PROPOSALS 
 
 FOB 
 
 AN A MERICA!BIMETAL LIC UNION. 
 
 BY WILLIAM BROWN. 
 
 [Price io cents each, 6 d stg. Address John Lovell <Sr Son, Publishers, Montreal .] 
 
 In presenting to American readers the following reflections on a 
 most important topic , the Author desires to state that he does not claim 
 that the present paper by any means exhausts either the subject itself 
 or the arguments which might be set forth in further support of bi¬ 
 metallism. Those who have given consideration to the great monetary 
 problems of the age will understand him when he says that he offers 
 for public consideration only some of the more salient points of these 
 problems. He has also endeavoured to avoid as much as possible those 
 artificial intricacies of monetary science in whose endless mazes so many 
 currency doctors but succeed in getting hopelessly lost, and which serve 
 only to bewilder and perplex the general reader and to cast discredit 
 on what is really one of the most important branches of human investi¬ 
 gation. 
 
 There are two precious metals produced by the hand of industry, 
 in each of which, so far as the opposing laws of monometallic or 
 single-standard nations have permitted them to circulate, labor has 
 invested for safe keeping the produce of its toil. It is of the utmost 
 importance to note that these two metals perform but one and the 
 same species of work; they are used in the exchange of relative values 
 over all the earth, not as media of exchanging something outside of 
 themselves, but as themselves the things exchanged. It is absolutely 
 certain that a disk of silver of known weight and fineness, and embody¬ 
 ing so much human labor, pays as well and as truly as a disk of gold 
 of so much weight and fineness. There is no more paying or pur¬ 
 chasing power, value for value, in a mass of gold than in a mass of 
 silver. Hence there can never, by any operation of natural law, be 
 such a thing as two prices, a price for goods in gold and a different 
 price for goods in silver. One price is the fruit of the concurrent use 
 of the two metals. These metals are not two independent units, but 
 are mutually dependent in the formation of all prices and in the 
 exchange of all commodities. As the removal of one horse from the 
 team would double the draught on the remaining horse, so it is certain 
 that the demonetization of one of the precious metals would 
 demoralize prices, greatly increase the purchasing power of the metal 
 left, and correspondingly degrade the prices of every commodity and 
 product of labor. But prices have for centuries past been established 
 on the presence of thousands of millions of dollars’ worth of coin in 
 silver and gold, in concurrent use throughout the world. So that such a 
 thing as is understood by the gold monometallist when he speaks of 
 his single gold standard does not exist at all. There is not a single 
 metal—there are two metals : there are not two prices—there is but one 
 price, and that price the fruit of the concurrent use of both metals. 
 
2 
 
 This great fact of one price flowing from the presence of two monetary 
 metals scattered over the civilized world is proof conclusive that 
 silver and gold form practically but one indivisible standard, and that 
 only unitedly, or as they receive concurrent circulation, can their 
 appropriate work be done. This mutual fungibility of silver and gold 
 was well known to the old Romans, and commented on by the 
 expounders of Roman law. Were the monometallic doctrines true, it is 
 certain that, as regards the price of every commodity offered for sale, 
 there would be a certain response when silver were offered, and another 
 and different response when gold were offered. It is certain as any 
 scientific truth is certain that one of the metals could not alone carry 
 the superstructure of price. If it were possible to destroy entirely 
 one of these metallic pillars, it is beyond doubt that the whole fabric 
 of industrial and commercial life would give way—the centre of 
 gravity would be gone. The two metals, though different coins, are 
 as thoroughly united in their work as if they had been welded into 
 one metallic bar. Under the reign of monometallism we can con¬ 
 ceive of one nation being entirely emptied of its gold and of another 
 being entirely emptied of its silver; but even this would not affect 
 prices, for a determinate value in gold would be replaced by an 
 equivalent value in silver or vice versa. Even the recent effort of 
 Germany and the Scandinavian nations to destroy the monetary func¬ 
 tions of silver, backed as it has been by all the power of England and 
 the needless closure of so many mints, has not altered the purchasing 
 power of the enormous mass of silver in daily use in all nations one 
 whit,—the ratio of 15^ to 1 established and tested for a century 
 past still reigns in all its force. All that has been accomplished is 
 the degradation of the raw material, the bullion or bar silver, to a 
 false price. I say false price—for, as the coined silver when protected 
 by law as gold is protected and no more, still circulates everywhere at 
 the old prices in the goods market of the world, or, as some hold, at 
 enhanced prices ; and as the value of coined metal should only differ 
 from the value of bullion by the cost of mintage, it is clear to a 
 demonstration that silver bullion is degraded to a false and unnatural 
 position by the arm of law, or by main force, and not by operations 
 in which industrial forces come into full and legitimate sway. From 
 first to last the recent European demonetization has been a destructive, 
 not an industrial process. Industry does not recognize it, and will 
 have nothing to do with it. In continuing to exchange its goods at 
 the old ratio of 15^, it emphatically repudiates the entire movement. 
 
 Now, what is the ground for the raid made by the monoraetallist 
 ■on all this orderly system ? He alleges that the double standard, or 
 what is known as the double standard, is an attempt to fix by law a 
 constant ratio between two fluctuating commodities. This is the sum 
 and substance of his argument. But he entirely misstates the case. 
 He cannot deny that there must be a ratio between silver and gold, 
 just as there is a ratio between every product of human toil. The 
 mint weighs out and sthmps portions of gold at a certain ratio to sil¬ 
 ver, and does the same with silver at the same ratio to gold. In the 
 Latin Monetary Union of Europe it proceeds on the assumption that 
 one pound weight of pure gold is the industrial equivalent in value of 
 15 Y* lbs. weight of pure silver. The mint really does no more than the 
 
3 
 
 grocer who weighs out your pound of tea at a certain ratio to silver, 
 and who may have stamped a certain trade-mark on his packages ; or 
 who tells you of the ratio between the rice and the sugar he offers for 
 sale. All the goods on the grocer’s shelves have a distinct ratio, 
 one thing with another, because they are all the fruit of human labor. 
 Were the grocer to destroy his sugar or mix it with some deleterious 
 substance on the ground that certain fluctuations had occurred in the 
 prices of rice, it would be nothing more ridiculous than the monome¬ 
 tallist proceeding to demonetize silver because of some alleged fluc¬ 
 tuation between that metal and gold. But there have been no fluctua¬ 
 tions between the metals to warrant any such proceedings. The 
 truth is that fluctuations between two such mighty masses as the 
 minted gold and silver now in the hands of men, and these two 
 masses approaching so near to each other in relative values as a 
 whole, are monetary impossibilities. The cost of producing that mass 
 -of gold as compared with the mass of silver is, bulk for bulk, fifteen 
 and a half times greater in the case of the gold than the silver—hence 
 the European ratio of 15.5 to i. On that fact the market and 
 the mint have placed their stamp for a hundred years. The 15.5 
 ratio has stood firm throughout all the eventful times of the Aus¬ 
 tralian and Californian gold discoveries. If silver could not do all that 
 gold can do, and even something more in regard to its capacity for 
 .small payments, the long-established ratio of 15.5 to 1 would have 
 been broken down in a day in the face of these discoveries. The law 
 never “ fixes ” the ratio between silver and gold. It could not do so 
 even if it wished. It accepts the ratio provided by industry itself, 
 and manufactures the bullion into coin at that ratio. Even industry 
 could not arbitrarily fix a ratio. But the current European ratio has 
 an eventful century at its back. It has outlived every change and 
 every attempt to dislodge it, and has triumphed amidst all that that 
 -century has witnessed of panic, convulsion and war, and of kingdoms 
 lost and won. Did England only know, it has demonetized England 
 at its feet. Bimetallism is the perfection of monetary strength ; mo¬ 
 nometallism is .weakness itself. There are no fluctuations as between 
 silver money and gold money. They exist only in the monometallist’s 
 own brain. The recent fluctuations between the silver bullion offered 
 on the markets of London, New York, or San Francisco, and the gold 
 money for which that bullion is sold, are almost entirely the fruits of 
 monometallism. The moment you destroy the monetary functions of 
 one of the metals you necessarily introduce fluctuations into the bul¬ 
 lion value of both metals, for the industrial attachment which formerly 
 held both in place is broken up and gone. You unnaturally depress 
 the one and you unnaturally raise the other; for each being in perfect 
 harmony with the other, each must suffer in sympathy with the other. 
 It is impossible for a monometallic nation to injure its silver with¬ 
 out injuring its gold. There are no statistics that I have ever seen to 
 prove that these fluctuations are connected in the remotest degree 
 with the relative out-put of gold and silver from the mines. They owe 
 their existence entirely to the monometallist, and notably to England’s 
 demonetization of silver. Monometallism, or the demonetization of 
 one of the precious metals, and especially if that metal be silver, 
 means sheer destruction to the industry of the people, and disorgan¬ 
 ization and confusion to commerce itself. 
 
4 
 
 It is no doubt quite true,as urged by that eminent American authority, 
 Mr. Dana Horton (Report of International Monetary Conference at 
 Paris, 1881, Exhibit A, 5th Session) that from a metrical point of 
 riew, and in its relation to the decimal system, a ratio of 15 to 1 would 
 be more acceptable to the nations than one of 15.5 to 1. If we 
 could conveniently lop off the odd half, or charm the coined silver 
 now abroad in the world to ascend, or the coined gold to descend 
 just a trifle, the question of a new ratio with the merit of even numbers 
 might be entertained. But that would be asking silver moley to 
 assume or gold money to reject a difference in value of nearly 4 per 
 cent., a difference which the one has no right to lose and the other no 
 right to gain, and under which drainage of one of the metals would 
 instantly begin. Margins of 4 per cent, are no trifles in questions 
 such as these, and history tells us that drainage will begin at lower 
 figures than 4 per cent. For the unfailing test of the accuracy of the 
 industrial ratio is the fact of concurrent circulation of both metals, 
 their presence known, seen and felt, side by side, in the open markets 
 of the world. And whatever may be urged as to the exact ratio about 
 the end of last century, the 15)^ ratio has been fully established by its 
 holding its position for all of the present century which has passed 
 away. That drainage of one or other of the metals, under the reign 
 of partial monometallism, will take place from the bimetallic nations 
 to the constant profit of these nations, is as certain as that drainage of 
 the only metal from the monometallic nations will constantly go on 
 at a loss to these nations, a loss which is duplicated when the current 
 again sets the other way. It is a monetary fact beyond all dispute 
 that a monometallic nation must inevitably lose on all its direct metallic 
 dealings with open-mint bimetallic nations. It is just as certain as 
 that the span, drawing steadily on an even bar, will outstrip the one 
 horse lumbering along under a similar load. 
 
 Moreover, the demonetization of one of the metals is not only a 
 direct destruction of values, but an attempt to destroy the ratio itself. 
 It is open war on industry, and war to the knife. It is worse—it is 
 monetary suicide. There is not a single silver coin, from the crown 
 piece downwards, which the Government of England permits its people 
 to handle but is clipped and degraded by public authority before it 
 leaves the mint. The monetary destruction of one of the metals 
 must be the destruction of the ratio, for what is there left with which 
 the full-fledged gold of the monometallist can now be compared ? The 
 silver is dethroned and the point of comparison is gone, the platform 
 on which they stood broken up and destroyed. It is practically the 
 Government of England saying to the people : There is now no ratio 
 between silver and gold in our country—we have destroyed the full 
 monetary functions of one of the precious metals, and you must all 
 get along as best you may—we have been so exercised about foreigners 
 carrying off our silver that we have now debased it so low that it will 
 be worth nobody’s while to carry it away—we have been so much 
 troubled lest coiners and counterfeiters should clip, degrade, or deface 
 our silver, that we have turned clippers and counterfeiters ourselves, 
 and have ordered our Master of the Mint to clip and degrade every 
 piece before he puts it into your hands—we have discovered that the 
 sum of forty shillings sterling is the mysterious line which separates 
 
5 
 
 all monetary virtue from all monetary fraud ; and thereupon we have 
 passed a law that all may pay, without fear of legal prosecution, in 
 our clipped coin, what they owe up to forty shillings, but that all may 
 refuse these coins when they presume to overstep this charmed line— 
 thirty-nine shillings in clipped silver is monetary perfection and integ¬ 
 rity, forty-one is monetary blasphemy and fraud—and thus we have 
 discovered the art of fattening our gold coin at the expense of the 
 silver constantly in the hands of our working men. And so these good 
 legislators sink back into a state of happy indifference, thinking that 
 they have fully demonstrated to the people of England the perfection 
 of monetary legislation and science. Shame on the people of England 
 that they have so long tolerated so silly a delusion ! I do not like to 
 use hard words, but if all this is not an exhibition of the most 
 thorough monetary lunacy, then our “ cranks ” may be permitted to 
 mingle amongst us as the wisest of men. And so the monometallist 
 does rot hesitate to proclaim in the public Journals that all this 
 sort of thing may be done not only without suffering to England, but 
 to her prosperity and advantage. 
 
 The monetary needs of the world can be met by nothing short of 
 the two existing masses of gold and silver provided by the hands of 
 industry, and you attempt the impossible when you demonetize one 
 of the metals and expect the other to do that which can only be done 
 by the two combined. You may just as well destroy one of the side 
 wheels of a steamer and expect her thereupon to make a straight 
 course to port. It is upon the combined mass of silver and gold 
 current as money in the world, and never on paper promises, that 
 price , with all the stupendous interests attached to it, has been built 
 up and established. What a perilous thing, theri, to tamper with either 
 of these noble metals, and especially with the silver which is in a 
 state of such constant activity in our hands, and which is so largely 
 instrumental in determining and sustaining prices. The genius of 
 Mirabeau pierced a truth hidden from the most of men when he 
 declared in presence of the French National Assembly that true money 
 and true liberty constitute a double torch to guide the nations on their 
 way, and to ensure the confraternity of the human race. Well would 
 it be for the people of this continent if they would but weigh in the 
 balances these words from the tongue of the eloquent orator of France. 
 
 The monometallist further claims that he should be permitted to 
 destroy the monetary functions of silver on the ground that a borrower 
 will prefer to pay in that species of money most convenient for him 
 at the moment, or when pay-day comes. But monetary laws take no 
 account of creditors and debtors, borrowers and lenders. It can 
 never be a disadvantage for a man to receive payment in that species 
 of money which fully discharges a debt, and which will, any hour of the 
 day, bring him in the full equivalent of what he lent. Government 
 should exercise what I may call a sort of police supervision over the 
 metals to the extent that it should never countenance men when they 
 haggle over the species of money when tender is made of either silver 
 or gold, each possessing equivalent value and full paying power. In 
 truth it is beyond the possibility for men so to haggle if nations will 
 but cease demonetization. If nations show a preference for one 
 metal over the other, it is quite natural that a struggle should arise to 
 
6 
 
 get possession of the coveted coin. Moreover, the monometallist 
 forgets that the lender lends to the borrower that species of money 
 most convenient for him at the moment, and that if there be any 
 serious disadvantage about it, he will either compel the borrower to 
 take what is offered, or will charge additional for the inconvenience, 
 or will break off negotiations altogether; in any case as strong an 
 argument on the side of the debtor as of the creditor. And yet it is on 
 some such selfish and groundless claim as this that certain leading 
 nations have taken up arms against our useful silver money. More¬ 
 over. if every debtor made a race to pay in so-called cheap silver, it 
 would be a race which would soon put an end to its cheapness. 
 
 I have read economists who have gravely pointed to an occasional 
 traveller on the streets of Paris carrying a bag of silver under his arm 
 as good ground for the monetary destruction of the world’s silver. 
 Such a view cannot at any rate be termed either large or liberal. We 
 must not be surprised at such notions cropping up. Many a strange 
 creature has first and last raised its head in the current of political 
 economy. Have we never met with men who, before they could 
 determine the politics of an Irish question or the economies of air 
 Irish rack-rent, had to boil down the Irish potato to discern whether 
 it claimed a Protestant or Catholic flavour? 
 
 The United States Government very properly buys the raw material 
 for its silver coinage in the cheapest market it can find. I have read arti¬ 
 cles in the monometallic journals of the seaboard cities gravely setting 
 forth with pious concern such acts as symptoms' of the decay of public 
 virtue. Certain European nations have taken a dislike to silver 
 money, and others, thinking to protect themselves, have for a season 
 closed their mints against its coinage. The nations which have taken 
 this step against silver are already pausing in their foolish crusade. 
 They may shortly go back to the double standard, or to silver 
 monometallism, or the mints may reopen their doors at any moment, 
 when it is certain that silver bullion would at once command again 
 its true industrial value. But, according to the journals I have 
 referred to, it would be the essence of monetary virtue and the height 
 of monetary wisdom to call in all the silver of America and all the 
 silver of France, and remint it in obedience to the command of Euro¬ 
 pean destroyers whose acts may all be undone to-morrow ! In fact 
 the entire silver in the world, including even the degraded silver of 
 England, would have to be called in and recoined, a task herculean 
 enough, one would think, to stagger the most thorough-going mono¬ 
 metallist. Suppose the people of India or of South America suddenly 
 to take some fatuous dislike to the hides they export, and cast one half 
 of the values into the fire; then, according to the monetary logic of these 
 monometallic journals, it would be a grave crime for American boot 
 and shoe manufacturers to reap a profit out of the folly of these 
 exporters of hides, or to pocket the values which they had deliberately 
 cast away; and the true thing to do would be, either to shut up all 
 shoe factories, or reconstitute values on a rotten foundation which 
 might all tumble to pieces in a week's time. Save us, we say, from 
 the piety of monometallism as well as from its wisdom. 
 
 Let us not forget that silver money is really more useful to the 
 human family than gold money. The silver is the more indispensable 
 
7 
 
 of the two. There are, every hour of the day, a hundred silver coins 
 handled by trade for one in gold. Everybody sees silver, few see 
 cold Silver can do all that gold can do and considerably more, for 
 it can penetrate as small payments where gold cannot reach. In the 
 past silver has for hundreds of years moved the commerce of the 
 world. It is emphatically the people’s money. To destroy its monetary 
 functions is therefore a heinous crime against labor, against trade, 
 against humanity itself. . , , 
 
 Here let me say that I have never entertained a doubt that the re¬ 
 cent closure of the French mint against silver has been a disastrous step, 
 not only for France herself, but for the entire Bimetallic Latin Union 
 of Europe. I have not failed to point out this in my recent work on 
 Silver It is a serious backward step in the path of monetary reform, 
 if France or any other of the nations constituting that Union, is. 
 afraid of a flow of silver, then it is afraid of the most refreshing 
 shower which ever fell on the seed bed of upright and honest trade 
 and toil. If she has a spendthrift, Germany, by her side, and deter¬ 
 mined to continue a spendthrift, why should she refuse to take at so 
 low a price the silver which that nation rejects from its circulation ? 
 
 I would entreat French statesmen into whose hands these papers 
 may fall to reconsider the situation. The fear of too much silver is 
 an idle fear. France must gain on purchase and sale of both metals so 
 long as she has dealings with monometallic nations. The bimetallic 
 mint of France has for a hundred years been the exponent and the 
 practical support of true monetary science. Let us not discredit or 
 imperil so grand and proud a record. An open mint in the Bime¬ 
 tallic Union, with England and Germany monometallic, cannot fail to 
 enrich the nations comprising that Union on every franc passing 
 through their hands. A closed mint is but paving the way for the 
 impoverishment of the people, and fostering monetary panic and con¬ 
 fusion. The open mint would simply exhaust the nations attempting 
 to despoil silver, whilst enriching the nations protecting it. He has 
 thought to little purpose on these questions who imagines that the 
 silver cannot have its revenge upon its destroyers. Germany already 
 staggers under the blow and begins to tremble at what she has done ; 
 not by any means that she cannot get just a little more per ounce for 
 a little more of her rejected silver, but because she knows the costli¬ 
 ness of her attempts to destroy her silver, and sees the monetary 
 trials amongst her people consequent on straitened circulation and 
 dear gold. 
 
 The Government of the United States should undo as speedily as 
 possible the recent pernicious legislation as to silver mintage in so 
 far as that legislation relates to coining on Government account. 
 I am glad that efforts in that direction are being made in Congress. 
 The mint is not now a free mint. It is thoroughly closed against 
 the people. Her efforts to force silver dollars into circulation 
 will be futile in face of shoals of one dollar notes, even though that 
 silver be clothed with legal tender and full purchasing power, and 
 though it should be minted at the rate of fifty millions instead of two 
 millions a month. Fo far the recent important monetary reforms 
 have halted by the way, and a sort of compromise been made with 
 monometallic doctrine. The fatal error was made in the late silver 
 
bill of permitting discrimination against silver. Not only the special 
 industry of silver mining but the entire industry of the United States, 
 calls for a free and open mint. To coin on Government account 
 alone is to keep silver bullion in the low and degraded position to 
 which it has been brought by the recent action of European nations. 
 It tends to ruin the great silver industries of this Continent, and to 
 close up altogether those mines from which there is but a lean out¬ 
 put. It is a serious and flagrant wrong, a wrong before as well as 
 after mintage. My conviction is that no Government ought ever to 
 mint on its own account a single coin in either silver or gold. All this 
 work is the prerogative of industry, and should be left to industry 
 alone, for there is no other power competent to create and preserve 
 values. 
 
 Some economists have proposed, as a final solution of the ques¬ 
 tion, to issue coins of an amalgam of silver and gold, and I believe 
 some of the mints have been practising their ingenuity on the fabri¬ 
 cation of such a coin. It would be a final solution indeed. The 
 amalgamation would be as thoroughly destructive as the demonetiza¬ 
 tion. It would at a stroke destroy the nature and properties of both 
 metals. It would be as practically annihilative of the relative values 
 of silver and gold as monometallism itself, and would go about as far 
 in the settlement of these great monetary questions as an amalgam of 
 pewter and bees-wax. 
 
 The first effect of the demonetization of silver is to create a dearth, 
 not of silver, but of gold. Under the true monetary rigime , a dearth 
 of either metal would be unknown, a fact which springs out of a 
 great monetary principle on which I have frequently insisted—that the 
 proper amount of money for the world is what industry itself turns out 
 from the mines, not a penny less or more. But demonetization of 
 silver necessarily creates a clamant and fictitious demand for gold on 
 the part of the nations perpetrating the deed. Gold is thenceforth 
 clothed with illegitimate power because of an apparent dearth of the 
 metal. A range of gold prices is established which lays a constant 
 tax on every hand which toils. Monometallic nations are compelled 
 to put forth strenuous efforts to hold the gold, and to thwart its former 
 natural and useful circulation. They become like bidders at an 
 auction, each pitted against the other. The fear that there will not 
 be enough of gold is not caused by any real scarcity, but by the des¬ 
 truction of its comrade the silver. Hence the natural flow of this 
 precious metal is completely destroyed, and it is compelled to adopt 
 all sorts of makeshifts and subterfuges in the vain attempt to work 
 in harmony with the silver brother from whom it is divorced. I need 
 hardly pause to point out to those who have given any thoughtful 
 attention to monetary problems, how needlessly harassing all this 
 must prove in practical monetary affairs. Witness the anxiety with 
 which a drainage of gold is regarded in England. And well may she 
 feel alarm, for by her demonetization of silver she has destroyed the 
 only real monetary source competent to counteract the drainage. But 
 strange to say, all this evil work is still insisted on at this time of day 
 in English circles, although silver is knocking at a thousand doors 
 loud enough to be heard by every ear. 
 
 Let me say to my bimetallic friends that I think they do our cause 
 
9 
 
 a serious wrong when, following the monometallic example, they 
 speak of a fixed legal ratio between the metals as if such a thing could 
 exist at all. It is a phrase which should never be heard from the lips 
 of a bimetallist except in unmeasured terms of condemnation. Such 
 a thing as a fixed value is an utter impossibility, so that the phrase 
 itself is absurd, even though used in reference to the all but 
 unchangeable value of two such masses as the gold and silver in 
 existence throughout the world. Government cannot fix a ratio— 
 Government never once fixed a ratio—the utmost it can do is to accept 
 of the open and well-known market values of the two metals as 
 established by the market itself. Industry indicates the ratio—Govern¬ 
 ment accepts of it and mints accordingly. Its employees simply 
 weigh out the metals at the current market rate, a rate which the 
 experience of a hundred years past has declared by countless millions 
 of transactions between generations who have lived and passed away 
 to be 15.5 to one. Every stamp at a true mint must be an echo from 
 the halls of industry. The glory of the discovery of the true ratio 
 belongs to France. To Mr. Dana Horton, an American gentleman 
 who has given much attention to these monetary problems, and an 
 expert of acknowledged skill, we are under obligations for a most 
 interesting historical account of the formation of that ratio in 1785. 
 It came upon the stage at a time of revolution and change, a time 
 signalized by restless and unwonted mental activity. The name of 
 De Calonne, the Finance Minister of Louis XVI, should be dear to 
 every Frenchman and monetary reformer ; for he it was, as we learn 
 from documents presented to the Conference of 1878 by M.M. 
 Ruau and L6on Say, who first placed the impress of the mint of 
 France on the true relative values of silver and gold, and caused that 
 mint to become the exponent to all Europe of the ratio which has 
 stood firm amidst all the discoveries and changes witnessed by the 
 last hundred years; which has, without even the shadow of retreat, 
 faced the flow of all that California and Australia have poured from 
 their mines ; and which, I firmly believe, will accompany the race to 
 the end of its journey. To this man of commanding genius let us 
 pay all the homage that is due. Hardly a more precious legacy has 
 been given to Europe than came from his hands. The monetary docu¬ 
 ments from his pen are worthy of the careful study of all economists. 
 Though maligned by his enemies and driven into exile, his work has 
 outlived him, and all civilized nations have more or less reaped the 
 benefit of his quiet and unobtrusive investigations. I am sure that 
 the recent closure of the French mint has not been accomplished by 
 friends of true money. France ought never to forget her brilliant 
 monetary history. Let her open her mints without fear to all the 
 world, and let these mints again become as it were the teeming womb 
 from whence shall issue the seed to fertilize and refresh the industry 
 and commerce of the nations. 
 
 The Government of England imagines that out of a morsel of 
 yellow gold it can fabricate what it calls a standard, to be carefully 
 confined under legal lock and key. It believes it has now in posses¬ 
 sion a standard of value as reliable as a carefully guarded yard 
 measure is a standard of length, or a gallon measure a s andard of 
 bulk, or a pound measure a standard of weight. It is on this stupendous 
 
10 
 
 error that the entire monetary policy of the British Empire may be said 
 to be built. Mortal man can no more fabricate a standard of value 
 than he can gather the wind in his fists. Value does not specially 
 spring from the acts of this man or that man, nor from the presence 
 of an industrial force here or there, nor from this mass of gold nor 
 that mass of silver, nor even from the presence of the entire mass of 
 the precious metals. If value does not spring from these masses it is 
 certain that you cannot construct a standard of value, either in silver 
 or gold, out of a portion of the mass. But where is there a more 
 popular delusion than that the English gold sovereign or pound 
 sterling is the exclusive standard of the values of all things under the 
 sun ? You may just as well try to fabricate a visible standard of 
 virtue or morals, one to be handled and measured, or tucked under 
 your arm, as a standard of value made from a bit of gold stamped 
 at the mint. You can give length a local existence in a yard or tape 
 line, bulk in a gallon measure, or weight in an iron pound, but this, 
 for the purposes of exchange, you can never do with value. Samples 
 of values you may have just as you may bottle up a portion of air; 
 but a standard of value, as a yard measure is a standard of length, is 
 something of impossible attainment. For value springs from human 
 labor; and no commodity ever made by the hands of man can 
 become a standard for all other commodities. Human labor is the 
 only measure of human labor, value is the only measure of value. 
 Every act of exchange throughout the world has a determinate 
 influence on every other act of exchange. In every exchange labor 
 measures labor, value measures value, therefore labor is its own 
 measurer. You can estimate values in dollars or sovereigns as you can 
 estimate quantities in yards or gallons, but in every act of exchange 
 there is a mutual measuring on the part of both the things exchanged ; 
 and what is this but saying that for the commercial world there is no 
 such thing as English economy understands by a monometallic 
 standard of value ? You may lay a yard measure on a forty yard roll of 
 cloth, and thus determine the length, but you can never in the same 
 way lay a gold sovereign on some other commodity and thus deter¬ 
 mine its value. The cloth is quiescent, the yard is the active measurer 
 —but, to attain that which you seek, the commodity is as active in 
 measuring the gold as the gold is in measuring the commodity. The 
 cloth submits to be measured by the yard stick, but no commodity sub¬ 
 mits to be measured in the same way by a bit of gold. It is not, What 
 does the gold say ? but, What do both commodities say ? In the case of 
 the cloth we do not take account of the cloth measuring the yard stick ; 
 but in the case of the metals, if you want a living trade at all, you 
 cannot but take account of the commodity measuring the gold as 
 truly and as fully as of the gold measuring the commodity, for it is 
 simply one commodity measuring another, each measuring each. 
 Hence may be seen, almost at a glance, the myth at the bottom of 
 England’s monetary system, and how thoroughly steeped in error is 
 monometallism itself. 
 
 No doubt false conceptions as to value lie at the root of much of 
 our monetary trouble. This is not the place to enter on so large and 
 important a topic. I have given this particular branch of Political 
 Economy a great deal of thought. My fellow economists will 
 
11 
 
 permit me on this occasion merely to suggest in passing—what, if 
 true, must have great weight as a scientific principle brought to bear 
 on a yet unsettled problem—that value is not an abstract idea like 
 length, breadth, height, bulk and so forth. Things in general may 
 be said to have value as the word is often used in the current of 
 ordinary language; but as a purely economic term, value is just so 
 much human labor and practically identical with it, and therefore 
 cannot be an abstract conception. It points in general to commodi¬ 
 ties, and these commodities on the market as the outgrowth of human 
 toil. And as it may be correctly said of any and every commodity, 
 that it has value apart from the act of exchange, that act only 
 bringing into view that which previously had a sort of latent existence, 
 so it seems to me that value is a purely concrete term having refer¬ 
 ence to a set of existing and established economic facts. Value and 
 Human Labor, so far as they represent living and existing facts, are 
 interchangeable terms ; for when you have in your hand a determinate 
 quantity of value, it is certain that you have in that hand a determinate 
 quantity of human labor. But value is undoubtedly also a relative 
 term, and has, in every case, reference to other values. So that it is 
 perhaps most accurately described by saying that it is both 
 concrete and relative. I throw out these suggestions for what 
 they are worth. When true conceptions as to value prevail, there is 
 more likelihood of Monetary Conferences arriving at harmonious 
 decisions. I need hardly say to the intelligent reader that I take no 
 stock in the current ideas as to demand and supply being the source 
 of value. I regret also to observe that the heresy that “ law ” can 
 create values, crops out so frequently at these Conferences. Perhaps 
 there is really no more degrading delusion in all the field of economic 
 science than this, and its practical evils are beyond reckoning. 
 From the moment a piece of ore is dug from the mine until it is placed 
 in our hands in the shape of a new and beautiful coin, it is wholly 
 the work of industry. Law no more creates the money than it creates 
 the boots in the manufacturer’s store, or the hardware on the trader’s 
 shelves. Public authority, in directing the size, weight, and form of 
 the coins, does no more than the manufacturer who tells his men what 
 sort of boots or shoes he wants made. The classics, by a rather far 
 fetched quotation, are invoked in favor of this notion— nomos, law,— 
 nomisma, money—therefore law creates money ! We can invoke the 
 classics to do better than that on behalf of those who believe that law is 
 the creator of value. Here is my offering. Pecus , cattle— pecunia , 
 money—therefore cattle create law, or law creates cattle 11 Better, 
 I think, shelve our classics and attend to our political economy. 
 
 The special error which leads the monometallists astray, and which 
 is the main inspiration in their monetary literature, is the belief that 
 the mintage of the two metals at the ratio of say to i is an 
 attempt to establish, decree, and maintain a fixed ratio of value 
 between them; an attempt which, it is said, must always end in 
 failure. They represent us as fighting against nature itself, and 
 therefore they conclude to destroy the monetary functions of silver. 
 Our reply to this is, that it is a false representation which is made of 
 bimetallism—that we never enter at-all on the region 1 of arbitrary 
 decrees, or arbitrary ratios, or fixities of value. They represent us as 
 
12 
 
 doin 7 things we never attempt to do, and which it would be vain to 
 hope’ to accomplish even did we make the attempt. It is not 
 bimetallism, nor the followers of bimetallism, nor Acts of Congress 
 or of Parliament, but industry itself, which establishes a ratio of value 
 be ween the metals—industry presents us with the ratio—industry utters 
 her decree in the open markets of the world—industry maintains its 
 own ratio. The mintage of the two metals at the ratio established by 
 industry does not “ fix ” anything one way or another, it does not fix 
 the ratio, it does not fix industry, it does not fix the mint. We do 
 not decree any unchangeable ratio. We decree nothing at all either 
 this way or that way, variable or invariable, as to values or ratios. In 
 minting the metals at definite weights, we no more decree values or 
 ratios than does the butcher when he carves up his meat among his 
 customers. Fixity is outside of the question altogether so far as we 
 are concerned. But the monometallist, in discharging silver, vainly 
 tries to fix gold, and imagines he has succeeded in the attempt by 
 entering on a propaganda against the only metal with which gold can 
 work. He points to some local disturbances of the exchanges between 
 London and Paris in days gone by, when there was some special 
 tendency exhibited in the flow of either metal towards one or other of 
 these centres, a flow consequent on the worn or degraded state of 
 English coins, or on the adoption of a false ratio of mintage, or on 
 the chaotic condition of European coins when there were as many 
 ratios and conflicting standards as there were States in Europe, and 
 then triumphantly demands if he is not therefore justified in attempting 
 the destruction of the world’s silver. His is the arbitrary act of a mone¬ 
 tary dogmatist who regards not the cry of nature herself on behalf of 
 her own offspring. As between the metals, he destroys the liquidating 
 forces with which each is endowed; that delicate, subtle, yet powerful 
 modus vivendi existing between gold and silver; and sets up a bare and 
 barren pillar of gold in his monetary wilderness. He might just as 
 well decree the extirpation of one of the sexes as the best means of 
 securing the growth of population and the progress of the race. His 
 is the attempt to decree a sort of fixity for gold which has nqthing com¬ 
 mon with industry or commerce to sustain it. And so he ends his work 
 by destroying the only monetary metal with which gold can be com¬ 
 pared, and thus altogether eradicates the idea of value between them. 
 He sets up, as I said, simply a barren golden pillar for men to gaze at 
 and worship ; and in trying to give the world half a monetary standard 
 only succeeds in giving it no standard at all. He ruins the mutual 
 fluency of the metals, and imposes on the commercial world a sort of 
 monetary crank whose erratic movements nobody can understand, 
 and whose powers of destruction nobody can anticipate or limit. In 
 arresting the natural flow of silver, he stops up one of nature’s great 
 conduits, and expects his cistern to keep its former level. He rings 
 the changes on the alleged contention of the ratios between silver and 
 gold, and would have the world believe that there is as determined and 
 endless a conflict between them as between two Kilkenny cats. 
 But with the 15 >4 ratio there is no conflict at all. It is a quiescent 
 ratio. It is established by the experience of a hundred years, and 
 these years by far the most eventful in commercial enterprise which 
 the world has seen. It is a ratio of perfect harmony and peace. 
 
13 
 
 Even iron Bismarck with all Germany at his back has not touched it 
 skin deep. There is no monetary fact in all our range of knowledge 
 more thoroughly established than that of the interchange, in all the 
 daily transactions of life, of the component parts of the two monetary 
 masses of silver and gold at the ratio of 15 1 / 2 to 1 wherever that ratio 
 has been put to test or found a field. At that ratio there has been a 
 mintage of silver the amount of which may be set before the eye in 
 figures, but the vaslness of which the mind fails to grasp. And it has 
 never been known to fail in the daily purchases by hundreds of mil¬ 
 lions of people and in thousands of millions of transactions. It will 
 yet be seen that the attempt to destroy the monetary functions of 
 silver on the faith of the trumped up charges of monometallism is one 
 of the wildest fancies which ever entered the disordered brain of man. 
 
 I hardly feel inclined to notice the silly argument so often advanced 
 against silver on the ground of its weight. This has recently received 
 the rather appropriate name of “ the wheelbarrow argument,” because 
 it represents the bimetallist as a person anxious to see people 
 breaking their backs or their limbs in the effort to move about 
 ponderous weights of silver. There would be some color for the 
 charge if we ranked ourselves as demonetizers of gold. We must 
 have patience, however, with even such an argument. Do the trades¬ 
 men who are so hostile to silver on the ground of its weight ever 
 refuse it over their counters ? Has such a monetary marvel ever yet 
 appeared? Are they not all only too glad to see its face? Are the 
 monetary qualities of silver to be destroyed because a thousand dollars 
 in that metal now and again manage to accumulate in a particular 
 corner ? Are you aware that the Express Company will transport for 
 you a million dollars in silver at the same cost as a million dollars in 
 gold? Because we defend silver, can you say that we therefore ad¬ 
 vocate that silver should be pushed into the sphere of large payments 
 where gold is most suitable ? Do we not advocate that both metals 
 should be preserved in order that each may do its own proper work in 
 its own proper sphere ? Is it consistent for those tradesmen to take in 
 silver at all who are so loud in their denunciations of the metal because 
 of its weight ? Does anybody repudiate iron or leather, or cotton or 
 bread because of their weight? A cask of nails has a specific 
 weight; so has a cask of silver dimes—if you demonetize the dimes 
 why not repudiate the nails ? Are not silver dimes as necessary for 
 the work of silver dimes as nails are for the work of nails ? Will 
 not a porter or carter take your cask of dimes to the end of the 
 street or to the depot at the same charge as for carrying your cask of 
 nails? Would it not really cost the tradesman more in salaries to 
 send his bookkeeper to the bank wjth a thousand dollars in gold than 
 to employ the porter to carry a thousand dollars in silver ? What do 
 our tradesmen desire who make these objections to silver ? Do they 
 want shillings of the weight of sixpences ? or quarters of the weight 
 of dimes ? Do they want each silver coin clipped in two ? What do 
 they propose to do about this weight, this alleged difficulty in move¬ 
 ment, this solidity of a sound ten dollar roll which calls forth so 
 many painful objections ? They affect to be in dread of the nimble 
 sixpence—do they want something lighter still ? I see nothing left for 
 our tradesmen to do who thus make war on their best friend, but to 
 
14 
 
 bury all the silver in the earth, and then go out in search of some new 
 metal. The intellect of the fanner is not more beclouded who would 
 complain of the rain falling on his withered fields because it came 
 down in multitudinous drops than is that of the tradesman who scoffs 
 at silver because each specific coin has its own specific weight. We do 
 not want silver in driblets. An abundance of it in the hands of the 
 people is a security and safeguard for which no substitute can be 
 found. Retail counters barren of silver present but a poor prospect 
 for wholesale shelves. The man who destroys or casts out a nation’s 
 silver strikes industry itself at the heart, imperils all trade, corrupts all 
 exchange, and brings a blight on every product of toil. 
 
 A whole library of nonsense has been written as to the alleged 
 instability of value, especially with reference to the precious metals. 
 There is no instability in value. It is one of the most stable things 
 in all the world. The whole art of exchange is the discover)' of 
 relative quantities of human labor. Values are rendered unstable 
 only by man’s foolish and improper tampering with values. A bushel 
 of grain which is one dollar this year may be worth only half a 
 dollar next year. This proves, not instability, but stability of value. 
 As a mere matter of comparison the price of grain next year will 
 materially differ from the price of grain this year. But value all the 
 time is as stable as a rock. If the grain continued to sell next year 
 at one dollar when it was only worth half a dollar, then indeed it might 
 be said that value was something of no stability at all, and on which no 
 man might place dependence. But the very fact of the change proves 
 not only the absolute necessity for the change, but that value itself, 
 or the relation of human toil to its rewards in the exercise of exchange 
 of its innumerable products over all the earth, is one of the most 
 stable things under the sun. A truth like this, rightly seen, opens up 
 to us new fields of thought in political economy. And there is no conflict 
 between what is here set forth and my previous statement concerning 
 the representations of monometallists as to the legal fixing of the 
 relative values of silver and gold. 
 
 But though there is not, as I have said, any such thing as a 
 standard of value, to be seen and handled, it is nevertheless true that 
 prices, and all the great interests directly affected by prices, spring 
 from the use of coined metal in the hands of man. All the nomen¬ 
 clature of the money market, as related to commodities, points to its 
 origin in the existence of coined money, or to the fact of the precious 
 metals in some shape or other, either now or formerly, in the hands of 
 man. There is nothing on the market, as a sensitive index, to com¬ 
 pare with prices. How needful, then, that the great metals should be 
 carefully guarded and secured against influences foreign to the nature 
 of those things from which prices spring, and especially from the 
 rough and rude hand which would enter upon the market and 
 attempt to destroy one of the two pillars on which prices rest through¬ 
 out the world. For price, if it is to have a healthy existence at all, 
 must of necessity rest on both metals. I am sure it needs no critical 
 analysis to shew how tremendous must be the destruction when such 
 violence is perpetrated on the industry of a nation; how ceaseless 
 must be the strain on industry in the effort to make good the losses 
 consequent on the demonetization of its silver; how uncertain and 
 
15 
 
 fluctuating must be the prices of a people thus standing as it were on 
 one monetary leg, and that a gold one ; and how powerful and 
 ruinous at the same moment must be the resources thus thrown into 
 the hands of those who have at their command the only monetary 
 factor left. All this, though it may not go without saying, may go 
 without urging. Though I have said that “ law ” never can create 
 values, what a noble work lies before the Legislatures of the world in 
 defending, within their own spheres, the great monetary interests of 
 the human family ! 
 
 It is not by any means difficult to trace the origin of the serious 
 economic error as to demand and supply being the source of value. 
 
 I will endeavor to place the matter in a nutshell. A particular crop 
 of grain is this year reduced one-half to what it was last. The 
 tendency, aside from the influence of other cereals to add to or 
 ameliorate the strain on the crop in question as a portion of our food, 
 is to double the price of that particular product. Again, let us 
 assume that that crop, instead of diminishing by one-half, is doubled 
 this year as compared with last. The tendency, apart from the influ¬ 
 ences just stated, is to reduce the price of that particular product 
 one-half. What more natural than that those who chase every passing 
 fancy in political economy, should immediately lay hold of fluctuating 
 prices as the grand elements in the formation of values, and cry out 
 that supply and demand are the legitimate sources of value ? But it 
 is just here that the precious and indispensable work of metallic 
 money on behalf of our race comes into view. That money steps 
 forth at once and prevents, in the raised prices of the deficient crop, 
 the sufferings and loss which would otherwise be the lot of the unfor¬ 
 tunate husbandman ; and restrains, in the lowered prices of the 
 double crop, the exorbitant and illegitimate profits which would 
 otherwise fall to the lot of those who raised that crop. What a 
 thorough leveller, and how faithful to the best interests of the toiling 
 world, is this metallic money ! If demand and supply were the sources 
 of value, it is certain that the lucky fellows with the double crops 
 would instantly double their wealth, and that the poor men with the 
 half crops would be brought to the verge of despair. But it is certain 
 that human labor will receive about the same reward in the case of 
 the half crop as in the case of the double crop, and that the lifting 
 of the scale in the case of the half crop is the counterpoise to the 
 falling of the scale in the double crop. All shewing that the source 
 of value is something deeper seated than price. And that source is 
 human labor itself. In a word, money helps to distribute the farmer’s 
 loss amongst all who consume the half crop, and distributes the 
 advantage amongst all who consume the farmer’s double crop. And 
 the money, in thus faithfully distributing reward to toil, does no 
 violence to any natural or monetary law. It points out, as with a 
 finger of light, that human labor over all the earth is the only true 
 source of value. If future Monetary Conferences recognize these 
 great but simple truths as to value, many difficulties in the path of 
 reform will be cleared away. 
 
 I have friends and correspondents on the other side of the lines 
 who seem to be actuated by a strange and unaccountable hostility to 
 metallic money. Little do these friends think how fatal would be the 
 
16 
 
 blow to industry itself if they could accomplish their desires. Because 
 men have done wrong with the precious metals, surely it is a silly 
 thing to attempt to strike from the hand of industry its best protector 
 and friend. 
 
 And now, let me offer some remarks having a practical bearing on 
 the monetary problem as it affects this continent. 
 
 That America has a special interest in the subject is apparent to 
 all. She is the principal producer of the precious metals, and cannot 
 but be deeply interested as to the future course and history of these 
 metals. Do they receive fair treatment at the hands of other Govern¬ 
 ments ? Are they permitted to take their free course throughout the 
 realms of commerce ? Do the Governments of Europe accord them 
 the fair treatment claimed on behalf of these great products of 
 American industry? Or are they banned and divorced and for¬ 
 bidden free circulation ? Is an unnatural embargo laid upon them 
 hurtful to both exporter and importer ? Are they curtailed and 
 shorn of the strength imparted to them by the hand of industry? 
 These, it is obvious, are questions in which America must ever have a 
 deep and lasting interest. 
 
 Concerted action on these monetary problems is demanded on the 
 part of the different American States. The entire continent, North, 
 Central and South, is interested. A Congress of the different races 
 represented here should be called together to utter, as in Europe, a 
 voice on these great questions. Our monetary condition is in any¬ 
 thing but a satisfactory state. What is wanted is such action as will 
 give to the continent one monetary pulse throughout all its length 
 and breadth. I appeal to the statesmen of the American Union, 
 and to those who have the charge of public affairs in Canada, that 
 they move in the matter. It is the interest of the Dominion to have 
 not only an assimilation as regards money of account, but a mintage 
 assimilation with the system of her powerful neighbor. In a word, 
 
 AN AMERICAN BIMETALLIC UNION 
 
 is what is wanted. It is time that every American State should agree 
 to call its representatives into session, say at Washington, to discuss 
 the entire question. Let a Conference of well-tried and thoughtful 
 men be appointed to consider the problem of a Bimetallic Union, and 
 an international money for the whole of America. A nobler theme 
 could not at present engage the thoughts of public men. Its progress 
 would be watched and weighed with deepest interest by every com¬ 
 mercial nation. British India, silver monometallic, coining the white 
 metal during the last twenty-five years at the rate of forty millions of 
 dollars annually, and suffering under the heavy losses consequent on 
 European demonetization (about ten million dollars yearly), could 
 not but feel the liveliest concern in the deliberations and decisions of 
 such a Conference on American soil. Japan, silver monometallic 
 China and other Asiatic nations, including the entire Asian Archi¬ 
 pelago, would be attentive listeners regarding so great a movement 
 towards the rehabilitation of silver. I would urge again, as I have 
 urged before, the necessity of a recoinage of United States money, 
 either of the silver or gold, so as to bring it into harmony with the 
 
17 
 
 long-tried European ratio of 15 y 2 to one. Perhaps it would be best 
 to follow the example set by France in 1785 and remint the gold. 
 This would remove the most serious existing divergence between the 
 American system, and that of her old ally, France. It would so far 
 bring Europe and America into accord. I believe the European ratio of 
 15^4 to one far more reliable than the American (or rather the Spanish 
 American) of 15.98 to one. It has been tested and tried where under the 
 same tests the American has failed. I think it may safely be said that 
 the United States and France acting in concert on this great question 
 may command the monetary homage of the world. Two of the principal 
 nations doing right by their monies will get the master hand of a 
 dozen of nations determined to do wrong. Has not bimetallic 
 France held this master key for an entire century ? Here I but echo 
 the sentiment of Mr. Cernuschi, when he said in presence of the last 
 International Monetary Conference at Paris : “ The Bimetallic Union 
 would be supreme in the world, even if composed only of the United 
 States and France.” I have long had a similar conviction. Mexico, 
 the United States, and Canada should at once take the initiative. 
 Mexico, as a producer of the precious metals, has long had a deep 
 interest in the entire problem. A nobler subject, and one fraught with 
 greater blessings to living millions and to countless millions yet to 
 come, could hardly at present engage public attention, and I hope 
 the American press may be induced from these reflections to take up 
 and discuss the propositions now set forth. Here, in the Dominion 
 of Canada, we are fully under the sway of the corrupt English system. 
 We have not one true national coin though we are a growing nation of 
 nearly five millions, owning a territory long enough and broad enough 
 to take all the peoples of Europe twice told within its sheltering arms. 
 England sends us over now and again a batch of degraded subsidiary 
 silver, and we have not a single national gold coin to tell that Canada 
 has any existence at all. Our legislation on the subject, I am glad to 
 say, is so far progressive that the Dominion may be said to have put 
 herself into an attitude of expectancy, awaiting, on this very question 
 of bimetallism, the monetary movements of her powerful neighbor 
 the United States. I commend the subject to the consideration of 
 every member of the Dominion Cabinet and Parliament. An inter¬ 
 national mint, identical conditions of coinage, a complete international 
 monetary system, a series of international coins of gold and silver 
 known at a glance by every dweller from Cape Horn to Labrador, 
 and passing from hand to hand at the same current rates throughout 
 the entire Continent, are no dreams of the imagination. It is the 
 happy destiny which lies before us, and will come some day or other 
 —among the nations a general pacificator wherever it holds sway; a 
 benignant impulse pointing to the promised substitution of the plough¬ 
 share for the sword; and a movement so mighty in strength and 
 volume that before it the monometallism of Europe, so far as it 
 prevails, would speedily give way. It would go far to settle the 
 monometallic troubles of even far distant India. Bimetallism, 
 though at present nowhere in Canada, has a powerful hold upon the 
 intellect of the United States. Many of their public men take an 
 enlightened interest in the subject, and not a few of them are working 
 away at these problems with constant and untiring zeal. At the Paris 
 
18 
 
 Conferences the American intellect has not by any means suffered when 
 brought face to face with the intellect of Europe. The speeches of 
 the American Delegates constitute a noble defence of what is 
 popularly understood by the double standard, and to these gentlemen 
 the world owes no ordinary debt of gratitude. The address of 
 ex-Senator Howe at the 7th Session is replete with practical wisdom. 
 I shall be glad if the present paper should aid in any way in drawing 
 public attention more fully to the subject, and I would earnestly press 
 the matter before my Canadian readers. One cannot but be 
 encouraged by the fact that the American press has always shewn a 
 readiness to discuss the questions at issue, and Journals not a few have 
 handled the matter with all the skill of thoughtful bimetallists. May I 
 not express both the hope and the desire that the Governments of 
 President Arthur and of the Marquis of Lome may be .signalized by 
 the beginning, at any rate, of so great a movement ? 
 
 It needs no argument to shew how powerfully the unification of the 
 American coinage on a bimetallic basis would draw into closer bonds 
 the different nationalities on our Continent. Even the preliminary 
 discussions of a matter of such great international importance would 
 be something full of promise. Barriers would be broken down. The 
 existence of common denominators would simplify every monetary 
 transaction between the nations. The different peoples would be 
 speedily educated to speak as it were a common monetary language. 
 What a spur all this would prove to healthful and remunerative 
 industry, how greatly it would simplify all international exchanges, 
 and how powerfully it would operate in drawing closer the commercial 
 bonds of North and South America, I need not pause to shew. 
 Hasty legislation on such a subject would have to be studiously 
 avoided. The most calm, thoughtful, and thorough deliberation 
 must precede any movement towards the new condition of things. 
 
 Furthermore, nothing can be urged against the present proposition 
 as if it were a new and untried experiment. We have before us the 
 example of the Latin Monetary Union or Treaty entered into in 1865 
 between France, Belgium, Italy, and Switzerland, and to which Greece, 
 the Papal States, and Roumania subsequently gave in their adhesion. 
 A mass of valuable monetary literature is at our hand. A degree of 
 success which these States could hardly have anticipated has attended 
 this now famous Monetary Union, a success which was unimpaired 
 until France, quite recently, under the impulse of needless alarm, 
 unfortunately closed her mints against silver, a movement which was 
 followed by Austria and by most if not all the mints on the European 
 Continent. Until this occurred, a more complete success could not 
 have followed any new experiment. I am not aware that a single 
 monetary jar has arisen to disturb the harmony during all the years 
 in which the working of the Union received a fair trial. We have 
 every warrant in saying that the question of monetary unification has 
 been satisfactorily and completely solved, and that the different States 
 on this Continent need not hesitate in adopting reforms which have 
 proved so satisfactory to eighty millions of the most active and 
 intelligent people in Europe. It seems indeed, so far at least as the 
 Latin Union is concerned, as if the bimetallic question had passed 
 beyond the Academic stage and entered on the final path of pure 
 practical monetary reform. 
 
19 
 
 Bimetallism has suddenly started into life even in England. A 
 large and influential meeting favorable to the rehabilitation of silver 
 has recently been held in London, presided over by the Mayor of that 
 City. The people of England are at last awakening to the fact that 
 monometallism is replete with danger to public interests, and not by 
 any means the salutary thing represented. A great national move¬ 
 ment towards monetary reform appears to be setting in at the heart of 
 the Empire. The admirable bimetallic address of Sir Louis Mallet, 
 one of the Delegates of British India at the last Monetary Conference, 
 inspires us with hope and confidence. The speeches of Lord Reay, 
 the other Indian Delegate, though more guarded, are far from being 
 unfriendly towards bimetallism. Mr. R. B. Chapman, of the Indian 
 Financial Department, in a thoughtful paper on the subject, dated 
 from Simla, 2nd June, 1880, entirely approves of a bimetallic standard 
 for India at the 15 1 / £ ratio. Monometallism is on the wane and is a 
 lost cause. Its ranks are irretrievably broken. Bank of England Direc¬ 
 tors who went to Paris monometallists, to their honor be it said, re¬ 
 crossed the Channel bimetallists, and now defend it with pen and voice. 
 Mr. Vrolik, the Delegate of the Netherlands, a life-long student of the 
 subject, and formerly Finance Minister, acknowledged at last Confer¬ 
 ence his complete conversion to bimetallism. The deliberations of these 
 Monetary Conferences are indeed beginning to bear precious fruit. Con¬ 
 ducted, as becomes the subject, with so much gravity and decorum, 
 and embracing, as these conferences do, the best genius and talent of 
 the nations represented, I see in these august deliberations the most 
 hopeful pledges of monetary reform and the final solution of questions 
 of profoundest interest to the human family. 
 
 No doubt the usual monometallic cry of alarm will be heard as to 
 the drainage of our gold. Even some bimetallists may express fears 
 at the proposition of an open mint for silver on American soil, in face 
 of the present monetary condition in Europe. They affect to see the 
 yellow metal all gone and the white metal all left behind. Such a pheno¬ 
 menon, let me say, has never yet been witnessed under a true ratio. 
 France is a standing evidence in point. Gold or silver may have 
 alternately increased and decreased in her circulation consequent on 
 the demands of monometallic nations, but this has always left a sub¬ 
 stantial profit in the hands of France. To close up the mints against 
 the flow of silver because it bears the stamps of the different German 
 States is just as foolish as to close them up against the output from 
 the mines of California or Nevada. It is, so far, a bid for the mono¬ 
 metallic doctrines. Has England saved herself from drainage by her 
 monometallic mint? From what bimetallic nation has gold ever been 
 swept away in such masses as from the shores of intensely mono¬ 
 metallic England ? Have we ever witnessed bimetallic France in 
 such mortal fears about a drainage as monometallic England? Has 
 not the breaking down of the silver door removed a safeguard which 
 no ingenuity can replace? Where does the silver bullion find a 
 readier market than in London itself? Let us even imagine that we 
 for once witnessed this monetary miracle—not a yellow coin in 
 America, not a white coin in Europe—where would lie the peril ? In 
 silver America with every industry in intense activity and the hum of 
 business on every hand ? Or in gold Europe languishing under the 
 
20 
 
 shadow of death, with every industry brought to ruin for want of that 
 metal which can do all that gold can do and a great deal more. More¬ 
 over, there is a great economic truth lost sight of by the monome¬ 
 tallists just at this point—that no nation can permanently retain more 
 of the world’s money than its just proportion ; a monetary truth which 
 shall expire only when goods shall have lost all prices and price itself 
 shall have perished from the earth. Let us have no fear. An open 
 mint in an American Bimetallic Union and an open mint in bimetallic 
 France means the triumph at no distant date of true monetary prin¬ 
 ciples over all the world. 
 
 The recent demonetization of silver in Europe will not prove an un¬ 
 mixed evil if it awakens public attention in England to the dangers 
 attending the condition of English metallic money. England, with re¬ 
 gard to this question, occupies a peculiar position. The home country 
 is gold monometallic, the Indian Empire is silver monometallic. Surely 
 this, in monetary matters, is a house divided against itself. The fall 
 of the Indian exchange, consequent on the demonetization of silver, 
 has been a serious matter for the Indian Government. The loss on 
 Government exchange alone, or on bills drawn in London by the Sec¬ 
 retary of State for India, may be roughly estimated at one-sixth, or 
 17 per cent, on every rupee converted into sterling. Of course all 
 mercantile bills, whether drawn in London, Calcutta or Bombay, must 
 share the same fate. Though the coined silver in active circulatio* 
 throughout the world has not fallen one cent—that fall only taking 
 place with regard to uncoined bullion, or rejected silver coinage 
 thrown into the condition of bullion—yet every rupee, or bill repre¬ 
 senting rupees, must submit to be filtered through the bullion market 
 of England. As all who have dealings with the East know to their cost, 
 there is no other way for the rupee of distant India to march into the 
 bank parlours of London than through the avenue of an artificially 
 degraded bullion market. At this remote distance, and more espe¬ 
 cially as I am far from being familiar with the details of Indian finance, 
 it becomes me to speak with reserve. I may say this much, however, 
 that I have never seen a statement quite satisfactory to myself which 
 explains exactly where and how the brunt of the loss on Indian ex¬ 
 change is borne. It is certain that the silver rupee and its subdivi¬ 
 sions, legal tender or otherwise, have lost nothing' of their former pur¬ 
 chasing power in india. If the loss fell on the people of British India 
 it would no doubt manifest itself in increased prices for British goods 
 consumed in India. But I find no rise or fall of prices in India 
 within recent years which may not be at once referred to the ordinary 
 influences at work in commercial nations. Even Manchester cottons, 
 instead of rising, have rather fallen in price. Other textile fabrics have 
 considerably fallen. Then it follows, I should say, that if the loss were 
 distributed on the people of India through increased prices of British 
 imports, there would be little or no disturbance in the prices of Indian 
 exports in Britain. But since demonetization the prices of nearly all 
 the leading staples usually exported from India have risen in England, 
 some of them in a very considerable degree. All which leads me to 
 the conclusion that the loss on the Indian exchange ends where it 
 had its beginning, on the shores of Europe. The enormous annual 
 loss, so far as Government finances are concerned, falls directly 
 
21 
 
 on the Indian Government, which has to make good in the sterling 
 money of England every year the equivalent of about 15 millions of 
 pounds in Indian rupees. So far as mercantile interests are concerned, 
 the loss is accounted for by increased prices paid iir Europe for im¬ 
 ports from India ; on direct reduction of mercantile profits ; on lowered 
 prices given for English and other manufactured goods for export; and 
 probably on depressed rates of freight to and from India. Does it 
 not stand to reason that it is not likely, or even possible, that the 
 millions of India should at once empty their pockets of 15 to 20 per 
 cent, of their contents at the bidding of the monometallic nations of 
 Europe ? And what reason in the case would anticipate, events seem 
 fully to verify. 
 
 There is an absolute test, one which never fails, to which the cor¬ 
 rectness or otherwise of the English doctrines must submit, and before 
 which they must either stand or fall. An ex-chancellor of the English 
 Exchequer, Viscount Sherbrooke, holds England’s position to be so 
 invulnerable that he has just declared in one of the London Reviews 
 that, like the late Mr. Bagehot, he has no patience at all with those 
 who advocate bimetallism, and assures us that he deliberately shuts 
 his eyes to what is written on our side of the question. I hope, how¬ 
 ever, in what I am about to say, to catch the eye and the ear of even 
 an English ex-chancellor. Here, then, is the test before which mono¬ 
 metallic doctrine in England stands self-condemned. If that doctrine 
 be what its advocates so strenuously claim for it—if it be the case 
 that silver, if raised to the monetary position of gold in England and 
 endowed with its true par, would be the ruin of the gold standard 
 of England—if the circulation of silver at par with gold would ruin 
 the gold metal of England—then it is certain that that gold, defended in 
 that country on every hand by all that the most thorough-going mono¬ 
 metallist has ever claimed for it, must be of far more value than the 
 gold of France and of all other double-standard countries. Living in a 
 monetary atmosphere so pure and so aristocratic, the gold of England 
 must be of matchless superiority when compared with the gold metal 
 of France, of the United States, of BeJgiuna, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, 
 &c. I is, in that case, beyond all dispute that a kilogramme of pure 
 gold int France must be far inferior to a kilogramme of pure gold in 
 England, or a pound of pure gold in New York to a pound of pure 
 gold in London, and that never once would exchange in Paris on Lon¬ 
 don have risen to par. In France the very test that England dread, 
 and on the alleged falsity of which it stakes its monetary character 
 and reputation, the equal legislation for silver as for gold, has been in 
 force for a hundred years, and never once in all that period has a 
 kilogramme of pure gold in France failed to be the equivalent of a 
 kilogramme of pure gold in England ; never once during all that cen¬ 
 tury has a kilogramme of her coined gold failed to exchange for 15^4 
 kilogrammes of her coined silver; never once has a bill of exchange 
 been bought or sold, except at the standard of the par of exchange of 
 exact equivalence between English and French gold. And all this 
 has occurred, not because French legislation did this thing or that 
 thing, but because it did no violence to true monetary principles. If 
 English Jdoctrine be true, it is absolutely certain that the par of 
 exchange between France and England would not rest on the quantity 
 
22 
 
 of pure gold in the coins of the two countries. Some other par would 
 have to be found, and what that par could be, or in what secret depth 
 or distant region it is to be found, only a monometallist can tell. If 
 Lord Sherbrooke turns his back on facts like these and still shuts him¬ 
 self up in his monometallic castle, there is nothing for bimetallists to 
 do but to leave him with the men who dread silver as a currency 
 because God has endowed it with the special weight to which it owns, 
 and without which it would be neither silver nor currency. In a word, 
 we have gone to the utmost verge of reason with our friends, and 
 further than that we cannot go. 
 
 The mintage under an American Bimetallic Union should be not 
 only assimilated to the ratio, but, as regards both metals, to the weight 
 and fineness of the legal tender coins of the European Latin Union. 
 We would thus enjoy a real community of money between America 
 and a large portion of Europe. The assimilation of values would be 
 complete although the monetary system on the other side rested on 
 numeration by francs, and on this side on numeration in dollars. And 
 there ought to be little difficulty in so arranging matters as to give 
 international currency to the coins of both Unions, by some sort of 
 international stamping or otherwise. This, however, is a matter to be 
 left in the hands of skilful experts. One thing we should carefully 
 avoid—the fabrication of any degraded or “ subsidiary ” silver coins, 
 a monetary error on which the Latin Union unfortunately set the seal 
 of its approval. The mints should be free to' all, but there should be 
 no straining after that economic impossibility, gratuitous coinage. 
 
 Lastly, there are not the same difficulties in the way with us as in 
 Europe relative to the adoption of a monetary unit. The dollar, bom 
 long ago in the heart of the mountains of Bohemia, has had a history 
 and influence in human affairs surpassing that of any other coin. There 
 is hardly a nation but has seen its face or become familiar with its name. 
 The Mexican dollar, like the best goods on the market, has always 
 been in extensive demand and ranks as a great traveller, its superior 
 weight having caused it to be more generally sought after for ship¬ 
 ment than other varieties of the Spanish dollar. The Frenchman will 
 naturally stick to his franc, the Englishman to his pound, the Austrian 
 to his florin, the Russian to his rouble, the Scandinavian to his krone, 
 the German to his mark, the Italian to his lire. National feeling in 
 such matters is not to be overcome in a day. But on this Continent 
 the dollar reigns supreme. It is familiarly known throughout its 
 length and breadth. It is the sum and substance of all our monetary 
 thought and discussion. And the silver dollar, as a recognized unit, 
 has travelled far beyond the American seaboard. It is the only legal 
 tender in Hong-Kong, and, concurrently with a Japanese dollar, is 
 legal tender in all the Straits settlements of the East. In the British 
 West Indies, the subsidiary silver of England has gradually displaced 
 the long current doubloon and dollar, owing to the fact of that 
 degraded silver having by law been elevated to the rank of unlimited 
 legal tender. And thus these British pieces have driven out 
 the more valuable gold and silver coin. Such a currency is 
 in the highest degree unsatisfactory, and cannot but do serious 
 injury to the commerce of these Islands. England, like every 
 good parent, can have no other desire than to see her children adopt- 
 
 L 
 
23 
 
 ing the policy and the practice which suits them best. As the mone¬ 
 tary Colonial policy of England has of late years tended towards the 
 adoption, for her smaller settlements, of the currency most convenient 
 for the people of these dependencies, even though that currency 
 should be that of the neighbouring nations, it is highly probable that 
 the British West Indies, would, as a whole, gladly fall in with an 
 American Bimetallic Union of full standard gold and silver coin, and 
 that no serious objection would be offered in England to a Canadian 
 movement in the same direction. In British Honduras, as we are 
 informed by Mr. Goschen, to whose published notes I am indebted 
 for much of this information as to Colonial currency, the circulation 
 •consists almost entirely of the dollars of the United States and of 
 Central America. In the Bahamas and smaller islands the coins of 
 the United States occupy the field of circulation. 
 
 The following appears to be the present condition of the monetary 
 metals on the American continent. The double standard countries: 
 the United States (with, however, its mints at present closed against the 
 public), Chili, Paraguay, Venezuela, Uruguay, Hayti, San Domingo, 
 Cuba, French and Dutch Guiana. The single gold-standard coun¬ 
 tries : Canada, Brazil, the Argentine Republic, British Honduras 
 (nominally), Jamaica, British Guiana. The single silver-standard 
 •countries : Mexico, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Bolivia, Costa Rica, 
 Honduras, San Salvador, Nicaragua and Guatemala. 
 
 In conclusion, we may gather from all that has been set forth that 
 •everything is hopeful for a unification of coinage, of standard, and of 
 money of account on this side the Atlantic. It would be the recogni¬ 
 tion on a great scale of the prophetic words of Napoleon on his prison 
 rock, “ a common law, a common measure, and a common coinage, 
 express the chief wants of Europe.” 
 
 I respectfully commend these thoughts to the consideration of the 
 American press and people, and venture to hope that the attention of 
 the different Governments interested may be drawn towards the sub¬ 
 ject. Everybody knows how difficult it is to clothe in popular language 
 anything treating on monetary science. The present is an attempt, at 
 any rate, to draw public attention into a new and practical channel on 
 questions which must always command precedence in the affairs of 
 men. How to assimilate the coinages and establish the monetary 
 standards of this great Continent on a basis which shall be at once 
 international, equitable, stable and permanent, is indeed a noble sub¬ 
 ject for debate, a theme of profoundest interest to every thinker who 
 wishes well to the peace of the world, the security of industry, and 
 the general happiness of mankind. 
 
 Montreal, Canada, July, 1882. 
 
 Journalists making any observations on this paper will confer a 
 favor on the Author by addressing to him a copy of the same, care of 
 John Lovell & Son, Printers and Publishers, Montreal. 
 
 This pamphlet can be had for 10 cents each (6d. sterling), or say 6 
 dollars per 100, which will include postage. 
 
 Recently published, by the same Author—Silver in its relation to Industry and 
 '"Trade : the danger of demonetizing it. 134 pages. Price 60 cents or 2-6 stg.