OCR Text |
Show Cannot Pay The Interest ;ffH OUR realty dealers ascribe the dullness in I BVJ their business and in building to the fact H that they cannot afford to pay the interest ' H demanded on loans. As we understand it, for HH some reason there is a depression, an apprehen- k H sion of possible coming trouble in finances in s H New York City, and when that is felt there, it l quickly extends to the remotest portions of the llH country. So we suspect the reason the interest f fjH charged here is high, is because the bankers in Ulfl truth, dj not wish to loan their funds'at all until Ul this apprehension passes. If that is true, it is H plain that while gold is the only standard, aifd Fl while a comparatively few men can control all that there is in the country outside the United H States treasury and sub-treasuries, there never V V can be a time when the country can be safe from H just such apprehension as is upon it now, and it BMV H' -would seem as though there should he a remedy H for such a situation. But the remedy to he effec- H tual would involve a lessening of interest all H around, and this fact we presume is what makes B it impossihle for a man of the disposition of Sen- H ator Aldrich to formulate a money system, for H' his mind has never heen lifted ahove the contem- H Mation of a money system founded on a public H lebt with the people paying perpetual interest. B Ve suspect that nothing hut dire necessity will H -ver break this rule. H When the great civil war came on and all H the gold fled to cover, something had to be done. H Before that there had been no national financial H system. There were state banks everywhere, H some of them were good, many of them were H wild-cat and a man when he drew money from H one of them, Avas in the condition of the man who H buys fish from a second hand dealer, and does H not know whether they will keep over night and H be good for breakfast or not. The first experi- H ment of the government, at the beginning of the H war was to issue demand notes, in lieu of money, H such notes bearing a promise of final redenip- H tion in specie, which meant gold or silver. To H these the people took joyfully. There was a cer- B tain promise of redemption, which promise was H backed by all the property of the government. That was as good money as the people wanted, in- H finitely better money than the wild-cat money H they had been used to. Had the government H continued to issue these notes, and had they been B given a one or two per cent Interest payable in B specie once a year, who can estimate how mighty B the saving to the country would have been made. B But the bankers clamored against those notes, B for they foreshadowed a time when the people B would rely upon them exclusively. In the mean- B time California and the desert to the east were B yielding enough gold and silver to make a basis B for a national banking system, and Secretary B Chase evolved the national banking system which B is still in vogue. Thereafter the government re- B lied upon greenbacks and upon selling bonds to B carry on the war. That gave the country what It B had never enjoyed before, a stable money on B vftiich to do business. Then came peace; then a B calling in and destroying of so much of the cur- B r&ncy that it brought a panic, next the demonetiza- B tion of silver with its untold and immeasurable m losses, and the final settling d n of the country M to the gold basis, ihe crowning act in the con- m spiracy to make the common people perpetual m servitors to the national banks. B Now gold has ceased to be any fair measure M of values, and has become the implement with M which prices are tossed up or knocked down H daily. In the stress of the war the demand notes PaB never depreciated in value. How would it do to H return to them and emancipate the masses of H the people from the ring and chain put upon H them by the interest gatherers? |