2. The change in relations between gold and silver, which has produced so much financial and political demoralization in the last quarter of the 19th century, was the subject of three international conferences within that time— at Paris, August 1878 and April 1881, and at Brus sels, November 1892. The last named was called by President Harrison for both business and political reasons. The accumulation of silver under the Sherman Act of 1890 was threatening the country with a fall to the sin gle silver standard and was only averted by the bond sales of 1893 and the repeal of the act ; and the free-coinage movement which con vulsed the country in 1896 was making head way, had been approved by the platform on which Harrison was elected and demanded some recognition. Abroad, the recent adoption of the gold standard by state after state was raising gold to a premium and arousing the fear that it was too scarce to be the sole money of ulti mate payment; the fall in silver was causing much loss and dislocation of trade, and many believed that its demonetization was the sole cause of this and of the low price of commod ities (which they called the high price of gold), and that its restoration by common agreement would raise its price again and restore equilib rium of commerce. The call was accepted by all the European states and Mexico, with the United States, 20 in number; and all the 50 delegates were present, but those of Germany, Austria and Russia were forbidden to debate or vote. The president was Montefiore Levi, of Belgium; its vice-president, Edwin H. Terrell, United States Minister to Belgium. The United States delegation drew up the order of business, and offered a resolution that 'lit is desirable that some means should be found for increasing the use of silver in the currency systems of the nations," and, while stating their own belief in general bimetallism, sug gested two plans short of this, to which Mr.
Alfred Rothschild, of the British delegation, added a third. The resolution was favored by most of the delegations, who indeed would not otherwise have been sent there; but was too gen eral to be of any service, and was laid on the table and not taken up. A special committee reported on the three schemes before it: (1) That of A. Soetbeer, too involved for interna tional agreement; (2) Rothschild's, as altered in committee, essentially, that all Europe should buy 30,000,000 ounces of silver yearly, the United States to keep on buying 54,000,000; that unlimited free coinage should be estab lished in British India and Mexico ; the agree ment should run for five years unless silver rose to an agreed price before that; (3) Moritz Levy's, laid before the conference of 1.Ni, to withdraw from circulation all gold coin and notes under 20 francs. The British delegation refused to support this unless joined with something like the Rothschild plan of maintain ing the gold price of silver; the Latin Union members would not have this amendment be cause it involved fresh purchases of silver; nor the United States, because of its unfairness; and Rothschild withdrew his plan. There upon the conference began discussing bimetal lism till they adjourned, 15 December, for the holidays, to reconvene the following May if the governments thought it advisable; but the elec tion of President Cleveland meantime had taken the subjects out of the immediate political field as an ad junct, and the conference did not meet again. See INTERNATIONAL LAW ; UNITED STATES, DIPLOMACY OF THE