The creation of wealth arises in three ways; via., transmutation, transformation, and transportation.
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http://www.apfn.org/apfn/comingbattle.htmThe man who plows, sows, and reaps, is engaged in the first-named process; the mechanic, or laborer, who adds value to the raw material, is an example of the second; the distribution of the products of the agriculturist, and the stilled or unskilled workman, falls in the province of the last named.
These processes are the sole means of adding to the stock of material wealth.
Bankers, merchants, and those belonging to what are called the learned professions, do not add a single penny to a nation's stock of wealth.
The banker and the money lender merely gathers toll from those, who borrow the medium of exchange to carry on business.
The merchant of every description who obtains a profit on the merchandise he buys and sells, merely takes the difference between the cost and selling price of goods from the customers, and adds it to his own possessions. This process does not add a farthing to the wealth of the nation as a whole.
Lawyers, physicians, and all other members of the professions, only absorb what is produced by others.
There is no way under heaven by which these classes of persons add anything to the wealth of a people
All township, municipal, county, State, and Federal officers, are merely consumers of what is produced by those who are engaged in the processes of transmutation, transformation, and transportation.
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Every tax levied and collected by the Government, and its various political and territorial subdivisions, is a transference of health from the people, to be in turn, given to those who are the official organs of lawful authority.
These definitions of the producing and non-producing classes are matters of every-day observation, and are susceptible of complete demonstration.
It is upon the shoulders of the producing class that rest the crushing weight of government, the enormous gains of national banks, and other wealth-consuming elements.
These burdens are surely bearing down the people into a bottomless abyss of bankruptcy.
One of the means that greatly increased the power of the national banks of Net York City, was their selection as depositories of government funds during the last thirty years.
In a speech of Comptroller Eckles, at a banquet given in his honor by these banks, he thus extols these pets of the Government. He said: -
"As government depositories the national banks have received, stored in their vaults, and accounted for $5,356,625,891 without expense to the Government. Allowing the rate of three eighths of one per cent. as a reasonable compensation for such services, which is the same as that fixed by the act of March 3, 1875, as the compensation of disbursing officers for public buildings, it would amount to $2o,o87,347."
Think of it! These few banks had the use of more than five billions of government money, increasing their loanable funds to that extent, and from which they gathered scores of millions of profit.
Through the agency of the railway and the tele-
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graph, the national banking money power of today can reach every part of the United States in twenty-four hours. The national banks know the value of organization, and they have brought it to a perfection that would excite the admiration of a Napoleon.
Shortly after the inauguration of President Cleveland, the national banks of New York City transmitted the following infamous circular to the thousands of banks scattered throughout the United States. The contents of the circular are as follows: -
"Dear Sir: The interests of national bankers require immediate financial legislation by Congress. Silver, silver certificates and treasury notes, must be retired and national bank notes upon a gold basis made the only money. This will require the authorization of from $5oo,ooo,ooo to $1,ooo,ooo,ooo of new bonds as a basis of circulation. You will at once retire one third of your circulation and call in one half of your loans. Be careful to make a money stringency felt among your patrons, especially among influential business men. Advocate an extra session of Congress for the of the purchasing clause of the Sherman law an act with the other banks of your city in securing a large petition to Con for its unconditional repeal, per accompanying form. Use personal influence with congressmen and practically let your wishes be known to your Senators. The future life of national banks as axed and safe investments depends upon immediate action, as there is an increasing sentiment in favor of Government legal tender notes and silver coinage."
While the national banks of that city were engaged in this conspiracy to wreck the business interests of the country, they were raiding the gold reserve of the United States Treasury to force an issue of bonds.
Coincident with the appearance of this circular, which advised the bringing on of this panic, the fol-
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lowing remarkable document was put forth by the national banking money power. It is as follows:-
"Dear Sir: The present financial situation requires the following action by Congress, which should be favored by all interests, to wit: -
"1. Pass a resolution repealing purchase clauses of Sherman silver bill.
"2. Pass a bill authorizing the issue of $3oo,ooo,ooo of United States 3 per cent. bonds, payable in gold, directing United States Treasurer to sell $1oo,ooo,ooo immediately in Europe, with stipulation that none of them should be resold within the United States; the Treasurer to take this $1oo,ooo,ooo of gold and issue $1oo,ooo,ooo of gold certificates against it, and deposit them in the different national banks of the United States pro rata to their capital and circulation, upon adequate security being given to the Government securing such deposits; such deposits to be preferred liens upon all assets of each bank, etc.
"It should also direct the Treasurer to sell $1oo,-ooo,ooo of such bonds immediately in Europe under similar conditions, the money to be placed in the United States Treasury or left on deposit in London, Paris, and Berlin, for use by the Government in paying deficiencies between the Government's receipts and expenditures, and drawn as needed.
"The remaining $1oo,ooo,ooo should be held subject to sale whenever the necessities of the Government or the financial interests of the country demand it.
"Bringing $2oo,ooo,ooo of gold to this country, in addition to the balance of trade in our favor, would immediately establish confidence in out financial strength.
"3.Pass a resolution calling an international conference to establish an international agreement as to the use of silver as currency, to be held within twenty days after the passage of such resolution. Twenty days' notice by cable is amply sufficient to allow time for every government to appoint men who understand the
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subject thoroughly, and have them meet at some convenient place.
"The delegates representing the United States should be selected by Congress and named in the resolution, two of them to be Senators from the silver States and two of them equally representative of the other side of the question.
"4.Pass the act increasing national bank circulation to par of deposited bonds.
"The above legislation would immediately inspire confidence here and abroad in American finances and start n the wheels of business, now helplessly clogged.
"For the future the following action should be taken:
"5. Pass a resolution appointing a committee, to consist of five New York bankers of the highest standing and one each from Boston, Philadelphia, Chicago, St. Louis, Cincinnati, Nashville, Atlanta, Savannah, New Orleans, Galveston, San Francisco, Denver, St. Paul, Detroit, Buffalo, and Pittsburg, the committee to immediately meet, consider, and report to an adjourned session of Congress a bill incorporating a United States national bank, founded on the same lines as the national bank of England and the national bank of Prance, to be entirely divorced and free from politics; and it being expressly stipulated that one half of the committee shall be selected from Republican banters and one half from Democratic bankers.
"A national bank is absolutely necessary for the future financial safety of the country. Under present conditions there is no elasticity to our currency.
"Five per cent. of our financial business is done with cash, 95 per cent. with credit.
"To-day credit is largely destroyed, which leaves us trying to do more than one half of the business of the country on the insignificant per cent. cash, and a considerable proportion of this cash hoarded and taken. out of circulation.
"To meet emergencies lite this, we should have a
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national bank, having power to make almost an unlimited issue of currency with the same power and self-interest, whcn confidence returns, to take and return all this specially-issued currency and retire it.
"The bank of England and the bank of France have power to issue - millions upon millions of additional currency whenever necessary to protect and conduct the finances ofthe country, and they exercise this power, arid therefore such extreme panics as ours are unknown in those countries.When the crisis is over, this extra currency is retired.
"There is no question as to the safety of this power; it has been exercised by these great banks in these two countries for generations, and has been their financial salvation, and we can have no permanent financial. safety in the United States until we create a similar national bank or else make the United States Treasury a bank and authorize and direct that in times of panic and destruction of credit the Government shall issue currency to an extent necessary to meet the emergency, and deposit it in the national banks of the country. Of the two measures, it is certainly preferable to have a great national bank, founded on almost exactly the lines of the Bank of England, thus taking financial question andmanagement entirely out of the influence of politics, because the government of the First National Bank of England is entirely in the hands of the greatest business men of the country, who have no interest whatever in politics, except as citizens.
Yours truly,
Wm. R. Conway."
This document was placed in the hands of members of Congress with a view of influencingtheir action. The first demand, couched in this circular,requested Congress to repeal the purchase clause of the Sherman law. The second demanded the passage of a bill authorizing the issue of $3oo,ooo,ooo of United States bonds, payable in gold, and $1oo,ooo,ooo of gold thus received,
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and for which interest was to be paid by the nation, should be given to the different national banks as a loanable fund.
The third demands the repetition of that farce - the calling of an international monetary conference. The fourth - the passage of an act permitting national banks to increase their circulation up to the par value of the bonds deposited by these.
Fifth, The passage of a resolution authorizing a committee of banters to frame a bill incorporating a national bank, operating on the same principles as the Bank of England. This proposed bank to be endowed with the power of making an unlimited issue of currency, the volume of which could be contracted whenever the self-interest of the banks saw fit to curtail this volume of money.
Thus the Tory-Eastern system of finance was outlined by the money power. The historical incident of Didius Julianus bidding-in the Roman Empire, that he might absorb its entire revenues for his personal benefit, was not a circumstance compared to the monumental greed of the national banking money power.
Subsequent history has fully demonstrated that several of the demands set forth in this circular have found their way upon the statute-books of this nation, and that the remaining are gradually taking the form of proposed legislation.
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