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Tree Coinage of Silver*
"Restoration of silver to its position under the act of 1792, and its equality
with gold as to coinage, bullion, and certificates; as well as its equality in
the integrity of governmental i>rotection and administration, demanded by
a majority of the Democratic party."
SPEECH
or
HON. W I L L I A M
H. HATCH,
OF M I S S O U R I ,
I N THE H O U S E OP REPRESENTATIVES,
Thursday, March 2Ih 1892.
The House having under consideration the t>ill(H. R. 412G)for the free coinage of gold and silver, for the issue of coin notes, and for other purposes-
Mr. H A T C H said:
Mr. SPEAKER: In the brief time allotted me I shall address
myself to the bill under consideration from the standpoint of an
earnest, consistent, and hopeful Democrat, a resident of the Mississippi Valley, a Representative of the people of Missouri, and
by choice and interest, a farmer. I believe' that this question is
a national one and therefore, of necessity, a party question. It is
utterly impossible for the Democratic party to ignoro its past
history, its promises and its pledges to the people, upon this subject.
No amountof sophistry, no selfish or sectional appeal, can withdraw, from this question the pledges made by the Democratic
party in twenty-eight States of the Union, in which, in their
State conventions, the Democrats of those States have not only
asserted but have pledged themselves to the people that whenever they should come into power they would see that silver was
restored to the coinage position which it occupied in 1873, when,
it was demonetized, not by a Democratic Congress, not by Democratic votes, but by the Republican party then in power in both
Houses of Congress", the bill being signed by a Republican Exec-"
utive.
So far as I am concerned as a Representative of a district in
the State of Missouri, I am in hearty accord with tho position of
the Democratic party of my State upon this question, the position it has unwaveringly held since 1873. Every gentleman in
this Congress who holds his seat by the vote of the Missouri Democracy comes here pledged, pledged by the action of the last
Democratic State convention, to support a bill for the free and
unlimited coinage of silver. I have never seen the time, sir, in
the past ten years when I would have accepted a nomination from
the district I have the honor to represent if tho platform upon
which I was nominated had not embraced a clear and unequivocal declaration for the restoration of silver. I support this bill
as a consistent Democrat, and I do not indorse the sentiment
which certain Democrats have expressed upon this floor that this
is simply an independent question.
2
This, sir, is a question, that is going to be settled by the Democratic party when it meets in national convention in Chicago
during the year 1892, and the effect of that sattlement will be
the same that we saw when for -ten long years the Democratic
party stood here and contended that the tariff was a national,
and therefore of necessity a party question, and the minority of
the party in this house, led by one of the ablest Democrats that
this generation has produced, were driven by the necessity of
party action to take their stand within the ranks of the party,
or to go to, the other side of the Chamber. [Applause.]
In support of my position as a Democratic Representative from
the State of Missouri I reproduce the declaration on this subject
embodied in the platform adopted by the State convention held
at St. Joseph, Mo., June 11,1890, which was as follows:
"We are in favor of the free and unrestricted coinage of silver, and the increase of currency to meet the legitimate demands of trade, and we believe
that the power to issue and control the volume of such currency should be
exercised by the Government.
The last expression on the part of any representative body of
Democrats in the State of Missouri upon this subject was a series
of resolutions passed by the General Assembly of the State of
Missouri, a copy of which I presented to the House, and which
was published in the RECORD, in which they declared "that in
order that the volume of money may be increased we favor the
free and unlimited coinage of silver." .
This was on the 19th day of January, 1891.
Since the resolutions of the Missouri Legislature that I have
referred to were offered and printed in the RECORD, and after
the publication of Mr. Cleveland's letter on February 13, there
was an effort made by resolution offered in the house of representatives of the General Assembly to indorse that letter, which
was very promptly voted down, and Mr. Fogle, a prominent Democrat, residing in my district, offered this resolution, which received the vote of every Democrat in the house, as well as some
Republicans, the vote being 85 yeas to 8 nays.
Resolved, That it is the sense of the house that we are unqualifiedly in favor
of the free and unlimited coinage of silver, and that we thereby represent
the sentiments of the people of the great State of Missouri.
The twenty-nine States that I have referred to are as follows;
and most cheerfully giving honor to whom honor and labor is
due, I acknowledge my indebtedness for this list to the Hon.
BENJAMIN H. BUNN, of North Carolina:
Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia,
Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana,
Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada,
North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota,
Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming.
And for one I am in favor here and now of making this question an is^ue of party fealty and party loyalty. The Democrat
who can not stand upon that platform on which the Democratic
party stood for eighty-two years, reinforced and reaffirmed by
such popular Democratic indorsement and approval, had better
hunt a home somewhere else. [Laughter and applause.] My
eloquent friend from Maryland [Mr. RAYNER], in his address,
admirable from his standpoint, delivered the day before yesterday, started for the "wilderness;" and the gentleman from New
York [Mr. COCKRAN], who addressed the House to-day, found
that path so beautiful that he had to follow into the "wilderness." Yes, my friends, if these two gentlemen could fix the
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policy of the Democratic party they would carry the Democratic
party into the " wilderness " of absolute defeat.
I am perfectly willing- to abide by the action of my party upon
this question. I have never seen the day when I was not willing1
to submit any great question of politics or principle to Democratic conventions and Democratic caucuses; and if when the national convention meets in Chicago the gentleman from Maryland and the gentleman from New York can sweep the great
majority of the Democratic party from its moorings upon this
question, they can no more drive me out of the party than the
declaration of the gentleman from Massachusetts can read me
out of the party.
The gentleman from Massachusetts, with an egotism that I
have never heard equaled in this House since I have been a member of Congress, declared substantially that only those who agree
with him on this question are Democrats, his exact language being—
A vote has been taken which shows that there are seventy Democrats in
this House who oppose the free coinage of silver, and, I take it, will oppose
it to the hitter end. Now, Mr. Speaker, these men are the Democrats of this
House.
Why, my young friend, you have not yet learned the first lesson of Democracy [laughter and applause]; you know no more
about the principles and usages of the Democratic party than you
know what is going on in the world beyond. [Laughter.]
The first duty of a Democrat is to abide by the decisions of its
caucuses and its conventions; and when the gentleman from Massachusetts undertakes to read me out of the Democratic party, I
simply resent it with the indignation of a Democrat who never
scratched a ticket and never bolted a nomination.
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. Mr. Speaker
Mr. HATCH. I decline to yield. I never interrupted the
gentleman during his hour.
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. I did not refer to you personally, and you have referred to me personally. I desire to ask
a question.
Mr. HATCH. If I had unlimited time I would be very glad to
give the gentleman all the time he might wish.
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. Can you refer me to a
Democratic platform that ever declared for free silver?
Mr. HATCH. I have already answered that question, I think,
effectively.
When you want a Democratic platform you will get it from
Democrats and not from men whose swaddling clothes have not
been on them a week, or a month, or a year. The gentleman gets
up here
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. You want to read me but,
do you?
Mr. HATCH. No, sir; I do not want to read you out. I am
simply repelling your endeavor to read me out; but I will tell
you what I will do with you: You said the other day, and two or
three of your colleagues'have said the same, that the time was
coming when the Democratic party of the United States must
choose between the Democrats of New England and the "Alliance" of the South; as you stated it, "either the Farmers* Alliance of the South or a Democratic alliance with the North." I
am ready to take my stand on that proposition; and I will begin
the exchange now. I will swap you for the barefooted statesman
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from Kansas [laughter]; he is a better Democrat than you are,
and will vote for more Democratic measures this Congress than
you will. [Laughter.]
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. What is your choice?
Mr. HATCH. And I will take one of your colleagues, and if,
by swapping him off, I can win back the young Democrat from
Georgia who has gone astray I will be glad to make the exchange;
and if that will not be accepted I will throw in another Massachusetts Mugwump to make the bargain.
Mr. FITCH. How about New York?
Mr. HATCH. I will come to New York directly. New York
will take care of itself. If it were represented to-day by gentlemen who fully understood the sentiments of the .people of New
York, and comprehended their best interests, it would-be solid
for this bill. The time is coming swiftly when the capitalists and
money power of New York will gladly compromise this great
money question by accepting free coinage of silver, and her Representatives ought to see it now.
Mr. FITCH. It will vote solidly against your bill.
Mr. TRACEY. Every Democrat of the delegation.
Mr. HATCH. Now, Mr. Speaker, this just shows the peculiarity of these gentlemen. I have sat here for three days listening to this debate. I have not taken one second of their time by
interruption, but I can notbs permitted to make a thirty-minute
speech without my time being occupied in this way.
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. Then do not mention
names any more.
Mr. HATCH. I will reply to anything you may have thought
worth saying; and I am nearly done with you.
Mr. WILLIAMS of Massachusetts. But you will not give me
the floor.
Mr. HATCH. Yes, Mr. Speaker, here are two of these gentlemen claiming to be Dsmocrats, yet their names, when this
House was organized, although they sat in a Democratic caucus,
are not recorded for the nominee of that convention for Speaker,
Mr. Speaker, you lost two votes to which you were entitled
under all the rules of party organization, but you have gained a
great deal more by your courageous and manly course in resisting the blandishments and importunities of this contingent of
the Democratic party, by which you have won the admiration
and hold the esteem of every manly Democrat in the United
States. [Applause.]
But these gentlemen say to us that we occupy a position of
"dishonesty." This bill has been denounced as "infamous."
Ah, that was a little unfortunate for the gentlemen, an unfortunate word for any gentleman to use in attacking this bill. '4 Infamous!"
Yes, there is connected with the history of this silver question
a legislative infamy that will not be wiped out during the nineteenth century, or that to follow, and that was the infamy of the
demonetization of silver in 1S73. The most infamous statute, in
my judgment, ever placed on the statute books of the Congress
of the United States was that act. Infamous, because it was in
the interest simply of a class; infamous, because it was in the interest alone of that body of men who represent to-day the moneychangers, tho33 who were turned out of the temple eighteen hundred years ago, and whom the gentleman from Maryland a few
short sessions ago in this House denounced in such eloquent
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terms when he stated (and I shall not undertake to quote his
language literally, but in substance) that these bankers, corporations, monopolies, and moneyed powers were cowards at heart
who always ran when attacked with the truth and in the interests of the people.
Oh! how I loved him that day for the utterance of that sentiment, and I wish his eloquent notes could have been heard in
this debate once moro in favor of the people who have been
robbed and almost ruined by the effects of that infamous act of
1873.
The demonetization of silver was the initial step in a series of
legislative iniquities, intended and premeditated by interested
and dishonest representatives to enhance the value and power
of moneyj depress labor, enrich favored classes and impoverish
tho producers of the country.
Dating from 1873, when the demonetization of silver was consummated, came the steady, gradual, but sure depression in the
average prices of all farm products 'and farm property. Statistics and the plexus of facts unerringly prove that the export
value of all such farm products has declined with the price of
silver; the anticipated and inevitable result of the Government
fostering an abnormal protection to the one metal, gold, and the
persistent and unholy warfare by every succeeding administration of the Treasury Department upon silver coinage and its circulation.
The srreat majority of the Democratic party stand earnestly,
fearlessly, and unwaveringly in their demand that silver shall be
restored to a perfect equality with gold as to coinage, bullion,
and certificates, and that the circulation of the two metals shall
be kept upon a parity by equal laws, equal advantages, and equal
governmental protection. Government alone has dishonored
and disparaged silver. The people have always been, are now,
and will continue to be satisfied with the silver dollar of 412{
grains of silver, nine parts fine, the dollar that was established
in 1792 by a wiser and more patriotic body of men than Wall
street can boast, the then representatives of a free people, among
Whom was not a single millionaire. This coinage act was not inspired by self-interest, nor did avarice and greed regulate the
conduct of the representatives who framed it.
To show how England guards her gold interests and how her
financiers rule us, let me quote from an admirable pamphlet entitled " The true cause for the decline in the prices for wheat
and a remedy," published by Ivan C. Michels, esq., in the year
England, with not a silver mine of any note in her possessions either in
Europe, Asia, Africa, America, or Australia, dictates to us the price for our
silver bullion—depresses by questionable means the value of our silver—but
jealously she guards her gold interests in Australia and her single gold standard by strict laws, which compel the Bank of England to purchase all the
gold offered at a lixed. rate, in order that the price of gold bullion might notf
be subjected to fluctuations.
As this fact has often been questioned by scribblers on flnancial questions,
and who, in complete ignorance of such an important fact, still insist upon
the appreciation of gold, wo herewith reproduce a letter addressed to us by
the chief cashier of the Bank of England:
BANK off ENGLAND, London, F. C., February is, 18S0.
SIR: I beg to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 6th instant, and
have much pleasure in inclosing a copy of the section of the act of Parliament (7 and 8 Vic., cap. 32) which compels the Bank of England to purchase
gold bullion at £317s. 9d. per ounce standard.
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
F. MAY, Chief Cashier.
IVAN C. MICHELS, Esq.
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And in support of my statement that the prices of farm prod*
ucts have declined relatively with the depreciation and demonetization of silver, and to show England's financial perfidy toward
the United States let me quote again from the same eminent authority:
When in 1873 Mr. Seyd, of London, appeared hero in Washington as missionary in the interests of Great Britain and her possessions in India, he
knew full well that upon his success of abolishing the free and unlimited
coinage of silver the American farmers' wheat, interests would soon be at the
mercy of Great Britain. Unfortunately for this country, this last move of
England has, owing to the coinage act of 1873, become an established but lamentable fact, and on the crop of 1886 of 457,218,000 bushels of wheat the losses
to the American farmer are $171,796,714.
Only in June last (1886) an important meeting of the British and Colonial
Chambers of Commerce was held in London, England, at which there was
an animated discussion of the silver question and its bearings upon the
commerce of India.
Sir Robert N. Fowler, M. P., the London banker and ex-lord mayor, said
"that the effect of the depreciation of silver must finally be the ruin of the
wheat and cotton industries of America, and be the development of India as
the chief wheat and cotton exporter of the world."
It is just this difference in the price of silver bullion which ruins the
American farmer. No wonder that the foreign exporters in this country
who purchase wheat for British account clamor fdr the suspension of coinage of silver.
OUR LOSSES ON THE WHEAT CROP OF 1886.
The Commissioner of Agriculture, in his report of December, 1886, on page
541, states: "The aggregate product of wheat for 1886is 457,218,000bushels,
having a farm value of $314,226,020. The average value is 68.7 cents per
bushel. This is 35 per cent reduction from the average value between 1870
and 1880.
As the average value for 1870~'80 was $1,063 cents, the loss to our farmers
on this last year's crop was therefore 8171,796,714.
The production of silver in this country during 1886, according to the latest
official report of the Director of the Mint, in coinage value was 849,695,390.
It sold, owing to the statute laws and persistent efforts of the enemies of
this country, at $38,992,192, leaving the miners a loss of $10,703,737.
Comparing this loss of $10,000,000 to the silver-miners with that ot the farmers of one hundred and seventy-one millions, it sinks into insignificance
and disproves the assertions of the enemies of this country—that the free
and unlimited coinage of silver benefits only the silver men. It will take
over seventeen years to inflict, upon the silver-miners the losses the wheat
farmers have been subjected to in one single year—that of 1886.
Truly, the member of the British Parliament uttered a truism in June
last. Will our legislators heed the warning? Would to-God they could rise
to the present emergency and deliver the American farmers from one of the
most uniust, unfair, and crushing burdens, the cheap silver bullion, which
enables England to build up India's prosperity upon the ruins of America's
agricultural interests.
with the free and unlimited coinage, the price of silver will be stable
again, and England will have to pay for all the silver she must have for India, $1.29+ per ounce fine. Exchange on India will advance her council bills
to 2 shillings from the present rate of Is. Gd. per rupee, and India's wheat
could not be laid down in Great Britain for less than $1.20 per bushel, and as
Indian wheat is inferior in quality, American wheat would again sell in
England at from $1.25 to $1.30 per bushel, and our farmers will receive just
33 per cent more for all the wheat they could raise.
And the gentleman from New York [Mr. COCKRAN] in his
speech to-day is merely begging the question, is begging quarter when he says, " Let us have no class legislation." My friends,
it was class legislation of the worst type when it was demonetized
*in 1873, and the interested representatives of the same class are
around here in these galleries now, crowding upon the representatives of the people to continue that class in power and dethrone the " sovereign of the United States—its people."
I am not alarmed by the declaration that this bill is class legislation. X am not alarmed by the declaration that any particular interest is to be injured by this bill, because I do not believe
a word of it. The gentleman from New York has the most magnificent memory I ever heard of in my life. He can recall all
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the traditions of the writers on monetary questions for two thousand years back, down to 1792, but he does not recollect a word,
an event, or a tradition that occurred between 1792 and 1873.
That is a blank to all these gentlemen. He talks about the
prophecy of my Colleague [Mr. BLAND] not being fulfilled.
Why does he not take the evidence of eighty-two years of prosperity here in this country, in the history of our own people,
emerging as they were from the war against the greatest power
that existed on earth, establishing their independence upon bimetallism, with silver and gold upon a perfect parity and equality, which they held from that hour to 1873, challenging the admiration of the world? Not one single break in it, and the Democratic party from Jefferson and Madison never produced a
statesman down to 1873 nor a public man that ever for one moment contemplated the demonetization of silver or offered a bill
in either branch of Congress for its demonetization, not one.
Mr. STOUT. Silver was demonetized in 1853 and the legaltender limit was fixed at $5.
Mr. HATCH. I can not yield to the gentleman. But they
say this is a fraud because it is only a " 70-cent" dollar. Gentlemen say that, and they have rung the changes on this " dishonest dollar;" that it is worth only 70 cents. Now, sir, the only
word in the old Anglo-Saxon language that can properly express my reply to that proposition is " demonetized " by the rules
of this House, and I am not permitted to utter it here. [Laughter.] But the statement is not true. There is not a word of
truth in it; there is not a citizen of the United States to-day,
three degrees removed from an imbecile, who does not know that
it is not true. It is demonstrated every hour in the day, and in
every town and hamlet in the United States that it is equal to
any other dollar in circulation in this country. If I owe a debt
of $100 to-day I can pay it with one hundred silver dollars. If I
owe a thousand dollars I can pay it with one thousand silver dollars.
If I want to buy anything in the United States to-day that is
offered for sale and has its price fixed, I can buy it and pay for
it in silver dollars without a murmur, and I defy any one of these
gentlemen at any time during this discussion or after it, to name
any place in this land where a silver dollar will not purchase as
much as a gold dollar, or a greenback, or a gold certificate. And
their assumptions that after silver is remonetized it will simply
be worth 70 cents, is worth just as much as their declaration
that the dollar to-day is only worth 70 cents. Their assumption
is a delusion and their prophecy without foundation.
The gentleman says, "What about New York? " I happen to
have in my papers, and I want to read it for the instruction and
edification of some of the gentlemen upon the other side who are
not Democrats, but Republicans, a declaration made in the St.
Louis convention in 1889, by the Hon. Edwards Pierrepont, one
of the great lights in the Republican party in New York, and an
abler man than they have sent to represent many of the districts
of that State since that time. [Laughter.]
No greater wrong was ever attempted upon a generous people than the bill
or 1873. It was a crime. Gold and silver ought to be treated alike. It i3
amusing to see how Englishfinanciersrule us. Edwards Pierrepont. |Ap
plause.]
Now, my friends, I want to read you a short extract from a
speech delivered on the floor of this House by one of the ablest
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and most eloquent Democrats that ever stood upon this floor. I
wish I had time to read the whole speech. It was the most earnest and brilliant I ever heard that gentleman make. I have an
interest in it, because I took great pleasure in gelding to him a
part ol the time in which he made it. Standing in this very
aisle and with an impressiveness of manner that I have never
seen him surpass, he uttered, in the close of a magnificent plea
for free and unlimited coinage of silver, these words:
But the crime that is now sought to be perpetrated on more thanftfty millions of people comes neither from the camp of a conqueror, the hand of a
foreigner, nor the altar of an idoUitor. But it comes from those in whose
veins runs the blood of a common ancestry, who were born under the same
skies, speak the same language, reared in t he same institutions, and nurtured
in the principles of the same religious faith. It comes from the cold, phlegmatic, marble heart of avarice—avarice that seeks to impale the whole land
on a bed of torture to gratify the lust for gold [applause]— avarice surrounded
by every comfort that wealth can command, and rich enough to satisfy every
want save that which refuses to be satisfied without, the suffocation and
strangulation of all the labor in the land. With a forehead that refuses to
be ashamed it demands of Congress an act that will paralyze all the forces of
production, shut out labor from all employment, increase the burden of debts
and taxation, and send desolation and suffering into all the homes of the
poor. In this hour, fraught with peril to the whole country. I appeal to the
unpurchased representatives of the American people to meet this bold and
insolent demand like men. Let us stand in the breach and call the battle on,
and never leave the field until the-people's money shall be restored to the
mints on equal terms with gold as it was years ago. [Prolonged applause.]
That speech was delivered by the Hon. ROGER Q. MILLS, of
Texas, on the 3d of February, 1886. [Applause.] I stand where
he stood then. Call on the battle. I am ready for the fray. I
have been enlisted for twelve years in this struggle in the interest of the people, and wherever the fight is hottest, wherever the silver battalions need the strongest support, my feeble
efforts shall be with them. I am for the people, and I have never
been afraid to trust them, nor have I ever uttered a word upon
this floor against their interests.
Mr. Speaker, I learned a lesson in the month of January last in
my own Western home. On a clear, cold morning.when the earth
was covered with frost, just as the sun was peeping over the hills
Of the Mississippi River, and bathing the sky with his golden
rays until they reached the very zenith, the moon, just full by
twenty-four hours, setting in the Western sky, was casting its
silver rays to the zenith and mingling with those of the morning
sun, where the morning stars, dimmed by the lights of these
two great luminaries, were fast fading from the heavens, but still
singing their song to the Great Creator.
I said to myself that the same Creator who made the sun and
the moon and placed them in their respective spheres in the
heavens placed the gold and the silver in the bowels of the earth;
and as long back as we have a history they have been the harbingers of His civilization; and I want to live to see the day
when the rays of the gold and the ravs of the silver in perfect
parity, and under equal governmental recognition and protection, will meet in the commercial world as the rays of the sun
and the moon met on that bright morning in the zenith of the
heavens, casting their beneficence over the entire land and
spreading prosperity to every section and to every "class, to the
just and the unjust alike. [Applause.]
I shall avail myself of the opportunity given b}T general leave
to extend my remarks in the RECORD. * Thanking the Speaker
and the gentleman of the committee who yielded me this brief
time, I am through. [Applause.]
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