Imperium Offtopicum: The Peshawar Lancers

San Francisco Leveled by God!

The Pearl of California was struck by a awful quake earlier this week, which has destroyed most of the buildings and the city’s populace mostly homeless and destitute.

Early in the morning on April 18th, a massive rumbling took hold of the city and did not cease until most of the city was collapsed on itself. A massive inferno then took hold, ravaging the remainder and hampering rescue efforts.

City officials are downplaying casualties, but Mormon aid workers in the area have reported there must be thousands of deaths. Federal officials are blaming the horrifying outcome on the city’s decline and lack of property upkeep and inspections while under self-rule after the Fall. There is even talk by many of abandoning the city and moving elsewhere.

Religious volunteers have rushed to the city to provide aid and baptize the dead. The rest of us can only pray for the souls of the dead and the rising fortune of the living.

We close with the note that surely there is no coincidence that San Francisco the largest city left in America with such a tiny population of Mormons, nor that the greatest numbers of casualties were among papist Mexicans and heathen Chinese. Those who remain not enveloped in the Church should take note.

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Panic Spreads as another Bank folds!

Panic is spreading even more quickly as another bank folds under a run by depositors.

The Texas Commerce Bank, which had invested heavily in stock involving the Trans-Rockies trade between Texas and California, admitted two days ago that it had lost an enormous quantity of money due to the collapse of the Californian economy in the wake of the San Francisco earthquake.

This terrible news from the largest bank in Texas has spurred an enormous run on the bank. Faith in the banks is at an all time low. Recovery is no-where in sight. Credit was already tight, and now with the inevitable collapse of the banking system, it will all but disappear.

The young stock market in Salt Lake City has fallen into yet another slump at the news. The market keeps unstable…no sooner are there signs of new life in evidence than something like another collapsing bank or setback in California send a tremble all through the economy, and any gain in values and hope is gone.

With most of the banking institutions of the territories being young and unequipped to handle such a crisis, who can tell when we shall see relief? While perhaps the elders among us were not sad to see the bankers and financiers of the glamorous East die in the Fall, such expertise in matters financial and economic are sorely lacking here in the West.

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Chaos in the streets of Salt Lake as another bank fails​

Free Silver Remedy Passes the Congress

The Territorial government has finally passed the Bimetallism and Fiscal Stability Act, which is aimed at bringing the country out of the economic doldrums it has suffered since early 1907.

It is clear that the economy’s failures have been due to the unavailability of money. When the government re-established a national currency, naturally it returned to the gold standard; such was the insistence of northeastern refugees such as Premier Roosevelt at the time.

However, attempts to rebuild a financial machine to match the old Eastern system have failed. Is there little wonder why? Such a standard might be suited to robber-barons and industrial kings, but our country lacks such demons. The gold standard only served the aim of a few to emulate the old, corrupt, gilded wealth of a bygone era, a wasted network. The vast majority of us, either simple in occupation or rendered penniless by the Fall, stood nothing to gain.

Naturally the time has come to implement a more logical currency. Silver is the obvious choice.

Premier Roosevelt attempted to block the reform, insisting on the retention of “sound money.” But it is little secret that many of the Northeasterners who survived the Fall went on to set up banks in our Territories, and many of them are friends of Roosevelt. It is little surprise that when the Quorum initiated the reform, the Congress passed it very quickly despite Roosevelt’s bullying roar.

Congress, however, is not inclined to replace Roosevelt as Premier. Instead, the provisions and powers of the Act will be implemented by the Office of the President and the Board of Trade. While Roosevelt has not resigned his post over the affair, he is eyeing the upcoming elections. He threatens to campaign heavily to have all congressmen who voted for the Act replaced, insisting that the economic stagnation we face now will lead to complete doom in the near future.

This, of course, is hogwash. For our opinion on why Roosevelt is engaging in this tirade, see our cartoon section.

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Roosevelt Sicks the Grizzly Bears of Greed and Megalomania on the Territorial Government​