tell you that this Government has the power to put its sovereign impress on a piece of paper; and, if the Government has that power, it don't take any more sovereignty to make a $2 bill than it does to make a $1 bill. What is the use of wasting sovereignty on $1 bills? (Laughter.) Why not have $10 bills? What is the use of wasting sovereignty on a $10 bill? Why not have $100 bills? (Laughter.) Why not have million-dollor bills, and every one become a millionaire at once? (Laughter and applause.) If the greenback doctrine is right, that evidence of national indebtedness is wealth, if that is their idea, why not go another step and make every individual note a legal tender? Why not pass a law that every man shall take every other man's note ? Then, I swear, we would have money in plenty? (Laughter.) No, my friends, a promise to pay a dollar is not a dollar, no matter if that promise is made by the greatest and most powerful Nation on the globe. A promise is not a performance. An agreement is not an accomplish

ment.

GREENBACK INFLATION.

We want no more inflation. We want simply to pay our debts as fast as the prosperity of the country allows it and no faster. Every speculator that was caught with property on his hands upon which he owed more than the property was worth wanted the game to go a little longer, Whoever heard of a man playing poker that wanted to quit when he was a loser? (Laughter.) He wants to have a fresh deal. He wants another hand, and he don't want any that is ahead to jump the game. (Laughter and applause.) It is so with the speculators in this counThey bought land, they bought houses, they

try.

bought goods. and when the crisis and crash came, they were caught with the property on their hands, and they want another inflation, they want another tide to raise that will again sweep this driftwood into the middle of the great financial stream. That is all. Every lot in this city that was worth $5,000, and that is now worth $2,000-do you know what is the matter with that lot? It has been redeeming. It has been resuming. That is what is the matter with that lot. Every man that owned property that has now fallen 50 per cent., that property has been resuming; and if you could have another inflation to-morrow, the day that the bubble would burst would find thousands of speculators who paid as much for property as property was worth, and they would ask for another tide of affairs in men. They would ask for another inflation. What for? To let them out and put (Laughter.)

somebody else in.

RUNNING IN DEBT.

We want no more inflation. We want the simple, honest payment of the debt, and to pay out of the prosperity of this country. "But," says the greenback man, "we never had as good times as when we had plenty of greenbacks." Suppose a farmer would buy a farm for $10,000, and give his note. He would send Mary, Jane and Lacy to school. He would give them pianos, and send them to college, and would give his note for the interest, and the next year again his note, and finally they would come to him and say: "We must settle up; we have taken your notes as long as we can; we want money." "Why," he would say to the gentleman, “I never had as good a time in my life as while I have been

giving those notes. I never had a farm until the man gave it to me for my note. My children have been clothed as well as anybody's. We have had carriages;

we have had fine horses; and our house has been filled with music, and laughter, and dancing; and why not keep on taking these notes?" So it is with the greenback man; he says, "When we were running in debt we had a jolly time-let us keep it up." But, my friends, there must come a time when inflation would reach that point when all the Government notes in the world wouldn't buy a pin; that all the Government notes in the world wouldn't be worth as much as the last year's Democratic platform.

HARD TIMES.

I have no fear but what these debts will be paid. I have no fear but what every solitary greenback dollar will be redeemed; but, my friends, we will have some trouble doing it. Why? Because the debt is a great deal larger than it should have been. In the first place

there should have been no debt. If it had not been for the Southern Democracy there would have been no war. If it hadn't been for the Northern Democracy the war wouldn't have lasted one year. (Cheers-voices, "That's so.") When we put up the greenbacks, the Democrats went to all the markets in the world and swore that we never could redeem that paper. They stuck to it during the period of the war until gold went up to 290. What did it mean? It meant that the greenback dollar was only worth 34 cents. That is what it meant. What became of the other 66 cents? They were lied out of the greenbacks. They were maligned and slandered and calumniated out of the greenback by the Democrats of

the North.

Whenever a Democrat talks about hard

times, tell him, "Your party made the hard times." Whenever a Democrat wants to get sympathy on account of the national debt, tell him, "Your party made the national debt."

There was a man tried in court for having murdered his own father and his own mother. He was found guilty, and the judge asked him, "What have you to say that sentence of death shall not be pronounced on you?" "Nothing in the world, judge," said he, "only I hope your Honor will take pity on me and remember that I am a poor orphan." (Laughter and applause; renewed laughter.) The Democratic party made this debt. The Democratic party caused these hard times, and now they go around the country and ask sympathy from the people because the Democrats are suffering such hard times. When you think about this debt, charge two-thirds of it to the Democracy of the North; charge the other third to the Democracy of the South, and if you have to work to get this money, and in working blister your hands, pull off the blister, and under every blister you will find a Northern Democratic lie. I say, have no doubt but that this debt will be paid. We have got the honor to pay it, and we do not pay it on account of the avarice or greed of the bondholder. An honest man don't pay money to a creditor simply because the creditor wants it. The honest man pays at the command of his honor, and not at the demand of the creditor. (Applause.) The United States will liquidate every debt at the command of its honor, and every cent will be paid. War is destruction, war is loss, and all the property destroyed, and the time that is lost, put together, amount to what we call a national debt.

1

When in peace we shall have made as much net profit as there was wealth lost in the war, then we will be a solvent people.

THE GREENBACK TO BE REDEEMED.

The greenback will be redeemed, we expect to redeem it on the 1st day of January, 1879. We may fail; we will fail if the prosperity of the country fails; but we intend to try to do it, and if we fail to do it, we will fail as a soldier fails to take a fort, high upon the rampart, with the flag of resumption in our hands. (Applause.) We will not say that we cannot pay the debt because there is a date fixed when the debt is to be paid. I have had to borrow money myself; I nave had to give my note, and I recollect distinctly that every man I ever did give my note to insisted that somewhere in that note there should be some vague hint as to the cycle, as to the geological period, as to the time, as to the century and date when I expected to pay those little notes. (Laughter.) I never understood that having a time fixed would prevent my being industrious; that if it would interfere with my honesty; or with my activity, or with my desire to discharge that debt. And if any man in this great country owed you $1,000, due you the first day of next January, and he should come to you and say:

"I want to pay you that debt, but you must take that date out of that note."

"Why?" you would say.

"Why," he would reply, in the language of Tilden, "I have got to make wise preparation.

"Well," you would say, "why don't you do it?”

“Oh,” he says, "I can't do it while you have that date in that note."