The Great Greenback Tug-of-War
A Seattle reader squares off against national editors over the power of the government to define the value of money itself.
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.
I read your editorial in the DISPATCH on the 'Money Question,' and also the Oregonian's comments on my letter. I feel the weight of experience against me, and yet cannot shake the thought that they are both mistaken in the premises they have assumed on the money question, which seems to be the question all over the United States at the present time. You dispute the truth of my statement that a gold dollar is worth a dollar to the holder, not because it is gold, but because the government places its stamp upon it and by statutory enactment makes it a legal tender for all debts, dues or purchases. Money of gold is coined under an act of Congress, which stipulates 25 8-10 grains of gold shall be put into its gold dollar. But let us take this coined gold to England or France, and what can we get for it? It is no longer money, as in the United States, and must be sold by weight. It is the power of payment in all places in our country where money is demanded that makes money worth par, and not the value of the material of which it is made. It is not money without these functions. I have shown the 'why' it was at par, and why it was not. I beg pardon, Mr. Editor, for the length of this article. Respectively submitted, M. S. B.
“It is the power of payment in all places in our country where money is demanded, that makes money worth par, and not the value of the material of which it is made.”
In 1878, Seattleites were deeply engaged in the 'Greenback' debate, questioning whether money derived its value from intrinsic gold or government fiat. Today's debates over cryptocurrency and central bank digital currencies mirror this 19th-century anxiety over the stability, nature, and political control of our medium of exchange.
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