250 
Annual Report of the 
wealth gathered so rapidly as that in your hands. X say it is a 
thing extraordinary in the world’s history, that property should he 
accumulated as it has been in Wisconsin in thirty years. If we 
are grumblers in the midst of this prosperity, what might those 
have been who went before us ? The opportunities have been very 
great. Many of you have realized comfort and opulence for your¬ 
selves and your posterity; hundreds besides you have done the 
same. It is these opportunities which have created this great de¬ 
mand for capital. It was only by capital that you were enabled 
to enter into these opportunities. And in reference to that de¬ 
mand, the supply has been too small. Now how does Mr. Field 
propose to help this matter? He proposes not to increase the 
amount of money but to diminish what we get for it. Now I say 
in reference to this, that there is no more reason or honesty in it, 
or any more probability of its succeeding than if, because I cannot 
get as much wheat as I want for a dollar a bushel, I should offer 
fifty cents a bushel, and insist that men should bring me the wheat 
at that price. They will not do it, and all the legislatures in the 
world could not make them do it. 
Is it philosophical, because ten per cent, will not bring as 
much capital to Wisconsin as we want, to say that a less rate will 
do it? It cannot be done in that way. The only way we can 
bring capital to Wisconsin, is by paying what under the nat¬ 
ural law of supply and demand, that capital is worth to us. And 
when we go into market and pay ten per cent, for capital, we do it 
because we know we can handle that capital, even at ten per cent, 
to advantage. If we did not go into the market for it, it would ac¬ 
cumulate and search us out, and offer itself for even two per cent., 
if we could not be induced to give any more. Capital is absolutely 
good for nothing unless parties can use it to advantage. Capital 
above all things must enter into competition for labor, because it is 
unproductive until it finds labor. But as long as we are as pros¬ 
perous as we are now, and as long as we can make such remunera¬ 
tive use of money as we think we can, we shall make a large de¬ 
mand for it, and as that large demand is felt, and our capital comes 
from a great distance, that capital will bear a high price. 
President Stilson - . I hold in my hand a penny, on which it 
says u one cent,” I would like to ask President Bascom, what is 
the intrinsic value of that without the Government stamp on it? 
