cepted and most delicate instrument, by means of which all contracts and agreements are settled, and all property transferred by purchase and sale.
(2.) Ideal money.—The advocates of ideal, or “fiat,” money claim that money is not a thing, but the mere attribute of a thing; that money is a function, a medium of exchange—that is, a mere something intermediate, that passes, not for its own sake, but for what it will bring, and is thus a means, not an end; that anything that possesses exchangeable value is money. Any- thing that will fully satisfy and pay a debt, pur- chase property, or procure services, is money. If a mere piece of paper—a bank-note—will do it, that is money; for the most important function of money is that it shall be received and accepted without qualification and in full satisfaction of debts. It will not do to say that a bank-note is a mere credit, redeemable in coin. It may be a credit as between the holder and the bank, but as between the holder and his debtor—the payer and payee—a bank-note is just as potent and effectual as money, as gold and silver coins. If the payer makes his indi- vidual promissory note to the payee, that does not constitute payment, for all debts must be paid in money; but, if he pays his debt in bank- bills, which are in reality the promissory notes of the bank, but receivable as money, the debt is fully satisfied and discharged. In other words, the payer takes up his own promissory note, which does not pay his debt, and gives in return the promissory notes of a bank, which does pay his debt. Thus, it will be observed, the bank- note has every requisite, and possesses every function, of money. Nothing more could be desired from anything than that it shall fully pay, satisfy, and discharge debts. Hence, it is argued by the idealists, that, if a mere bank- note can be made to perform all the functions of money, why should not a government note, secured by and “redeemable” in “all the prop- erty, wealth, and resources of the nation,” be even better money? It is very forcibly argued, also, that the barter theory of money has one fatal objection, to wit: that when the commod- ity of which it is composed becomes scarce from any cause, the entire commerce and industry of the world become crippled, and thus money becomes the master, instead of the servant, of industry. There can be no doubt that it is just as essential that the commodity selected as money shall not be too scarce, as that it shall not be too plentiful. The evil in the one case is as great as in the other. And it is also true that the ratio between the value of money and other commodities should be approximately maintained. If other commodities have in- creased in value beyond all comparison with gold and silver, it would seem to be quite as important to abandon these metals, as it was to successively abandon skins, cattle, and slaves, for the history of money proves that money has always consisted of some common and easily obtained commodity.
Thus, on one hand, we have a theory; on the other hand, a fact. It has been happily re- marked that “abstract ideas are of no use in going to market.” The butcher and the baker are both hard-fisted and hard-headed fellows, who have no taste for philosophy. They want money, not theories. They have no time to dis- cuss political economy, and much less dispo- sition to experiment on the functions of money. And yet they would not hesitate to accept even “fiat” money, if they saw their neighbor taking it. From this fact we may infer (even at this stage of the discussion) that Professor Francis A. Walker is right in his “handsome” parody, “Money is that money does.”
H. N. CLEMENT.
WHY THEY LYNCHED HIM.
Peterson’s luck was, without doubt, the most contemptible luck that ever handicapped a hu- man being in the race of life. An offspring of misfortune, he seemed to have been grappled by Fate, and, in a breast-to-breast struggle with his relentless antagonist, had a “fall” scored against him in every contest. In the language of Mart Keyes, Montezuma’s most successful short-card speculator, “it was safe to copper your stake against Roger Peterson’s bets on every card; for, if you didn’t win, you’d compel the bank to split your pile of checks;” which, being rendered into plain English, meant that whatever venture this man undertook another man might profit by, provided he pursued a course of action diametrically opposed to that of Peterson.
He came to California with the first tide of immigration, and during the most prosperous periods of the early days, by dint of the hardest
