The Political Economy of 'Free Silver'
An editorial critique of the Populist push for silver currency, warning that inflation would only devastate the working class.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The People's party agitators denounce the Democratic and the Republican parties because they both declined to favor 'free silver' coinage, telling their hearers that 'free silver would get more money into the pockets of the farmers.' This is a delusion, for the farmers would suffer more from free coinage than anybody else. There is no scarcity of money in the country; there is more money per capita now than there ever was before. If the Bland free silver bill had become a law, the holder of silver bullion could today get a dollar that is legal tender for 100 cents for 64 cents' worth of bullion, but the 36 cents above the market price would go to the silver mine owner, and the farmer would get none of it. Wage workers would be met with higher prices quoted in a depreciated dollar and, between higher prices and their fixed wages, would see their dollar rapidly ground away. It was Daniel Webster who said that of all the machinery for impoverishing the working classes, the most perfect was 'cheap money and plenty of it.' Free silver coinage is nothing but an attempt on the part of the owners of silver bullion to force the government to purchase their output at an artificial price.
“It was Daniel Webster who said that of all the machinery for impoverishing the working classes, the most perfect was 'cheap money and plenty of it.'”
This 1892 editorial captures a classic moment in American economic anxiety—where the promise of 'easy money' meets the reality of inflationary risk. The rhetoric, framing populist movements as 'locusts' and 'wild money,' echoes the perennial friction between monetary policy and the working-class struggle for purchasing power.
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