Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 3.djvu/492

466 only experience can determine. But it seems inevitable that, as soon as that quantity is exceeded by the silver dollars put into circulation, silver dollars will be quoted at a discount as to gold, or, in other words, gold will bear a premium as to silver, and we shall have the old uncertainty, and the gambling speculations of the gold-room in Wall street once more. And what will follow? As more and more silver money is put into circulation, the old universal law, that the inferior currency drives out the superior one, will operate again; gold will leave the country and silver coin will remain our only metallic currency. We shall then have reached the condition in which the Chinese have been for a considerable time. And our Democratic friends in Ohio seem [to be in] a particular hurry to reach that condition, for they loudly demand that the coinage of silver, which is now limited to $4,000,000 per month, shall be relieved of all restrictions. But I can not permit myself to doubt that, when with the actual resumption of specie payments, a better order of things and a revival of prosperity dawns upon us, the American people will be disposed to approach this question also with a more dispassionate and clearer judgment.

The third thing which I pointed out as necessary to lay the foundation for sound business and prosperity is a well-regulated and safe banking system, as a depository of business funds and a machinery for business exchanges. How supremely important a part of our economic organism banks have become I need not explain. Every practical business man, as well as every student of the subject, knows it. The American people, even of this generation, have in this respect, gone through a lively variety of experience, from the wildcat State banks, which existed before the war, to the National banking system of to-day.

What qualities must a bank possess so that you may