It is insisted that national and State debts are enhanced by the
prevalence of the single gold standard. To prove this we are asked to
compare the low prices of the present day with prices of past times.
Does not that prove that the bondholder gets more value now than he
bargained for, and hence that the taxpayer pays more?
No, it does not. Bondholders are entitled to share with others the
advantages of low prices of manufactured goods resulting from new
inventions and facilities for production and transportation. As to
products of the farm, prices were much lower when I was a boy than
they are now. Eggs sold then for 4 cents per dozen, butter for 6 to 8
cents per pound, corn for 15 cents per bushel, wood for $1 per cord,
etc., etc. If the gold standard has had any lowering effect on prices
it has not touched these articles. But why should we shed tears over
national and State debts, seeing that ours are nearly all paid? Let the
crocodiles of Europe weep over the enhanced burden of national debts if
there be any such enhancement due to the gold standard, which I take
leave to deny.
Suppose it were true that national and State debts were enhanced in
the manner alleged, would that be a reason for changing the standard
of value for the countless daily transactions of business? The bank
clearings of seventy-nine cities in the United States for the week
ending May 20 amounted to $1,165,478,664, which is about double the
interest-bearing debt of the nation. Add to this the payments of wages
and the retail transactions that are not embraced in clearing-house
returns, and then multiply the whole by the fifty-two weeks of the year
and you will see how large a cannon you are loading to kill a mosquito
and what a tremendous recoil it must have.