Democratic watchman. (Bellefonte, Pa.) 1855-1940, February 20, 1891, Image 1
Ink Slings. —The blizzards are interfering with the banana’s being a sure crop in Da- kota. —It would appear that MATTHEW STANLEY QUAY was the victim of a wicked partner. --QuAy'’s vindication is very interest- ing reading, but it does not convince a discerning public that MAT is a martyr. —Would it be less offensive to Sir JouN McDoNALD's bumptiousness if the United States were annexed to Can- ada ? — Whisky and dynamite are a deadly combination that couldn’t have been de- vised by any one but the agent of a whisky trust. ——February has not fulfilled the pre- dictions of the weather prophets. It has even compromised the wisdom of the ground hog. --The weather we had this week was calculated to fool the crocus out of the ground and to inveigle the blue bird into premature song. —The little fellows in the Republican party who are denouncing Dox CAME- RON will want to get under his wing in the next campaign. —Itis hoped that GORMAN is not fated to become a favorite of the New York Sun. He is too good a man to be sacrificed in that way. —The belief that CLEVELAND has committed suicide by writing his silver letter has set DANA to dancing with glee that is more than ghoulish. Mrs. CLEVELAND, it is said, is learn- ing to play the violin. Probably she intends to furnish the music when the Republicans are waltzed out of office in 1893. —A New York lawyer, of the name Parsons, gota fee of $400,000 for or- ganizing the Sugar Trust. The people help to pay for this when they sweeten their coffee. —By buying his own tombstone be- fore he died General SHERMAN may have prevented his memory from being unpleasantly associated with a monu- ment scandal. —-The colored troops have an advantage over their white fellow soldiers in an In- dian war, in that the redskinned enemy consider it ‘bad medicine” to take a scalp that is covered with wool. —The bill to provide every congress- man with a clerk failed to pass the House not because the members didn’t like the measure, but because they were afraid their constituents wouldn’t like it. --The nation that believes that En- gland’s navy isan cffete establishment would be likely to get itself into trauble if, acting upon that impression,it should trifle with the old mistress of the sea. —If it wasn’t customary for the rain to fall equally on the unjust and the just we would think that the Democrats of Belletonte received such a Waterloo on Tuesday because it was such a wet day. —An English socialist says that the trouble in this country is that there is not enough discontent. Ie evidently doesn’t know anything about the feel- ings of the politicians who are out of office. —1It js to be hoped that Mr. CLEVE- LAND may not be placed in the pre- dicament in which Mr. BLAINE found himself when he was forced to make a frantic appeal for the incineration of his letters. —If editor WATTERSON hal consult- ed the Star Eyed Geddess she would have advised him not to write the letter which was sure to cause a coolness be- tween two such distinguished Democrat. as himself and Governer HILL. —A manager who has a new rendi- tion of Pinafore on the stage in New York insists upon the female singers ap- pearing in tights, but it may be asked An what way is a display of legs essen- tial to the success of a musical perform- ance ? —1t is reported that Emperor WIL- LIAM is strongly disposed to banish Bis- MARCK from Germany for talking too ‘much. Wouldn't it be the irony of fate if the ex-chancellor should be ignomin- iously hustled out of the empire which he may besaid to have created ? —A Kansas genius claims to have invented a process that will produce eggs by artificial means and intends to get a patent fcr it. In view of a com- petition so ruinous to their industry the hens have reason to cackle their dissent as loudly as the protectionists did in the last Presidential campaign. —The Press in a recent issue publi sh- - ed a picture showing how the wicked Democrats have gercvmandered Ala- bama. The politicians of that State have made some unshapely looking dis- tricts, but we will leave it to our esteem- ed contemporary whether their expert- ness as gerrymanderers surpasses that of the Republicans who in every state - where they have had the chance have done a job of that kind. VV ON STATE RIGHTS AND FEDERAL UNION. VOL. 36. BELLEFONTE, PA., FEBRUARY 20, 1891. NO 7. Common Sense on the Silver Question. The very fact that this country pro- duces large quantities of silver natur- ally leads the people to desire a liberal monetary ase of it. It is difficult to make them believe that what nature has so abundantly supplied will be in- jurious if plentifully used as a circulat- ing medium. Hence the popularity of the proposition of free silver coinage. Subject to certain modifications there seems to be good reason for the de- mand that silver should be used to the full extent of its production,the same as any other production of the country. That modification should consist in pre- venting the silver producer from get ting more for his product than it is real- ly worth in the market. When a farmer produces a bushel ot wheat, the value of which is eighty cents in the market, he gets but eighty cents for it. There is no law, and there shouldn’t be any, to compel purchasers to pay for it twen- ty cents more than the market price. The same rule should obtain in the case of thesilver producer. Themarket price of so much of his production as will make a dollar is somewhere about eighty cents. Why should he get a dollar for it? This is giving him an advantage over the farmer or any oth- er producer that is not right. Eliminate this feature from the free coinage proposition and its object in our opinion is rendered unobjection- able. The silver producer has his commodity for use; the country wants the use of it. Let him take it to the government mints as the farmer takes his grain to the mill. As the farmer doesn’t get from the miller more than eighty cents for eighty cents’ worth of grain, the silver man should be treated at the mint on the same basis of value. He shouldu’t be authorized by law to get more for his product than it is worth in the market. But when the government puts the stamp of a dollar on his silver, eighty cents worth of it becomes practically worth one hundred cents. Why should he be allowed this 20 per cent bonus? If this unfair ad- vantage should be removed there doesn’t seem to be any valid reason why those who produce a precious metal which in all time has been used as money, shouidn’t take it to the mints, pay the expense of converting a dollar's worth of it into a dollar's worth of coin, and put it in circulation, either as metalic currency or its representative certifi- cates, for the benefit of the public. This appears to be a common seuse solution of the silver coinage question. Of course there are financial experts who see disaster in this plain method of putting silver to its legitimate use. They resort to their finely spun mono- metallic and bimetallic distinctions,and see a natural antagonism between gold and silver that 1n their opinion is sure to knock one or the other out. Bat it may be well to remember that when an enlarged silver coinage was propos- ed some years ago there were financial alarmists who were sure that it would knock all the gold out of the country ; yet, irstead of having that effect, after $450,000,000 of silver has been coined there is more gold in the country than there was when the Bland bill was passed. ——Nothing else was looked for than that the Republicans would carry the municipal election in Philadel phia on Tuesday. A good deal was said ahout having a new Philadelphia, but it was too much to expect that any other thansthe old way of getting it would be tried. EpwiN L. Stuarr, the Republican candidate for Mayor, beat Lapxer, the Democratic candi- date, by a majority of about 40,000. Most of the Republican councilmen were elected. The Committee of Fifty, operating for reform, made very little impression upon the result, the coun: cilmanic fight going largely against that organization. There was a heavy falling off in the Democratic vote. The Press doesn't think very highly ot Senator Quay’s de’e:se. It fears that it “has been delayed too long to do much good,” and that what he has now done ‘should have been done at least ten months ago.” The leading party organ of the State has discarded the servility to Quay and CaMeroN which has so long held the Republican press of Pennsylvania in thrall. Mr. Cleveland and the Silver Question. The letter of ex-President CLEVELAND to the anti-silver mass meeting in New Yorl last week, expressing his opposi- tion to the free-coinage of silver, has created something of an excitement in political circles and drawn out a varie- ty of views in regard to it. It should not, however, occasion surprise, for it was merely a reiteration of sentiments in regard to silver which Mr. CLevE- LAND had previously expressed. Some of his friends appear to believe that he made a mistake in taking the position he has on this question. They fear that it will interfere with his re- nomination for President, even going 80 far as to say that it pues him entire- ly out of the question as a candidate, as there is such a determination, par- ticularly in the West and South, for more silver that his expressed opposi- tion to it places him in antagonism to a powerful and growing public sentiment. Probably the ex-President have acted more prudently for his own good as a Presidential candidate if he hadn’t been so candid in giving his silver views, but whether the expres. sion he has made will have an inju- rious effect upon his candidacy will de- pend very much upon whether the tar- iff or the silver question shall be the predominant one in 1892. It the Democratic party a year hence shall coatinue to consider the reform of ua- just and oppressive tariff laws as of paramount importance—if they shall determine to reap the advantage of the economic education which the peonle have been receiving since 1888—a dif: would ference in regard to silver coinage may not prevent Mr. CLEVELAND from be- Besides, a year's time and the pressing political exigen- ices of a Presidential campaign may subordinant silver to questions of more inz the nominee, urgent importance. Bat fortunately the fortune of the Democratic party is not dependent upon the availability of any particular candidate. Its principles are broad and there are a namber of leaders from whom may be selected a suitable representative of those principles in the coming Presidential contest. Impertinent. The Americus Club, a political or- ganization of Piutsburg has been guilty of the foolishness of calling upon Sena- tor CAMERON to resign because of “his support of the free coinage of silver notwithstanding that the people whom he represents are opposed to it.”’ By what means has this Americus Club ascertained that a majority of Senator CAMERON'S constituents are opposed to the free coinage of silver? That measure may not be approved by a majority of the people of Pennsylva- nia, but they have given no expression on the subject that could serve as a guide or warrant to their representa- tives. This silver question has been too recently and indefinitely interjected in- to politics to be made a test of the po- litical standing aud party fidelity of public men. A Republican ora Demo- crat can be for free coinage or against it without being subject to the charge of being uuture to his party, and we doubt not that, taking this view of the matter, Senator Cameron will regard the action of the Americus Club in call- ing upon him to resign on account of his vote on the coinage question, as a piec: of impertinent intermeddling. Doesn’t Want It Investigated. There is good reason for believing that the census of New York was in- correctly taken, the defects being caus el either by careless work or by de- liberate design. Whatever may have been the fault, a wrong was done the State, particularly as the evident defi- ciency in the report cf the population, to the extent of several hundred thous- and, deprives it of the representation in congress that it is entitled to. Under the circumstances the New York Leg islature was justified in appointing a special committee to inquire into the methods employed in taking the ‘cen- sue and the manner in which the work was done. It was to be an inquiry in- to a matter of great importance to the State. But Superintendent Porter in- structs his subordinates that they need not answer any questions concerning the census, or give any information about the way they did their work. What other inference can be drawn from this than that the work was done in a way that won't bear investi- gation ? The Superintendent says that he doesn’t object to an examination of the books if it be nrade “through the properly constituted authorities,” but if the Legislature of a State, inquiring into a matter of great importance to that State, isn’t authority worthy of being considered properly constituted, we should like to know what authority would be considered as being up to the required mark? But the fact is that Porter doesn’t want any authority, whether properly constituted or other- wise, to investigate the methods of the New York census by which’ the pop- ulation of the State was cut down some 200,000 for a shameful partisan pur- pose, A ———— Baby Business. It was a singular position the Re- publican State Senators took last week in condemning Governor Parrisox for vetoing the concurrent resolution cen- suring Senator CamMERoN for his action on the Force Bill question. What would they have wanted the Governor to do It the matter? By their own act they forced him into an expression of his sentiments on the subject, for the passage of such a resolution constitu- tionally required that he should ap- prove or disapprove it. Could they expect that it would meet his approv- al? As an opponent of the Force Bill, had he any other recourse than to dis- approve a resolution which censured Senator CaMeRroN for being also an op- ponent of the Force Bill ? It was baby business that the Repub- lican Senators engaged in when they condemned the Governor for ‘doing what they gave him the chance to do and what was entirely in line with with his constitutional power and duty. Nothing couldhave been sillier than to charge bim with trying to promote a Presidential boom by the perform- ance of a functional act that was clear- ly within his official province. There 18 reason to believe that in the case ‘in question he did what he thought was right without any ulterior purpose. — Something About Our Currency. At this time when the question of making more dollars for the use of the people is under consideration; some- thing about the different kinds of mon ey that constitute the circulating me- dium in this country may be of interest. A writer on this subject gives some facts which when condensed amount to the following : The gold dollar is 23.22 grains of pure gold, worth intrinsically every- where 100 cents. It is said to cost that to get it out of the ground and purify it. The silver dollar is 371} grains of pure silver, worth now intrinsically 83 cents. The gold dollar is represented in our circulating medium by the gold certifi- cate, the silver dollar by the silver cer- tificate. The gold and silver to redeem these certificates are in the treasury at Washington. The greenback is a mere promise to pay. It has behind it the credit of the United States and $100,- 000,000 of gold kept to redeem it. The uational bank notes represent the assets of the stockholders of such banks, and are further secured by government bonds and thecredit of the United States. The new silver treasury notes have behind them the bullion held by the governmument and the credit of the government. In round numbers the currency and coin in circulation amount to $1,500,000,000. This sum is made up as follows: Gold, $386, 939,723 ; silver dollars, $62,142,454 ; subsidiary silver and fractional cur- rency, $56,311,846 ; gold certificates, $158,104,739 ; silver certificates, $309,. 321,207 ; United States notes, $340,- 905,726 ; national bank notes, $177,- 250,514, In 1870 the circulation per capita was $19.97 ; in 1880, $20,37 ; it is now $23.28. M. S. Quay displayed astonish- of Bake WALTERS's connection with the speculation in which the State money was used, he said: “I had every assurance that my associate was able to carry his share of the losses.” No one knew better than Quay that poor WALTERS wasn’t worth a .dollar without taking it from the treasury. ing disingenuousness when in speaking | Mr. Quay’s Remarkable Defense. The public are interested as well as amused by the defense which Senator Quay made in the Senate on Monday against the charges that have assailed his personal and official reputation. It had been rumored for some months that the Senator would make this de- fense, but at different times reasons were given for its delay. He has now done what is evidently the best he could do in replying to the bill of in- dictment upon which he was tried by the people of Pennsylvania last fall and condemned, It will strike the average reader that the Senator did not select the proper time for making his defense. Ie should have made it last year when the charges were fresh and flying through the country, and the place to make it should have been in the courts, where, if he was innocent, he could have haa the evidence to prove that his enemies were libelously and falsely assailing him. That would have been satisfactory to the public, and should have been more satisfacto- ry to himself, than an unsubstantiated denial in the Senate. A sample of this ipse dizit sort ot de- fense appears in what he saysin refu- tation of one of the leading charges against him, as follows: The first assertion concerning my official acts is that at some time or continuously be- tween the years of 1879 and 1852 I alone, or act, ing with another or others, used the monies of the state of Pennsylvania for speculative or private purposes. I denounce this statement as absolutely false. In 1877 the Democratic party of Pennsylvania elected a State treasur- er and an auditor general and the financial of- ficer of the commonwealth. A year or two later pending their termsof office I became en- gaged in stock operations. In some transac- tions I was associated and jointly interested with the gentleman who was at that time cashier of the state treasury. These transac tions proved seriously disastrous and I was compelled to pay a portion of his losses as well as my own. In doingthis it became necessa- ry to supply an alleged deficiency he had caus- ed in the treasury as a portion of the fund. For this purpose I borrowed $100,000 from the gentleman who is at present my colleague in the Senate. I gave him a judgment note there. for, the amount of which note I paid to him dollar for dollar years sgo. Not until the beginning of the settlement of our losses was I aware that a deficiency existed, and I had every assurance that my associate was able to carry his snare of the losses. My connection thereafter was simply with the aid of friends to raise the necessary funds to supply the de- ficiency. This is far from being a satisfactory denial of the charge that he had used for a speculative purpose money be- longing to the Sate treasury. It would appear from the Senator's state- ment that the $100,000 he admits having borrowed from Senator CAMERON was obtained for the purpose of help- ing Bake WALTERS out of the difficuls ty he got into through “the alleged de- ficiency he had caused in the treasury” by losing the money in an unsuccess- ful speculation. Is it probable that Mr. Quay acted out of sheer sympathy for Warrers and hada’t any difficulty of his own in connection with the transaction from which it was necessa- ry to extricate himself ? The Sendtor could have made his in- understanding of the people if he had vindicated himself in a court of justice. Mr. Wayne McVeagr and Senator Cameron would have been effective witnesses to prove that their assistance was not secured to relieve Mr. Quay from a treasury deficiency, if the charge to that effect was not true. The Senator takes up, in succession, the other charges that were made against him, and denies them in detail, butsuch denial under the circumstances attending his case, unsupported by any- thing like evidence, carries no more weight with 1t than does the ordinary plea of “not guilty” in the courts. That he was 1n a deal with the cashier ofthe State treasury in which the State moa- ey was used, without his being cog- nizant of the criminality of the trans- action, hasn’t even a shade of plausi- bility. It was a refreshing sight to see a Pennsylvania Republican cpngress- man administer a good carrying to a member of Mr. HarrisoN's cabinet, as Mr.DarzerL did to Secretary Tracey for wrongfully censuring Commander Re1- ' Ter. The congressman showed that he had a better understanding of the func- | tions of the American flag and of the | requirements of national honor than is and had no money to put into the deal | possessed by one of the most prominent | No. slope, oppos and responsible of the cabinet officers. nocence more evident to the common and $5000 cash tempt J. H. Sternbergh to Spawls from the Keystone, —Allegheny has 1600 liquor license applica- tions. —A Carbondale Justice has not tried a cas for over a year. —During last year 2, 533,84 barrels of beer were made in this State. —Mrs. Fisher, of Hummelstown, died while praying at her bedside. —A Lock Haven oyster opener found a $40 pearl in a bivalve recently. —Allentown’s seventh shoe factory is pro- jected to employ fifty hands. —Two young men at Sharpsburg fought a duel with coaching whips. —Tax Collector J. 0. Ssnnberg, of Bradford, is charged with a $2000 shortage. —The English syndicate won't buy the Crane iron works at Catasauqua. —Albert Gerhart’s 1-year old baby ate a mor- phia pill at Wernersville and died. —The Laurel Fire Company, of York, has celebrated its 10lst anniversary. —The fifth convention of Sanitarians will be held at Altoona on May 15 and 16. —Four law firms in Delaware county have dissolved since the first of the year. —A fall from a Lancaster hay-loft and a broken back killed William Simmons. —William L. Scott, of Erie, intends to erect a $200,000 residence and a $100,000 hotel. —A severe hail-storm swept through the southern end of Lancaster county last week. - Rev. George Cooper, of Wilkesbarre,was ar- rested on the eve of his wedding for forgery. —Carnegie, Phipps & Co., are about to take a contract for naval armor involving $3,500,000. —The Farmers’ Institute at Kennett Square - drew about as many farmers’ wives as farmers. —Tramp labor on the highways has been unprofitable in Cumberland county and aban- doned. —Legislators are looking into Norristown’s claims for State aid for her asylum and hos- pital. —At the Union Depot in Pittsburg 56,000 pieces of baggage were handled during Jan- uary. ; —'I'ke 10 per cent. reduction still keeps the miners, cokers and operators apartin the coke region. —Judge Harry White, of Indiana county, is - in the field for the United States District Judgeship. —The Economites landed in this country eighty-six years ago, and have property valued at $15,000,000. —A flock of 114 crows which had been caught for trap-shooting at Berkley escaped a few days ago. —James Statton, of Sharpsburg, a 70-year-old storekeeper, attacked and beat a bully who en- tered his store a few days ago. —Widow Muskovitch is insane as a result of the Jeanesville mining horror. Five boarders perished with her husband. —Rich Oliver H. P. Stern’s will at Hoken- dauqua orders an autopsy upon the decedent within two days after death. David Fox survived last year's Notingham mine explosion to be killed by a blast near Wilkesbarre on Thursday. —While in Scranton a few days ago John L. Sullivan made a generous donation for the families of the miners killed reeently. —During a fight ina Reading saloon a man and a chair, to which he was holding, were thrown together through a $75 plate-glass. —The three miners rescued alive from. the Nanticoke mine will join a museum and. exhi. bit themselves for a term of six months. —A peculiar disease is raging among horses in the vicinity of Monongehela City. Many persons report having lost valuable animals. —Whooping cough and pneumonia have re- moved two of Michael A. Foley’s children at Reading within a week, and a third maydie. —Mrs. Sarah Elmer, of Columbia, Lancaster county, wes fata 1 barned by her dress taking fire while she was getting supper on Tuesday. —Coffins are ordered and graves dug for all the seventeen entombed miners al Jeanes. ville, whose bodies may be reached: by Mon~ ' day. —Robert Wallace, of West New: Castle, fell and broke his leg and was compslled to. erawl to hi: home, half a mile away, over: the rough road. —Lehigh County Auditors have met annual. ly tor twenty-five years in a bank, The law stipulates the Court House, and there is a row over it. —Peter McManus, a boy 12 years old, broke thr ough the ice at Wilkesbarre on Saturday, ‘and was drowned. He is the son.of a promin- ent man. —A stray bullet went through a knot of hair at the back of the head of Mrs. Curtin S. Bare, of Pittsburg, while she sat at a window in- Huntingdon. —Free site, free water, no taxes for ten years erect his nut and bolt works in a city that . rivals Reading. —Two masked men broke into the house of. I. B. Kinter, of Derry, and for their pains re- esived a terrible beating at the hands of Mr. Kinter and his son. —A pin got stuck in young Harry Rittle’s throat at Bethel on Christmas. It has just worked out through his. larynx. He couldn’t swallow, and was half starved. —Fifteen persons at Freeport have been held for maliciously painting the jail at that place. The color was changed from a sombre rod to a dazzling white. —Joseph Fisher, of Allentown, has been showered with misfortune. Thieves broke in and stole $700 recently, and the next day the Sheriff took charge of his place. —Congressman Brunner tells Reading American mechanies that he “will favor any reasonable bill to restrict immigration that may be presented in the House.” —Three of the sixteen Cherryville Cemetery desacrators at Easton were convicted and fined $15 and costs each! The other thirteen pleaded guilty and got similar sentences. —A Hungarian looking for his brether, a victim of the Jeanesville mine disaster, was with difficulty restrained in his desperation from jumping down the shaft of the mine. —The condition of William West, the con- demned murderer at Washington, has assum- ed sich a serious aspect that itis feared he will not live until the time set for his execution. —Edward Workheiser and his team dropped through the earth into an abandoned mine sixty feet deep in Williams township, North. ampton county. Workmen are digging for them —Ninety million gallons of water had failed, as late as Monday, to extinguish the fire in ite Nanticoke though it is ex- | pected to die out before the 100,000,000 gallon mark is reached.