OBITUARY NOTICES. Vll 



jeopard the peace, happiness and prosperity of the people of the 

 United States, and that the thoughts of every patriot should be 

 turned to measures for the gradual abolition of slavery, by compo- 

 sitions with loyal citizens of the South for the freedom of all 

 persons born after a certain day, and by the speedier method of 

 immediate freedom, with properly guarded and limited political 

 and social rights, for the slaves of all who may continue in treason 

 and rebellion." 



Those of us who were living at that time and who remember the 

 conflict of opinion in Philadelphia between the supporters and the 

 opponents of the Government, and the strong personal and social 

 influences which were arrayed in this city against a vigorous prose- 

 cution of the war, will fully appreciate the force of Mr. Fraley's 

 frank declaration and will regard it as both patriotic and states- 

 manlike. 



It is but right to add in this connection that no one more fully 

 than Mr. Fraley rejoiced in later years that the wounds of war had 

 been healed and that North and South were united under one flag 

 in the full enjoyment of a common prosperity. 



Animated by the sentiments to which he had given such clear 

 expression, Mr. Fraley as a private citizen loyally supported the 

 Government in all its efforts to raise men and secure money for the 

 suppression of the insurrection, and his only regret was that his 

 years forbade him to serve as a soldier in the field. In furtherance 

 of his patriotic purposes he became one of the founders of the 

 Union League, and he labored earnestly for the success of the Sani- 

 tary Commission Fair of 1864. 



So long as the relative rates and costs of production of gold and 

 silver preserved an approximate stability in the market prices of the 

 metals Mr. Fraley, as a scientific bimetallist, advocated the double 

 or alternating standard of value ; but when the conditions changed, 

 no one more clearly than he saw that to admit silver to free coin- 

 age would result in silver monometallism, and would inevitably be 

 followed by national repudiation and individual bankruptcies. He, 

 therefore, vigorously opposed the silver legislation of 1878 and 

 1890, and in 1891 he appeared as a representative of the Philadel- 

 phia Board of Trade before the Coinage Committee of the House of 

 Representatives and, as the report of the Board of Trade for that 

 year states, " going over the history of the coinage laws of the 

 United States, from the beginning of the nation down to that 



