126 AGRICULTURAL ORGANIZATIONS. 



way of destroying the power of the lever to raise or lower price, is to 

 remove the resistance offered -by the fulcrum the inflexible volume of 

 government issue. The power to regulate the volume of money so 

 as to control price is so manipulated as to develop and apply a potent 

 force, for which we have in the English language no name ; but it is the 

 power of money to oppress, and is demonstrated as follows : In the last 

 four months of the year, the agricultural products of the whole year 

 having been harvested, they are placed on the market to* buy money. 

 The amount of money necessary to supply this demand is equal to 

 many times the actual amount in circulation. Nevertheless, the class 

 that controls the volume of the circulating medium desires to purchase 

 these agricultural products for speculative purposes ; so they reduce the 

 volume of money by hoarding, in the face of the augmented demand, 

 and thereby advance the exchangeable value of the then inadequate 

 volume of money, which is equivalent to reducing the price of the agri- 

 cultural products. True agriculturists should hold their products and 

 not sell at these ruinously low prices. And no doubt they would 

 if they could; but to prevent that, practically all debts, taxes, and 

 interest are made to mature at that time, and they being forced to 

 have money at a certain season when they have the product of their 

 labor to sell, the power of money to oppress by its scarcity is applied 

 until it makes them turn loose their products so low that their labor 

 expended does not average them fifty cents per day. This illustrates 

 the power of money to oppress ; the remedy, as before, lies in removing 

 the power of the fulcrum the inflexible government issue and sup- 

 plying a government issue, the volume of which shall be increased to 

 correspond with the actual addition to the wealth of the nation pre- 

 sented by agriculture at harvest time, and diminished as such agricul- 

 tural products are consumed. Such a flexibility of volume would 

 guarantee a stability of price, based on cost of production, which would 

 be compelled to reckon the pay for agricultural labor at the same rates 

 as other employment. Such flexibility would rob money of its most 

 potent power the power to oppress and place a premium on pro- 

 ductive effort. But how may so desirable a result be secured ? Let us 

 see. By applying the same principles now in force in the monetary 

 system of the United States, with only slight modification in the detail 

 of their execution. The government and the people of this country 

 realize that the amount of gold and silver, and the certificates based on 

 these metals, do not comprise a volume of money sufficient to supply 

 the wants of the country ; and in order to increase the volume, the gov- 

 ernment allows individuals to associate themselves into a body corporate, 



