GREENBACKS AND BONDS. 539 



was chairman of the National Central Committee of the 

 Democratic party. Mr. Belmont was a national banker 

 and agent of the Messers Rbthchilds of England. Roth- 

 childs held large amounts of the bonds of the United 

 States, which they wanted paid 'in coin.' The sequel is 

 easily guessed. The New York World, the leading Dem- 

 ocratic paper, controlled by Belmont, "throwed up" the 

 race. Gen. Grant was elected, and the first bill he signed 

 was the one which stripped from the greenbacks the power 

 to pay the bonds. The "grand old Republican party" 

 has almost the sole credit of this stupendous steal. An 

 act that is only second in infamy to the contraction and 

 resumption acts. Early after the war the capitalists set 

 about to have the bonds payable in coin. It was their 

 original intention. The law for the payment of the bonds 

 was this: 



"And such United States notes shall be received the 

 same as coin, at their par value, in payment for any loans 

 that may be hereafter sold or negotiated by the secretary 

 of the treasury, and be reissued from time to time, as the 

 exigency of the public interests shall require." 



In 1868 the Republican platform read : 



"The national honor requires the payment of the pub- 

 lic debt in the interest of good faith to all its creditors at 

 home and abroad, not only according to the letter but the 

 spirit of the law under which it was created." 



This was put out as a feeler; "according to the spirit. " 

 What did that mean? It was the insidious work of the 

 money power; it was "breaking the ice." Yet the masses 

 of the Republican party would not believe that it indi- 

 cated a change in the contract. Thad. Stevens, "the 

 grand old commoner," and the leading statesman and 

 patriot in the Republican party, said: "When the bill 

 (the five- twenty) was on its final passage, the question was 



