If a cotton planter in 1873 owed $10,000 he could then have paid it with
60,975 pounds of cotton. To-day, by reason of the increased command
which gold has over commodities, it would take 101,010 pounds of cotton
to pay that $10,000; not withstanding that the money in which the debtor
has paid the interest has each year become more valuable than it was at
the time he contracted to pay it.
The cotton manufacturer of the East who in 1873 owed $10,000 could then
have paid it with 70,422 yards of uncolored cotton cloth; to-day owing
to the rise in the value of gold it would require 147,059 yards to pay
that debt, without taking into account the amount lost by the debtor in
the greater sacrifice he had year by year to make to pay the interest.
The farmer of the North and West who in 1873 owed $10,000 could then
have paid it with 8,733 bushels of wheat; to-day it would require 11,446
bushels of wheat to liquidate that debt, though he, too, has year by
year been "cinched" through the progressive increase in the value of the
money in which the interest has been paid. Or he could, in 1873, have
paid his debt with 1,514 barrels of flour; to-day it would take 2,126
barrels of flour to pay the same debt.
The property of the country is fast passing into the hands of the
creditors, and if the iniquitous system is not reversed the condition
of our American farmers will be that of the farmers of gold-standard
countries. Instead of owning their farms they will be tenants and
rent-payers--a condition but little in advance of that which prevailed
in feudal days.
Machiavelli, describing a turbulent period in the history of Florence,
said:
The people perished, but the brigands throve.
The brigandage of the Middle Ages, whether in Italy or elsewhere, was a
criminal defiance of law, but it was pursued at some risk, and under
manifest disadvantages. The brigand took his life in his hands. He knew
that his calling was unlawful; and, although ruthless in his work, the
method by which he exacted ransom of his occasional victim was less
destructive to the prosperity of the community than the legalized
brigandage of to-day by which, through a vicious system of money, the
great mass of the people are despoiled of their property. The
distinguishing characteristic of the brigandage of the nineteenth
century is that it scrupulously observes all legal forms, and is
conducted in the name of honor, honesty, good morals and "sound
finance." Mortgages are foreclosed only in accordance with law, and the
unearned increment which results from the increased and increasing value
of the money is transferred from the debtor to the creditor, with
punctilious regard for the statutes.
The demands of the brigand were enforced with guns and pistols; those of
the creditor are enforced with bonds and mortgages; both exactions cruel
and unjust, one by violence, the other by law. But, in the latter case,
so indirect is the method of operation that many of those who are
benefited by it are unaware of the perpetration of any wrong. So subtle
is the process that the change seems to be only a change in the price of
commodities, and thousands of men who would scorn consciously to exact
from any one more than a just return for money loaned are beneficiaries
of this vicious and ruinous system.
With regard to the great body of the working masses it is sometimes said
they have no cause for complaint, that their condition now is better
than ever before.
But, Mr. President, it is not enough that men are better off than they
have been. When we reflect that nine-tenths of the inventions and
improvements constituting all the material features of the civilization
of this century have been made by working men, it is manifest that they
are entitled to much more of the comforts and convenience of life than
are now accessible to them. By watchful, repeated, and aggressive
efforts through their trade organizations, the working men in many
branches have been enabled to keep wages from sinking, and occasionally
to secure an advance; but, during a period of falling prices, what is
gained in this way by those who are kept at work is lost to the working
class as a whole by the remission to idleness of part of their number.
The statisticians who seem to be employed by some propaganda to prove
by figures that prosperity prevails, point exultantly to the fact that
the wages of the working people seem constantly to have increased while
prices are falling, and they cite this to prove that low prices are
consistent with prosperity. They leave entirely out of the account the
large numbers of workmen who of necessity are relegated to idleness on
account of the lack of profit in business.
If you go into the workshops of any large manufacturing enterprise,
while prices are low and lowering, and ask the managers what they now do
when a strike occurs among the workmen, they will tell you they find it
impossible to shut down, because they have contracts extending through
time that they must fill, but, they add, "We pay the wages demanded and
we reduce the number of the employed."
If there are a thousand workmen employed, getting $2 each per day, that
would be a wage fund of $2,000 a day. If, when prices fall and business
becomes dull, the employer should want to reduce the pay of each workman
to $1.50 a day, and if the workmen, by striking, should prevent that
decrease, and if, then, 25 per cent. of their number should be
discharged, the loss to the working class, as a body, and to the
community at large, would be the same as though the wages were reduced
to $1.50 a day. Until these people who present statistics can show us
how many laborers are left out of employment there is no possibility of
arriving at any correct conclusion as to what the wage fund is and how
much wages are paid.
The loss to society is much greater when 25 per cent. of the people are
unemployed than if all continued at work upon a 25 per cent. reduction
of wages, because the relegation to idleness of 25 per cent. of the
workmen reduces the producing force, and lessens correspondingly the
aggregate annual production.