X-Rays in Finance; Or, Finance Versus Politics. a Bill for Divorce (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1896. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER VI. CONSERVATISM AND COUNTERFEITING. The history of nations shows conclusively that whenever coins have been issued at any considerable fiat value, a policy which our plain old-fashioned ancestors named, and which all historians allude to as 'a debasement of the currency, ' the result has invariably been disastrous, the extent of ultimate loss being proportionate to the difference between the fiat and the actual values, and there is needed no argument to show that where there is a subsequent decline in the value of the metal of which a coin is composed the effect is precisely the same thereafter as would have resulted from a debasement of the coin in the beginning. The present United States silver coins must therefore, take their places, ere long, with the other debased coins of history. The experiment of debased currency has been tried so often by the nations of the earth that any one who requires to be convinced of its worse than folly may find in the history of Governments conclusive evidence for his enlightenment. The history of the money of England in this connection, which is similar to the history of the money of the civilized world, for the same period, will, however, be found entirely ample. Up to the time of the establishment of the Bank of England, in the reign of William and Mary, 1614, it is a story of repeated efforts, and as oft repeated failures, to increase the values of the coins of the realm, by royal decree or legal enactment, beyond actual values, or, what was the same in effect, to decrease the weight or fineness of the coins, and still maintain the values they had before such debasement. In summing up the subject, the American Cyclopedia says: "The early history of the money of England, in one "respect, at least, answers to a...