Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly volume 14.djvu/181

 ". . . It is useless, therefore, to attempt a remedy now for the defects of our banking and currency system. We shall be compelled to blunder along with the system as it is, and ^to accept the consequences of such financial collapses as it will, at intervals, necessarily produce. Sometime we may become wise enough to have a great central bank, with branches all over the country, like the Bank of France, whose strength was so great that even the Commune of Paris, in the ascendant in 1871, dared not touch it.""

Greenbackism waned in strength after 1880, for then a new fiat doctrine was spreading—free coinage of silver at ratio of 16 to 1—which largely supplanted the idea of fiat paper. The same arguments, in the main, were used against the silver heresy as earlier against the paper delusion; with the important difference that silver coins possessed bullion value whereas paper currency had no intrinsic value whatever. Free coinage of silver could not be redeemable in gold money nor could unlimited issue of paper currency. Both would make inflation, and debasement of silver would make depreciation of paper worse, because then the remote expectation of redemption in gold would be gone. Silver coins would fall to their bullion value of between 76 and 46 cents (1891–1901); paper currency would fall to whatever level credit confidence would give it (in 1864, 39 cents gold). Following the popular project of paying the national debt in greenbacks, came the scheme to pay it in debased silver dollars. Mr. Scott fought these later phases of fiat money as he did the earlier. When frequently asked late in life how he placed himself right on subtle questions of finance, even in their hazy beginnings, and kept consistent course through years of polemics, he was wont to answer: "By study of history I learned fundamental principles. By adhering to the principles of universal human experience, I pursued the right and logical course; I could not go wrong."

For versatility and force, the Oregon editor's treatment of free silver is one of the most notable feats in journalism. It