State Convention—Dollars and Sense. 
257 
and bears of the currency would find a checkmate among the peo¬ 
ple, who, with whetted sickles, would cut their “ corners,’ 1 and the 
volume of currency would run as even and regular as an engine 
under control of the best modernized governor. Thus, the very 
thing the bullionists charge as u inflation ” would avoid the possi¬ 
bility of inflation, for business men are not such fools as to keep on 
hand an article in excess of its utility, especially when a metamor¬ 
phose, that costs nothing, would yield more of the oil of profit than 
in the unchanged condition. The cry of “inflation” then, when 
stripped to the skin of its true import, is but a protest against a 
measure that would prevent both inflation and contraction. In 
short, it is the old “stop-thief” dodge. 
If the supply of jackknives was limited, and someone should in¬ 
vent some two hundred-fold new, and almost indispensible uses for 
jackknives, the prices of jackknives would go up amazingly. So it 
is with anything. The more you increase its uses, and the neces¬ 
sity therefor, the more valuable and high-priced it becomes, if the 
supply be limited. And so it is with gold. If we only used for 
all purposes, saj' $50,000,000 per annum, it would become a drug 
on the market. Since bankers do not desire it in banking, on ac¬ 
count of the trouble and expense of handling large sums, and the 
constant reduction of all sorts of standards to that of the American 
dollar. The present demand annually for gold, to pay interest, 
import duties, and the balance of trade, etc., is probably not less 
than $400,000,000, and the premium over the best paper money 
ever devised, the soundness of which is vouchsafed by thirty bil- 
- lions of wealth, and which no man distrusts, is from twelve to 
fifteen per cent. Now, let that demand for gold be more than doubled, 
as it would be if the greenbacks and fractionals, and all the “ certifi¬ 
cates,” ($582,000,000, and, say, $30,000,000 for interest,) are to be 
redeemed in gold, and the volume of national currency raised to, 
say $600,000,000 to fill up the void by the destruction of green¬ 
backs, and the national banks are required to keep, say thirty per 
cent., ($180,000,000,) specie reserve, making a new demand for gold 
of $752,000,000, there is no knowing to what altitude the prem¬ 
ium on gold would reach, since, as it is now, we must send to Eu¬ 
rope to pay interest alone, $60,000,000 per annum, on government 
bonds, with only about $200,000,000 gold in the Union, all told, 
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