It is barely possible that the financial fallacies of the populists and other vagaries may temporarily secure a majority of the voters of the United States. Should such a catastrophe overtake the country, the people must learn by experience what they should have learned by diligent study and reason. I have no hesitation in declaring myself utterly opposed to all free coinage fallacies, all the 16 to 1 lunacies, and all of the cheap money illusions and delusions which populists and other vagarists advocate. My judgment is that silver cannot be restored to its monetary place in the commerce of the world, because the supply of silver has outgrown the demand for silver in the exchanges of civilization. The relation of supply to demand is the sole regulator of value. This maxim applies alike to salt, silver, sugar, and soap. All the legislation of all the law-making bodies on the face of the globe can neither mitigate nor annul the operation of the inexorable law that "the relation of supply to demand is the sole regulator of value." The President's critics ask, What is sound money? Any ordinary man of business may answer that question. Sound money is that sort of currency which has the most universal and least fluctuating purchasing power in the markets of all countries. That money is the soundest for which, throughout the commerce of the civilized world, there is the most universal demand. And that universal demand is always based upon the universal and unfluctuating purchasing power of that money. The present epidemic of the silver fever will in due time abate. As the temperature of the 16 to 1 patients declines, mental aberrations will disappear and reason once more resume its sway. GOVERNOR SAMUEL W. BLACK. May 2, 1859 to Feb. 24, 1861. The appointment of Samuel W. Black,' as associate justice of the territory of Nebraska, in 1857, was the date of his introduction to the "Far West." Born in the city of Pittsburg, Pa., in 1818, then on the confines of western civilization, and educated under the severe moral constraints of covenanter influence, he reached man's estate better furnished for the battle of life than a majority of American youths. At twenty-two years of age thousands were charmed by his brilliant oratorical efforts in that incomprehensible campaign of 1840, when speech and song, hurled in passion, drove democracy from the White House and enthroned "Tippecanoe and Tyler too." Sanguine friends were predicting for him the garlands of success at the bar, when the Mexican war gave an outlet for youthful valor, and a colonelcy commission filled the demands of an enthusiast's ambition. When introduced to Judge Hall, of Nebraska, a Mexican remembrance incited his wit, when he exclaimed, "Judge Hall, are you related to "The Halls of the Montezumas?" and received the retort, "Governor Black, are you a relative of the Blacks of South Carolina?" After the resignation of Governor Richardson in the fall of 1858, the Hon. J. Sterling Morton, territorial secretary, became acting governor until the arrival of Governor Samuel Black on the 2nd of May, 1859. On the 6th day of December, 1859, Governor Black delivered his first official message to the legislature. Being a man of scholarly attainments and well posted in political history, he devoted half of the space of a long message to dispel the cloud cast over the Territory by the ignorance and hasty decisions. of early explorers, as to its being a desert region, and further, to establish its right to speedy admission as a state. Biography of Gov. Black, Nebr. Stat. Hist. Soc. Pub., 1st series, I., 94, 95. But inasmuch as practical agriculture has completely dissipated the illusion, and the question of an admission to the Union been a fixed fact for twenty-four years, both theories may be passed over in silence. At the threshold of discussion we meet the following: Nebraska has heretofore suffered from inconsiderate and nasty legislation, as well as from sudden and untimely repeal of a large portion of her laws. We have, however, just cause of congratulation that the code, both civil and criminal, adopted by the legislature of last year, is in full force and successful operation. The recommendations relative to lands bearing the greater share of taxation, homestead exemption from sale for debt, prudent usury laws, the intelligent limitation of official fees, the enactment of laws to protect debtors and secure creditors in the sale of real estate under execution, were worthy of a sound lawyer and impartial judge. The brief allusion to the mistakes and calamities of the past was pungent and graphic: It is a matter of bitter experience that the people of this Territory have been made to pass through the delusive days of high times and paper prices, and the consequent dark and gloomy night of low times and no prices. By far the most notable message ever delivered, up to that date, in Nebraska closed, pure in morals and beautiful in style: We may here turn to our past history as a territory, and find material for pleasant meditation. Individual faults and occasional infractions of the law are of course upon the record, but not a single page is darkened by the registry of a single outbreak among the people. Our growth in population and prosperity has been equal to the most sanguine expectation. Of agricultural supplies we already produce far more than we consume, and we may reasonably hope that but a few years will roll around before Nebraska will be as well known in the markets of the world as the oldest and largest grain growing states in the Republic. A railroad to the Pacific Ocean is no longer a problem without a solution, and its construction and completion are but a question of time. These prairies will all be peopled from the great rivers to the mountains. The farm house and the school house will decorate the plains, and temples reared to the living God will resound with praise from living and grateful hearts. This is the mighty and • majestic future to which we look almost with the assurance of divine faith. Our fathers saw this and were glad. And when this "goodly frame," without a parallel, this Union, was first conceived, they trusted in Jehovah and were not disappointed. They knew as we know that there is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow, and in the rise and fall of nations. That their fate, who have fallen, may not be ours, and that our country may continue to rise and increase in just power, in excellence and in virtue, should be and will be, in all parts of it and in all times to come, as in the times past, the invocation and prayer of the patriot. On the occasion of vetoing an act of incorporation, the governor said: "It is time that the spirit of incorporation should be subdued and checked. All special privileges and chartered rights conferred on a few, are so much taken away from the general privileges and unchartered rights of the many." As illustrative of the bungling way in which laws had been enacted, a committee reported: "That there was no law in existence in 1858 which authorized the levy and collection of territorial tax. The legislature of 1857, in attempting to adopt a revenue law, only adopted the enactment clause." As only four counties paid anything into the treasury in 1858, said amounts were recommended to be returned. There seeming to be no doubt that there were six slaves in Nebraska and had been formerly as many as thirteen, a bill was introduced and passed for the abolition of slavery in the territory, which was vetoed on the ground that slavery existed in the Louisiana purchase when we acquired it by the treaty, and could not be disposed of until the adoption of a state constitution. On the 4th day of December, 1860, the governor delivered his second and final annual message to the legislature, and proceeded at once to the vital questions in which the people were specially interested. Referring to the previous session, he said: I urged then, as I urge now, the necessity of the law against usurious rates of interest. Better have no money than buy it with the life blood of the needy and hard In response to this utterance the rate of interest was placed at 10 per cent in case there was no agreement for another rate not exceeding 15 per cent. Of salaries he said: It is perfectly well known that the income of several of the officers in the Territory is far greater than it should be, and that the territorial debt would be an easy burden if it were not for the issue of the warrants to satisfy the claims of public officers, whose fees in many cases are four times as much as their services are worth. To remedy this evil, a most searching and comprehensive law was passed covering the whole range of fees and salaries. The territorial debt was stated at $52,960, with collectible resources amounting to $30,259. Contemplating the manner in which the public debt had increased from a small amount in five years to $50,000 his indignant language was: Let the days of extravagance and enormous fees be numbered and cut short, and let a system of rigid and severe economy, suited to the times and our condition, be introduced and adopted, and that without delay. His plea for an indirect bounty by which the growth of timber on the treeless prairies might be encouraged was promptly met by the passage of an act allowing a reduction of $50 on the valuation of real estate for every acre of cultivated fruit, forest or ornamental trees. On the supposition that "the relation of a Territory to the general government is peculiar, and one in many respects of entire dependence," he urged that Congress be called upon for aid for bridges and roads on the lines of western travel, and for emigrant hospitals, and an arsenal of repairs and supplies. No important interest of the home-seeker seemed to escape his attention. His confidence in the future of the Territory was reiterated: A soil so rich and prolific, a climate for the most part of the year so pleasant, and at all seasons so full of health, was not meant for a waste place nor a wilderness. God has |