Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 5.djvu/337

Rh although ever so solvent, under ordinary circumstances, will break, because they cannot pay what they owe, being unable to collect what is due them.

Every bank, while being a creditor to its borrowers, is a debtor to its depositors. I say this with great deference to Mr. Bryan, for he has made a profound discovery in economic science. He says in his New York speech: “It is sometimes asserted by our opponents that a bank belongs to the debtor class, but this is not true of any solvent bank. Every statement published by a solvent bank shows that the assets exceed the liabilities.” According to Mr. Bryan, then, one must be a bankrupt in order to be a debtor. We always thought that he is a debtor who owes, whether he can pay or not, and that he is a bankrupt who owes more than he has the means to pay. But the new Bryanese doctrine changes all this. The man who owes, but can pay his debts, is not a debtor, and therefore owes nothing. This will be welcome news to many of his supporters.

But although Mr. Bryan is anxious to exclude the banks from his favorite class of debtors, he is not without solicitude for their welfare. He is evidently haunted by the singular idea that the gold dollar will indefinitely go on appreciating, and that prices will indefinitely go on falling, and that we shall never touch bottom. He reasons that if the gold standard be maintained and prices continue falling, “the bank is apt to lose more of bad debts than it can gain by the increase of the purchasing power of its capital and surplus.” And to avert this trouble, which the bankers themselves almost unanimously refuse to see, Mr. Bryan proposes to make short work of them by a policy which will result in the establishment of the silver standard and make all the debts due to the banks payable in 50-cent dollars.

If he had the slightest conception of the nature of the