Dollar

“ The very sight of a dollar now whenever I see one once more, fills me with deep, hopeful working joy, thinking of what a bargain it is and how I can use it twice over, thinking of the dollar's worth of news, to say nothing of the dollar's worth of things that belong with a dollar! ”

“ I am one of those that believe that these men from your shops, these farmers remote from money centres, have the largest interest of all people in the world in having a dollar that is worth one hundred cents every day in the year, and only such. If by any chance we should fall into a condition where one dollar is not so good as another I venture the assertion that that poorer dollar will do its first errand in paying some poor laborer for his work. ”

“ This is a dollar—a unit of money—part of the great instrumentality created by society to effect the multitudinous exchanges of property and services among men. The amount of its command is constant, because the increase in the volume of money is regulated by the sovereign authority of the nation, with strict regard to the increase of population and demand—hence the value of this unit remains unchanging through time. ”

“ By the latter the currency is enlarged at the expense of the people,—being at once a tax and a derangement of values. You pamper the morbid appetite for paper money, and play the discarded part of John Law. You blow up a bladder, without thinking that it is nothing but a bladder, ready to burst. As the volume of currency is increased, the purchasing power of each dollar is reduced in proportion. As you add to the currency, you take from the dollar. You do little more than mark your goods at [Pg 293] higher prices, and imagine that they have increased in value. ”

“ In contrast to their disdain for this foreign currency the boys cherish to a degree that is half funny, half pathetic, any specimens of “real money” that they are lucky enough to possess.
“Say, I had an American dollar bill in my hand the other day,—I felt just as if the old flag was waving over me!” And another lad; “Saw a U. S. Dollar bill today. Oh boy! but it looked a mile long to me!”
If anyone displays an American greenback at the counter a little riot is sure to ensue. All the boys nearby crowd about, feast their eyes on it, touch it, pat it, kiss it even. ”

“ A dollar picked up in the road is more satisfaction to you than the ninety-and-nine which you had to work for, and money won at faro or in stocks snuggles into your heart in the same way. ”

“ Two commodities like gold and silver make a better standard than one and many make a better standard than two. The dollar standard should be worth a specified bill of goods such as one board foot of lumber, fifteen pounds of coal, half a pound of sugar, half an ounce of butter, a quarter of an ounce of leather, a quarter of a pound of steel, etc. Such an aggregate of goods, selected on the basis of their relative importance in trade, may be called a goods-dollar or a market-basket dollar. ”

“ Wall Street had been doing business with pieces of paper; and now someone asked for a dollar, and it was discovered that the dollar had been mislaid. ”

“ At certain times there are greater and less demands for money, which, under our present practices, make a dollar, to-day, worth four per cent. per annum interest, and to-morrow increase it to ten per cent. It must be remembered that we are now speaking of an irredeemable currency, the representative of the wealth of the nation: that the government representing the nation has uttered it, in behalf of the people, upon the soundest and, in reality, the only sure basis of value any money can have—the productive power and capacity of the nation. ”

“ We have not learned as we should the value of a dollar. I remember one time while I was spending a week with a friend, one morning at the breakfast table his father said to him: "My son, you have been to college and studied Greek, but you have not learned the value of a dollar. I am going to give you a dollar, don't spend it, take it out and look at it every day. Study the possibilities of this dollar. There are horses, farms, factories and railroad stock in this dollar, all that tends to wealth, study the value of it." ”

“ Money is but another name for values, and the dollar is one of the divisions of its measures. There is no more reason why money should fluctuate in its capacity of measuring or of being measured than there is that the foot should grow longer or shorter, or the pound greater or less, and there is just the same reason why it should not. ”

“ Don't you think it's time you got Nature to work for you? A dollar put into a peach orchard will work for you days, nights and Sundays. It never stops to sleep or eat but keeps on growing—growing— from the very minute you put your money in.
Think of the difference between a dollar invested with us and increasing and yielding day by day and the dollar which you use to purchase a few moments idle diversion or pleasure. ”

“ What is needed is to stabilize or standardize the dollar just as we have already standardized the yardstick, the pound weight, the bushel basket, the pint cup, the horsepower, the volt, and, indeed, all the units of commerce except the dollar. ”

“ Practically and commercially speaking, a dollar is not necessarily a specific thing, made of silver, or gold, or any other single metal, or substance. It is only such a quantum of market value as exists in a given piece of silver or gold. ”

“ Under such conditions all parts of the circulating medium tend to expand or contract in unison and a change in weight of the basic gold dollar carries with it a control of the whole mechanism of exchange, cash, and credit. ”

“ One or two things I will say, and first, I believe that every person who thoughtfully considers the question will agree with me upon a proposition which is at the base of all my consideration of the currency question, namely, that any dollar, paper or coin, that is issued by the United States must be made and kept in its commercial uses as good as any other dollar. ”

“ A fairly nimble dollar had to be set down so many times in so many places, as it went from hand to hand, that we calculate in about five years it must have cost itself in ink, paper, pens, and clerk hire, let alone fret and worry. ”

“ The cautious and conservative reader will ask: if the evils of our present dollar are so great and the remedy so simple, why did not our civilization improve its monetary units years ago, as it improved all other units? ”

“ I define money to be a commodity or representative of a commodity, accepted by or forced upon the common consent, as an invariable ratio and medium of exchange. Now, since the price of all things else is variable and subject to extreme fluctuations, the dollar in exchange, and especially where the exchange is suspended as in borrowing, or buying on credit, becomes, as friend Pink suggests, a "war club" rather than a tool or instrument of commerce. ”

“ If we were to double the weight of the unit or dollar by putting forty-six and four-tenths grains in it, we would thus reduce the value of all the property in the world, as expressed in dollars, except debts, as they call for so many dollars. ”

“ So with the price level, while the strong-arm method is not only costly and vexatious but futile, the simple regulation of our instrument for measuring prices, the dollar, will accomplish the same result not only without cost and effort but, what is more to the point, with success. ”

“ You and I know that the dollar is what is running things in this country to-day, and if you come along with an ideal proposition—a proposition that carries with it a change in our laws or a proposition to have some new laws passed—you might as well say good-by to it, because the fellow whose hundred millions you want to take away is going to say: 'How many dollars does it need to turn that upside down?' and he is going to supply the dollars. ”

“ It will be clear to any one who follows the reasoning and explanations in this book, [3] that the only money theory assumed is that common to all theories, and accepted universally; namely, that a large quantity of gold will buy more goods than a small quantity—a pound, than an ounce, for instance—and that an increase of the gold in a dollar will, somehow, increase the dollar's purchasing power. ”

“ Even if our shifting dollar were guiltless of most of the offenses charged, even if the high cost of living had no relation to the dollar, there would still be excellent reasons for standardizing it—on the same general principle on which we have standardized all other units. ”

“ My own opinion is, that either the dollar must be absolutely defined—it must be the world over so many grains of pure gold, or so many grains of pure silver—or we must have other denominations for our money, as for instance, ounces, or parts of ounces, and the time will come, in my judgment, when there will be a money of the world, the same everywhere; because each coin will contain upon its face the certificate of a government that it contains such a weight—so many grains or so many ounces—of a certain metal. ”

“ Moreover, the fact that money is "fungible," and that its use is to be found in a process which commonly returns to the owner, not the same coin, but a different coin, we may, in general, abstract from the wear and tear of the dollar, and look upon the dollar as a capital instrument which promises its owner, if he chooses to use it as capital, a perpetual annuity. ”

“ If we determine that a Dollar shall be our Unit, we must then say with precision what a Dollar is. This coin, struck at different times, of different weights and fineness, is of different values. Sir Isaac Newton's assay and representation to the Lords of the Treasury, in 1717, of those which he examined, make their values as follows:
The Financier states the old Dollar as containing 376 grains of fine silver, and the new 365 grains. ”

“ In trade they reckon ten cents the eighth of a dollar. If you purchase nominally a dollar's worth of an article, you can pay for it in eight ten-cent pieces; and if you give a dollar, you receive no change. ”

“ A gold dollar has intrinsic value, and is worth, 340actually, just as much in England or France as it is here; and yet you attempt, when there, to pay your grocer or milliner with an American gold dollar, and they refuse to take it; so you have to take it to a broker, and suffer him to pocket a certain amount from you just for giving you another piece of gold or silver of the same value! ”

“ So far we have treated only of Coin-Money in its two forms, substantive and subsidiary. The latter may now be dismissed as of little consequence in itself, and as already elucidated fully: the latter is the only Money that stands in its own right as a commodity, and the only Money that can give birth to the Denominations of Value, such as sovereigns, dollars, marks, and francs. What is a Dollar? A dollar is 254⁄5 grains of a metal compound coined, of which nine parts are pure gold and one part a hardening alloy. ”

“ Instead of great price convulsions, such as we find throughout history, the index number would run close to par, say, 101, 1001⁄2, 101, 100, 102, 1011⁄2, 100, 98, 99, 99, 991⁄2, 100, etc., seldom getting off the line more than one or two per cent.
The process of correcting the dollar has just been likened to steering an automobile. ”

“ We do, indeed, sometimes hear of the exorbitant wages which some persons obtain, but we must remember, in most cases, these wages are great, in consequence of the currency of the district, for there are, I understand, some parts of the United States in which the dollar passes for more than its coined value; but then, if a labourer is paid at a very high nominal rate, there is reason to believe that articles of provision, and other necessaries, must be selling at high prices also. ”

“ This the proposed currency will be by right of use,—a right inherent in a national currency, and respected as long as the government respects itself, that is, as long as the people govern wisely.
A dollar, value-currency, will always buy a dollar's worth of gold, but it may not always buy the quantity of gold contained in the gold dollar. ”

“ The first and most obvious method of attaining the object is to issue a paper currency which shall be redeemable, not in gold dollars of fixed weight, but in such quantities of gold and silver bullion as shall suffice to make the required purchases. ”

“ The value of a dollar is social, as it is created by society. ”

“ With much more rea­son Americans might have suspected that in Amer­ica Englishmen found everywhere a silent influence, which they found nowhere in Europe, and which had nothing to do with avarice or with the dollar, but, on the contrary, seemed likely at any moment to sacri­fice the dollar in a cause and for an object so illusory that most Englishmen could not endure to hear it discussed. ”

“ Every man of them refused to take dollars. They say that no more than five shillings’ worth of commodities, even at the present prices, is to be had for a dollar, notwithstanding the government order that it shall pass at five and sixpence. ”

“ And so, as long as the index number persists in staying even a little above par, the dollar will continue to be loaded at each adjustment period, until, if necessary, it weighs an ounce—or a ton, for that matter. ”

“ A penny here, and a dollar there, placed at interest, goes on accumulating, and in this way the desired result is attained. It requires some training, perhaps, to accomplish this economy, but when once used to it, you will find there is more satisfaction in rational saving, than in irrational spending. ”

“ Your Dollar is your only Word, The wrath of it your only fear. "You build it altars tall enough To make you see, but you are blind; You cannot leave it long enough To look before you or behind. ”

“ For the benefit of those readers who are not familiar with the American coinage, it is only necessary to say that a dollar is a hundred cents and a dime ten cents. A puzzle of this kind should rarely cause any difficulty if attacked in a proper manner. ”