It 



THE STATE REVIEW. 



HOW BILLS ARE KEPT FRESH 

 AND CLEAN. 



Every work-ins day of the year there is printed 

 at Washington an an average of more than three 

 million dollars of new paper money. F.very day 

 there is destroyed practically the same amount. 

 The presses in the mints at Philadelphia, Xew 

 Orlcans and San Francisco daily stamp into form 

 about eight hundred thousand dollars of shining 

 coin. NYe have then a total of almost four million 

 <!ollars of new money created every dav at the 

 money work-hop.- of the Government. 



But good money cannot he had even by urea! 

 nments merely lor the making. The sources 

 f th- tream of fresh hills and bright coins 



illy guarded. 1 hey are governed by 

 financial principle 1 ; that are above legisla- 

 tion, writes F. A. Vanderlip, formerly Assistant 

 Secretary of the Treasury, in the Youth's Com- 

 panion, and by laws which congress has tr j e d to 

 frame as nearly as possible hi" conformity with 

 those higher financial laws which must ultimately 

 govern the currency of all nations. 



An active printer, with the aid of a young girl 

 assistant, and working on a simple handpress of 

 a type that has hardly varied since the Govern- 

 ment began to print money, or, indeed, since one 

 or l\vo centuries before, can turn out eight hun- 

 dred Sheets of finished bills in a dav. each sheet 

 containing four bills. There are <MII printers at 

 work in the <io\ eminent Bureau of Printing and 

 Engraving, si me upon bonds, stamps or other 

 form- of Government securities, but most of them 

 printing money. 



Among all the interesting sights at Washington 

 there is perhaps none more interesting than the 

 intensely active Bureau of Kngrav -ing and Print- 

 ing. There are 2.9SS employes there, whose ex- 

 perience in handling and counting the sheets of 

 bank note paper and turning out the finished hill- 

 has given them a dexeterity that is fascinating to 

 sec. 



Of quite as deep interest as the bureau itself 

 would be a study of those principles that are back 

 the printing of each piece of paper. 

 of this rushing manufactory principles, laws and 

 regulations which govern with absolute certainty 

 \i hrst glance one piece of paper money looks 

 very much like another. Kach is an example of 

 the finest steel engraving, more skilfully made 

 and more difficult to counterfeit than the notes 

 of any other government. 



Tin ' ve kinds of paper money printed. 



The sort that people are most familiar with is 

 the silver certificate, for almost all the one, two 

 and five-dollar hills are in that form. They are 

 printed chiefly as a matter of convenience to the 

 public, for the public prefers paper money to the- 

 silver coin. The amount of paper currency out- 

 standing is between eighteen and nineteen hun- 

 dred million dollars, and of that amount there 

 are about four hundred and seventy million dol- 

 lars in silver certificate.-, and four hundred and 

 seventy-seven million dollars in gold certificate-. 



Although the (iovernment prints gold and sil- 

 ver certificates so freely, there are only two ways 

 by which they may be issued and become a part 

 of the nvmey stock of the contry. If any person 

 ;t- with the Government gold or silver coin, 

 or gold bullion, th? Government may issue silver 

 certificates for the silver coin, and go'd . 

 cates for the gold coin or bullion; or if any one 

 returns worn certificates, like certificates may be 



'1 to replace them, the old ones in turn 

 destroyed. 



A doliar bill has an average life of ahout fifteen 

 months. Two-dollar bills, nut being quite so 

 ' <tl iii<' a\ . e than six- 



teen 



age two yt ire it i- worn out and the Gov- 



erniii lied upon to replace it. Ten-dollar 



b'll- \cars and twenty-dollar 



bill- in T than four year-. 



'1 he amount of money that goes to the G.ivern- 

 nien- . mptii n. either for the purpn 



securing fresh, clean bills or for conversion into 

 r form of money, reaches a total almost 

 omprtheiul. In I'JOi the Govern- 

 ment reeei\ed .*;i|;.',(ii)(i.iKiO of paper money to he 



exchanged for new bills or bills of some other 

 form or denomination. 



N'ext to the gold and silver certificates in point 

 of volume are the national hank notes. They 

 constitute between one-fourth and one-third of 

 the total amount of the paper money outstanding, 

 and although they are printed under the Govern- 

 ment's supervision their volume depends, subject 

 to the provisions of the national hanking law. 

 upon the judgment of the officers of the national 

 hanks of the country. 



'1 here are ."i.ss;! national hanks in existence and 

 their capital forms an aggregate of $si>s,;;;.>s,i;,-,s. 

 The law provides that any national bank may is- 

 sue it- notes in the form of money to an amount 

 equal to its capital. There could be, therefore, 

 under the provisions of the law. a great many 

 more than the present $533,000,000 of national _ 



notes if th of national hanks found 



it sufficiently profitable to issue their notes in this 

 form. 



In order that this kind of money -hall be per- 

 fectly secure it has been provided that each na- 

 tional hank wishing to issue notes must dcpo-.h 

 with the Trea-ury an amount of I'nited S 

 Government bonds equal to the notes which the 

 bank proposes to i- 



\\ 'believer the bills are worn out new ones 

 must be issued in their place. Therefore, when- 

 ever a new United States note is printed il mean- 

 on ly that some other note of the same kind has 

 been worn out and has been sent into the Treas- 

 ury to be exchanged for a new note. The Tre.is 

 ary has no power to i--ue a single dollar of ad- 

 ditional L'nited States notes. It can only ex- 

 change new one- for old ones. 



There remains one more kind of money, and 

 that a comparatively insignificant amount the 

 Treasim notes of is'iu. There are less than 

 $'.1,000,000 of them now, although at one time 

 there were Sl.Vi.onn.non. They were issued by the 

 Government to pay for silver bullion bought dur- 

 ing the time when the law was in force which 

 nrovicled that the Government should purchase 

 l.oUii.iioo ounces of bullion each month. Silver 

 .certificates have taken the place of the Treasury 

 notes retired as rapidly as the bullion was coined. 



With all the activity of the -Bureau of F.ngrav- 

 ing and Printing it will be seen from what has 

 been said that nearly all the work is for the 

 purpose of keeping clean and fresh our supply of 

 paper money. 



Xo additions to the outstanding United States 

 notes or Trca-urv notes may be made. Xo new- 

 gold certificates or silver certificates can be print- 

 ed except in exchange for gold 'and silver coin 

 placed in the (iovernment vault. The onlv really 

 new money that can be printed, therefore, i- na- 

 tional bank not< 



'I he snpnlv of national bank notes is subject to] 

 the provision that the Ivink asking for them mu-t 

 deposit Government bonds equal to the amount 

 'of notes received. 'I here is. therefore, nothing 

 like creation of moiicv value in all the printing 

 that the bureau doe-. In the main it is simply 

 putting in convenient form value that the G >\ 

 ernment holds in its vaults. 



Active as are the presses in the Bureau of En- 

 graving and Printing, thev furni-h only part of 

 the stream of fresh money. There are co 

 mints at Philadelphia, Xew ( (rleans and San 

 Francisco. In 11)04 th presses of the three mints 

 stamped out more than 1:;.1 Min.iHin pieces of mon- 



. in value amounting to $350,781,000. 



In our present coinage there arc four denomi- 

 nation- of gold coin- struck and a like numb 

 silver coins. In the min ;e there are two 



piece- onlv. the pennv and the live cent 

 'I he half-dimes and the twenty cent nieces are no 

 longer coined, nor arc' the gold dollars and the 

 dollar pieces, all of which in former years 

 ! in small amount-. In value about 

 three-fourths of th is gold. 



\Ye have in the I'nited Stale- whit is known 

 as iree and unlimited coinage of gold. Standard 

 /old bullion may he deposited at the mints by 

 any person, in anv amount, and will he . 

 for the benefit of the dep i-itor without charge 

 for th< 



If "standard bullion" is taken to (he mint -that 

 is to -ay. if it is in just the proportion of pure 

 gold and copper allov that is used in making our 



gold coins the person taking the gold to the 

 mint will receive back exactly as man)' ounces 

 and -grains in the form of stamped coins as he 

 took the mint, and there will be no charge made 

 by the Government for turning the bullion into 

 Standard gold is nine hundred parts pure 

 gold and one hundred parts copper alloy. If the 

 gold which is taken to the mint must be refined 

 and base metals eliminated, there i- a charge for 

 that operation which varies with the actual ex- 

 penses. 



The production of gold from the mines of the 

 United Stales amounted in 11)0-1 to $80,500,000. A 

 large amotitn of gold which is brought to the 

 mints is refined until it is standard bullion, and is 

 then melted into bars with the exact weight and 

 linene-s stamped upon each bar. 



When gold is wanted for export it is usual to 

 obtain bars and ship the gold in that form, rather 

 than to ship our coined money. A large amount 

 of coin is shipped, but there is always a small 

 loss ill doing that, as the piece- are Usually worn 

 more or less, and will not weigh exactly as many 

 runces and grain- a- when new. 



The stamp of the mint add- nothing to the 

 value of the gold. At sonic season- we import 

 large amount of Id which is brought to the 

 the form of coins of Great Britain. France or 

 other European countries, and sometimes in the 

 form of bar gold. In whatever form it come-, I'L 

 is taken by the importers to the assay office, and 

 is melted down and carefully a-.-ayed. 



The per-oii bringing it will receive gold coin 

 in return in the same way that he would if it 

 were new gold which had been brought directly 

 from the mine; or if he wishes he may, and 

 usually does, receive gold ccrtiiicai 



oine lime the (iovernment coined from ten 

 to twenty million silver dollars a year. They were 

 coined from bullion which was purchased under 

 the law passed in isnn, providing for the purchase 

 of 4..">no.non ounces of silver bullion each month. 



All the production of our own mines and all 

 liic gold which we might import in the settlement 

 of trade balances can be converted into gold coin. 

 Bui we depend mostly on gold from our own 

 mine-, for notwithstanding enormous sales of our 

 products and manufactures abroad, we retain per- 

 manently little gold in settlement of the great 

 trade balances. As a matter of fact, we have ex- 

 ported about $40,000,000 more gold than we have 

 inmorted since 1Mir,. 



The -year ]00:i-04 was the banner year in the 

 history of our mints. The gold coined in 1904 



amounted to $233,000, I. Of course the larger 



part of this great sum was from bullion accumu- 

 lated in previous y. a 



Perhaps the most important thing to remember 

 in studying ah >nt sources of the supply of money 

 i- that real monev is not a thing that can be cre- 

 ated merely bv running Government presses, and 

 that not a new dollar coines into the circulation 

 of the countrv which has not corresponding value 

 behind it. 



$1.00 

 per year 



flic 



$1.00 



per yea) 



tate Metmtti 



I Can Sell Your Real Estate or Business 



NO MATTER WHERE LOCATED 



Properties and Business of all kinds sold 



"iiieklv for cash ill all parts of the United 



Don't wait. \Yritc imlav describing 



what you have lo sell and give cash price on 



same. 



If You Want to Buy 



any kind of Business or Real Estate anywhere, 

 at any price, write im-_yonr requirements. I 



can save yon lime and money. 



DAVID P. TAFF, 



The Land Man, 



415 Kansas A"?nue, 

 TOPEKA, KANSAS. 



