? Twenty-oncents a day for the protected farmer of America ! And the plutocrats call that prosperity It will take far more than that to kill the cause of free coinage. e 1 -- . advocates? Concerning the mission of Senator Wolcott of Colorado and others the same authority says When a concession was made in something else that should be preserved. It is ricKinley's this : the St. Louis platform to internaInternational Bimetalliam. We are glad to see that the British governtional bimetallism the idea was dement, as represented by Sir Michael Hicks-Beac- h rided and a leading Republican called it an chancellor of the exchequer, refuses to say irridescent dream. But an international bimetwhether it will in another monetary allic plank was inserted for the reason that it conference until participate has it carefully measured the efwas perfectly harmless and meant nothing, but fects of such a step. The assembling of another afforded silver state delegates and members congress of this kind would amount to asserting that there was something radically wrong with of the party some consolation and a necessary exthe gold standard, and it is time that this sort of cuse for allegiance to the nominees of that condelusion and folly ceased to be encouraged. Evivention. The appointment of a monetary comis of the same dently Sir Michael Hicks-Beacmission to go abroad for the purpose of arranging opinion, for it is not difficult to detect between the lines of his note to Senator Wolcott and his for an international conference, as the President colleagues a polite intimation that the latter are explains, was in accordance with a law passed engaged in a rainbow chase. The Westminster before his inauguration and signed by Grover Gazette of Saturday does not hesitate to speak is not to Cleveland. Therefore it fair President' out in plain terms about the matter. It declares McKinley to attribute his action in the matter to that the mission of the silver envoys is a farce of the baldest kind and that it is a foregone a desire on his part to bring about international conclusion that the British government will debimetallism, which he regards as international cline to enter into any project to do something inMurat declares Halstead the for silver. repudiation. That newspaper unquestionably voices British sentiment. Senator Wolcott ana ternational project to be a bimetallic myth, his associates have been courteously received and and says that there is no hope for it whatever. heard because they officially represented a great The Xew York Commercial Advertiser, the leadnation with which Great Britain is anxious to re: remarks administration organ, editorially main on terms of amity, but had they been dising patched by a power of inferior importance it is Many people who believe in the single gold standard have been inclined to look upon the likely they would have met with a peremptory scheme of an international bimetallic standard, refusal long ago. with tolerance, on the score that it was utterly impracticable, and, therefore, that no With the Klondike stampede has Klondike haim could come from humoring those persons Season arisen a new excitement and shipIs who profess to be eager to see it brought about. Over. loads of miners, monied men and It was this feeling, apparently, which Ted to the adoption of the international bimetallic plank in prospectors are setting out for the auriferous the last Republican national platform and to the fields of Peru. This appears to be far more action of Congress last winter in passing a bill inviting than the northern prospect and fully as appointing an international monetary commispromising. The enormous outlay in preparing sion. for a year of labor in the frozen zone, the danThe Commercial Advertiser says further that gers and discomforts of the trip, the perils of it is a mistake to take such a view prospecting among the glaciers and everlasting snows of the Klondike, the exactions of the of so serious a subject because, it says, g people everywhere are united in the Canadian government, the rush, the crowd, the jamb, the meager facilities for transportation opinion that the project of an international bimetallic standard is chimerical and absurd, but this render the polar diggings somewhat forbidding does not alter the fact that the principle at the just at present. None of these difficulties will be encountered in Peru. Of course, the government bottom of it is at once dangerous and vicious. will place some restrictions upon the adventurers who seek the hidden treasurers of her hills, but The Provo Enquirer and other local adminisit would be utterly, impossible ior any country to tration organs have sought to create the impressmake demands as unreasonable as Canada imion that the administration is heartily in favor of international bimetallism, which, they hold, is poses on the aliens in the Klondike. Besides, when the Yukon miner clad in furs and flannels quite a different thing from independent bimetallism. Read what the Commercial Advertiser, is hovering over his fire awaiting the dawn of an organ away up at the head of the class, right spring and the summer thaw, down in Peru the next to the President, has to say in this connecminer is able to work twelve months in every tion : year clad in a turban and a breech-clout- , eating wild fruit of the tropics and drinking the What is it that international bimetallists, as the nectar of the native vines. This mad rush to they call themselves, seek? Reduced to plain it is English, nothing less than a cheapening of Alaska should stop and people who are hunting the present monetary standard of the civilized world. The movement has practically no other fortunes should turn in some other direction. The Klondike season is over and those who canraison detre. If the value of the present monetary standard was not to be affected, what would not content themselves until the coming of spring be gained by the proposed change? International should go to Peru or Mexico. The steep and h . good-nature- d good-nature- d right-thinkin- |