We have endeavored to state the case between the two parties as one of pure theory. In so doing we fail to give any adequate idea of the heat of the controversy and the passions which it has aroused. To understand properly the ardor of the struggle, a brief reference to the historical setting of the discussion is perhaps de sirable. The great bulk of the theoretical and controversial literature upon the subject ap peared in the period between 1573 and 1898. This was a period of steadily falling prices—a period, upon the whole, of commercial depression. Trade languished, and the burden of debt grew heavier. The gold product was growing less each year, yet the general adoption of the gold standard with increased population, and an ex tension of the use of a money economy made a constantly increasing pressure upon the gold supply. Bimetallism scented to promise a relief from the deadening effects of falling prices, and the industrial world lent a ready ear to its plans. It was not so much a conviction that bimetallism was right as a deep-seated feeling that the gold standard was wrong which gave such wide ac ceptance to its propositions. For the moment the pressure of immediate necessity has been re moved. The new output of gold in the world, which brings the annual production higher than in the palmiest days of California and Australia, has induced a r6gime of rising prices which has of which men complained without any radical monetary legislation such as bi metallism contemplated.
The literature of bitnetallkm is extensive, and no statement of references can be complete. An exhaustive bibliography on the money question was issued in 1878 as an appendix to the A to cri ran Report of the International Monetary Con ference. (Consult Horton, The Monetary Situa tion, Cincinnati, HITS.) Since that time the out
put has been enormous. The bimetallic theory claims the authority of Wolowski and Cernuschi in Frame; Malou and de Laveleye in Belgium; Idees, Vrolik, Van den Berg, and Boissevain in llolland; Seyd, Nicholson, and Foxwell in Eng land; Arendt in Germany; Haupt in Austria; Horton, F. A. Walker, and Andrews in the United States. On the side of the single stand ard are many of the older English economists— Locke, Petty, Harris; later Lord Liverpool, Tooke, Ricardo, and J. S. Mill, and, more re cently, Giffen—and among American writers, Wells and Laughlin. For a clear notion of the controversy, consult: Walker, International Bi metallism (New York, 1896) ; and Giffen, Case Bimetallism (London. 1896 ) . Other works to be commended arc: Nicholson, Money and Monetary Problems (London, 1897) ; Hor ton, The ,Silrer Pound (London, ISS7) ; Walker, Money (New York, 1S7S ) and Money, Trade and Industry (New York, 1879) ; Andrews, An Honest Dollar (Hartford, 1894) ; Report of the Monetary Commission of the Indianapolis Con vention (Chicago, 1S98) ; Helm, The Joint Standard (London, 1894) ; Taussig, The Silrer Situation in the United States (New York, I S93 ) ; White, Money and Banking ( Boston, 1896) ; Laughlin, History of Bimetallism in the United States (New York, 1897) : and Price, Money and Its Relations to Prices (London and New York, 1896).
In official literature, the Report of the United States Monetary Commission (IS%) ; the Re ports of the Monetary Conferences (1878, 1881, and 1S92) ; the Reports of the Royal Commis sion on the Depression of Trade (18S3) and on the Relation of gold and Silver (1886) ; the Report of the Indian. Currency Commission (1893) ; and of the Berlin Silver Commission (1894) are important.