equal, its debt-paying power and its general purchasing power. When these are equal, the problem of our currency is solved, and not till then.

We who defend the resumption act propose not to destroy the greenback, but to dignify it, to glorify it. The law that we defend does not destroy it, but preserves its volume at $300,000,000, and makes it equal to and convertible into coin. I admit that the law is not entirely free from ambiguity. But the Secretary of the Treasury, who has the execution of the law, declares that Section 3579 of the Revised Statutes is in full force, namely: "When any United States notes are returned to the Treasury, they may be reissued, from time to time, as the exigencies of the public interest may require." Although I do not believe in keeping greenbacks as a permanent currency in the United States, although I do not myself believe in the government's becoming a permanent banker, yet I am willing, for one, that, in order to prevent the shock to business which gentlemen fear, the $300,000,000 of greenbacks shall be allowed to remain in circulation at par, as long as the wants of trade show manifestly that it is needed. Now, is that a great contracIs it a contraction at all? Why, gentlemen, when you have brought your greenback dollar up two and one half cents. higher in value, you will have added to your volume of money $200,000,000 of gold coin which cannot circulate until greenbacks are brought to par. Let those who are afraid of contraction consider this fact, and answer it.

tion?

Summing it all up in a word, the struggle now pending in this House is, on the one hand, to make the greenback better, and, on the other, to make it worse. The resumption act is making it better every day. Repeal that act, and you make it indefinitely worse. In the name of every man who wants his own when he has earned it, I demand that we shall not make the wages of the poor man shrivel in his hands after he has earned them, but that his money shall be made better and better, until the ploughholder's money is as good as the bondholder's money, and there is no longer one money for the rich and another for the poor.

This is the era of pacification. We believe in the pacification of the country. That is, we seek to pass out of the stormcentre of war that raged over this country so long, and enter the calm circle of peace. We believe in the equality of States,

and the equality of citizens before the law. In these we have made great progress. Let us take one step further. Let us have equality of dollars before the law, so that the trinity of our political creed shall be equal States, equal men, and equal dollars throughout the Union. When these three are realized, we shall have achieved the complete pacification of our country. We are bound by three great reasons to maintain the resumption of specie payments. First, because the sanctity of the public faith requires it; second, because the material prosperity of the country demands it; and, third, because our future prosperity demands that agitation shall cease, and that the country shall find a safe and permanent basis for financial peace. The conditions are now all in our favor. The Secretary of the Treasury tells us in his report, laid upon our table this morning, that he has $66,000,000 of gold coin, unpledged for any other purpose, waiting as a reserve for the day of resumption. He is adding to that stock at the rate of $5,000,000 a month. Our surplus revenue of $35,000,000 a year will all be added to this reserve. Foreign exchange is now in our favor. We are selling to other nations almost $200,000,000 a year more than we are buying. All these elements are with us. Our harvests are more bountiful than ever before. The nation is on the wave of returning prosperity. Everywhere business is reviving, and there is no danger except from the Congress of the United States. Here is the storm-centre; here is the point of peril. If we can pass this peril, and not commit ourselves to the dangerous act now threatened, we shall soon see resumption complete.

I notice that gentlemen do not move to strike out the first section of the resumption act. Why? Two years ago my colleague, in his debate in Ohio with Governor Woodford, laughed at silver resumption, so far as the fractional currency was concerned, as absurd and impossible. He spurned the proposition to destroy our paper scrip, which cost but little, and replace it with silver change, which had some value. He argued that every silver coin issued would be hidden away, and none would go into circulation. But since that debate silver resumption under the first section of the act is completed, except that we have not yet been able to find all of the old scrip, so lazily do the people exercise their right of redemption. But gentlemen think that now, if we resume under this section, the greenbacks will all be taken up.

MR. EWING. In the debate with Governor Woodford in 1875 I did make the statement to which the gentleman refers. But that was before the people of this country, or, I presume, the people of the world generally, knew of the furtive and rascally act of demonetization of silver in the adoption of our Revised Statutes. It was before the immense fall of silver. It was when the silver dollar was at a high premium over the greenback dollar. Speaking from conditions then existing, and the price of silver at that time, the statement was reasonable that the fractional silver currency would be taken up and sold, and not go into general circulation.

The trouble with the statement of my friend is, that, the fractional silver currency being twelve per cent below the value of the silver dollar, there was not the slightest danger, at the time he speaks of, that the silver change after being issued would pass out of circulation. He did not believe in silver resumption until that metal became so depreciated as to be worth much less than paper.

Gentlemen think there is danger that the people will present all their greenbacks and demand the coin, if resumption is enforced. Let us see. Remember how slow they have been in giving up their scrip. Suppose that a farmer in one of your Eastern States sells his farm for $10,000. He wants to remove to the Great West. He gets ten greenbacks of the denomination of $1,000 each. This is easy to carry; he can put it in his vest pocket. Do you think, as a matter of convenience, he will go to the Assistant Treasurer in New York and get for those greenbacks forty pounds' weight of gold coin to carry in his pockets, or, if the silver dollar should be restored, six hundred and forty pounds of silver? No, gentlemen; the moment your greenback is equal to gold, it is better than gold, for it is more convenient; and it will remain in circulation until the business of the country demands its withdrawal.

In conclusion, Mr. Speaker, if any of the amendments offered to this bill will make resumption more safe, more certain, and will more carefully protect the business interests of the country, such amendments shall have my vote; but any measure that takes back the promise, that gives up what we have gained, that sets us afloat on the wild waves from which we have so nearly escaped, I will oppose to the utmost, confidently trusting to the future for the vindication of my judgment.

THE NEW SCHEME OF AMERICAN

FINANCE.

SPEECH DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, MARCH 6, 1878.

ON the 5th of March, 1878, Mr. W. D. Kelley, of Pennsylvania, made a lengthy speech in reply to Mr. Garfield's speech on the repeal of the Resumption Act, delivered on November 16 of the previous year. The next day Mr. Garfield replied to Mr. Kelley. Certain ad hominem portions of his reply are here omitted as not possessing permanent value or interest, although they gave great force and piquancy to the speech. when delivered. The House was in Committee of the Whole on the state of the Union.

"Capital may be produced by industry, and accumulated by economy; but jugglers only will propose to create it by legerdemain tricks with paper." — THOMAS Jefferson.

"If there be, in regard to currency, one truth which the united experience of the whole commercial world has established, I had supposed it to be that emissions of paper money constituted the very worst of all conceivable species of currency."- HENRY CLAY.

MR.

R. CHAIRMAN,- It is not of my seeking or according to my desire that any interruption of work on the appropriation bills is made by general debate; but the House, by unanimous consent, allowed the gentleman from Pennsylvania two hours and a half yesterday, which he devoted to criticism of a speech which I made one hundred and nine days ago against the repeal of the Resumption Act; and if I take an hour to reply, I can hardly be charged with a wanton delay of the public business. It is of consequence, not only to me, but to all those who have an interest in these subjects, to know whether the main statements on which my former speech was based are trustworthy, and the conclusions warranted by the facts. To these alone I shall invite the attention of the House.

I am laboring under the same embarrassment that I was under on the 16th of November, when I replied to some points made by the gentleman from Pennsylvania. His speech then was withheld from the Record, and I was compelled to reply to it as I remembered it: And now, after the speech, most if not all of which was in manuscript, and for aught I know has been many weeks ready for delivery, was read deliberately to the House, it does not appear in the Record of this morning; and I am again compelled to trust to my memory, to the few notes I made while he read it, and to the brief notices contained in the morning papers. If I shall in any way misrepresent his statements, the fault is mainly his own. I am embarrassed now, as I was also in November, by the fact that the gentleman himself is not here; for I dislike to refer to a member in his absence. But he sat in the room of the Committee of Ways and Means for two hours this morning, and he knew that I had the floor, and that I must speak now if at all.

The first forty minutes of his speech was devoted to attacking a proposition of mine which was incidental and not vitally essential to my argument. The line of my argument was this: that it was generally conceded that 1860 was a time of peace and of general prosperity in this country; that there was fair employment for labor and fair remuneration for the laborer; that it was an era of free banking, and that the volume of the currency was $207,000,000,- the largest which the country had ever had, except for a brief period in the panic year of 1857. I drew the conclusion, that it was incumbent on gentlemen who say that we have not now enough currency to show how, after all that has occurred to us in years past, the present depression of prices (which are nearly, if not altogether, as low as in 1860), and the present non-occupation of laborers, — three times as much currency as we then had is still insufficient.

That was the drift of my argument; and upon the preliminary declaration the gentleman spent forty minutes to show that 1860 was one of the most distressful years, except, perhaps, the present, that this country has ever known. In the first place, he denied that it was a year of peace, and for three very curious reasons. First, that during the previous year seventeen men had invaded Virginia at Harper's Ferry! Second, that it was the year of the Presidential election! Third, that the year afterward we had a war! Well, if these three facts prove