Show WHAT IS MEANT BY demonstration OF SILVER F A correspondent says that inas t as there in ia nothing in the coin axe age bill of february 12 1878 pertain ing to of any metal it in ie hardly fair to characterize that measure as a silver act lla in a certain sense our correspondent is correct the act wasi waa ostensibly for the purpose durw of regulating details of coinage at the mint its object was to collate and embrace in one act all previous legislation on the subject of T U j 8 money it is true it made no reference to the standard silver dollar in the way of or other wise it did not make aDy anything thing else the unit of value however it limited the coinage oi 0 silver to half and quarter dollars a and i nd dimes and to a trade dollar above the standard of the unit dollar it prohibited these coins from being aegan a legal tender for more than five dollars in any one payment of the old unit dollar was 4 entirely omitted emitte d as one of the coins to be made at the mint the bill contains sixty seven sections section seventeen says wo no coins either of gold ailder or minor coinage shall hereafter be issued from the mint other than those of the denominations standards and weights herein set forth by the terms of this the old unit dollar was set aside and silver coins in legal tender limited to five dollars many of the men who voted tor for this bill openly cont confessed essed a jew few years afterwards that they never thought for a moment it would demonetize silver among these were r thurman blaine garneld garfield and the silver dollar at the time of the passage of this bill was actually worth bios in gold almost immediately after the bill became law silver began to depreciate but during the first year nothing of any extent was said in about the third year it became a theme of universal versa comment the forty fourth congress took it up in august 1876 the monetary commission was organized it consisted of three senators jones bogy and boutwell three depre gibson willard and bland financial experts groesbeck bowen and weston the duty of this was to inquire first into the change which hag baa taken place in the relative value of gold and silver the causes thereof whether permanent or otherwise second into the policy of the restoration of the double standard in this country and if restored what the relation of the two coins shall be the labors labon of this commission extended over a wide field in the financial world information was received from every prominent banker financier and economic student in the civilized world the main substance stance of the report was submitted and ordered printed march 2nd and 1877 in its ito findings it said of the depreciation of silver the evil is enormously aggravated grava ted by selecting gold as the metal to be retained and silver as the metal to be rejected it also said that of silver in this country will have a powerful influence in preventing and probably will prevent the of silver in france and other european countries il but the item which refers directly to reads the ancient money of the country instead of being intentionally ae legislated g isolated out of ex existence stence by congress was revised out of existence I this of course meant that oil silver was reduced from an article of money to a mere commodity and became an article of commerce |