190 



CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



tion ; but I declare as my candid opinion that 

 since the first year after the close of the war, 

 when our irredeemable currency system had 

 not so deeply eaten its way into the whole 

 economic life of the nation, and when the busi- 

 ness of the country had to adapt itself from 

 the ways of war to the ways of peace a mo- 

 ment which unfortunately we missed the 

 present time is the most opportune for the 

 inauguration of a resumption policy ; and if we 

 lose that opportunity again we shall have to 

 wait for another and perhaps more disastrous 

 revulsion to see it return. And it is just from 

 the present crisis in our economic affairs that 

 the new opportunity springs. The reason is 

 very simple. Many of the difficulties which, 

 it was feared, would accompany and follow 

 resumption have already been anticipated by 

 the crisis. Much of that preparation which 

 must precede resumption in order to avoid dis- 

 astrous embarrassment has already been per- 

 formed by the crisis. 



"As to the resolution now under discussion, 

 I shall vote for the amendment of the Senator 

 from Delaware (Mr. Bayard), in which I find 

 the simplest and clearest statement of the ob- 

 ject I pursue. If that should fail, the resolu- 

 tion introduced by the honorable chairman of 

 the Committee on Finance will of course have 

 my support. Let me express the hope that at 

 an early day a bill embodying a method of a 

 return to specie payments will be laid before 

 us." 



Mr. Sherman, of Ohio, said : " Mr. President, 

 at the outset of my remarks I wish to state 

 some general propositions established by ex- 

 perience, and the concurring opinions of all 

 writers on political economy. They may not 

 be disputed, but are constantly overlooked. 

 They ought to be ever present in this discus- 

 sion as axioms, the truth of which has been so 

 often proved that proof is no longer requisite. 



"The most obvious of these axioms, which 

 lies at the foundation of the argument I wish 

 to make to-day, is that a specie standard is the 

 best and the only true standard of all values, 

 recognized as such by all civilized nations of 

 our generation, and established as such by the 

 experience of all commercial nations that have 

 existed from the earliest period of recorded 

 time. "While the United States as well as all 

 other nations have for a time, under the press- 

 ure of war or other calamity, been driven to 

 establish other standards of value, yet they 

 have all been impelled to return to the true 

 standard ; and even while other standards of 

 value have been legalized for the time, specie 

 has measured their value as it now measures 

 the value of our legal-tender notes. 



"This axiom is as immutable as the law of 

 gravitation or the laws of the planetary system, 

 and every device to evade it or avoid it has, 

 by- its failure, only demonstrated the universal 

 law that specie measures all values as certainly 

 as the surface of the ocean measures the level 

 of the earth. 



"I purpose now to pursue the argument 

 further, and to prove that we are bound both 

 by public faith and good policy to bring our 

 currency to the gold standard ; that such a re- 

 sult was provided for by the financial policy 

 adopted when the currency was authorized; 

 that a departure from this policy was adopted 

 after the war was over, and after the necessity 

 for a depreciated currency ceased; and that 

 we have only to restore the old policy to bring 

 us safely, surely, and easily, to a specie stand- 

 ard. 



"First, I present to you the pledge of the 

 United States to pay these notes in coin 'at 

 the earliest practicable period.' In the ' act to 

 strengthen the public credit,' passed on March 

 18, 1869, I find this obligation: 



And the United States also solemnly pledges its 

 public faith to make provision at the earliest practi- 

 cable period for the redemption of the United States 

 notes in coin. 



" Without renewing the discussion in regard 

 to the nature of these notes, or quoting the 

 decision of the Supreme Court of the United 

 States, or the declaration of the various acts 

 of Congress from 1862 down, I rest upon this 

 pledge of the public faith. Under what cir- 

 cumstances was it made? The condition of 

 our currency, the obligation of our bonds, the 

 nature of our promises, had been discussed 

 before the people of the United States in the 

 campaign of 1868 ; various theories had been 

 advanced ; and the result was that those who 

 regarded the faith of the nation as pledged to 

 pay not only the bonds of the United States, 

 but the notes also, in coin, prevailed, and Gen- 

 eral Grant was elected President of the United 

 States. On the eastern portico of the Capitol, 

 on March 4, 1869, he made this declaration : 



A great debt has been contracted in securing to us 

 and our posterity the Union. The payment of this, 

 principal and interest, as well as the return to a 

 specie basis, as soon as it can be accomplished with- 

 out material detriment to the debtor class or to the 

 country at large, must be provided for. To protect 

 the national honor every dollar of Government in- 

 debtedness should be paid in gold, unless otherwise 

 expressly stipulated in the contract. Let it be under- 

 stood that no repudiator of one farthing of our pub- 

 lic debt will be trusted in public place, and it will go 

 far toward strengthening a credit which ought to be 

 the best in the world ? and will ultimately enable us 

 to replace the debt w_ith bonds bearing less interest 

 than we now pay. 



" The Congress of the United States, in 

 order to put into form its sense of this obliga- 

 tion, passed the act 'to strengthen the public 

 credit,' and the last and most important clause 

 of this act is the promise which I have just 

 read, that these notes should be paid ' at the 

 earliest practicable period ' in coin. 



" Mr. President, we see, then, the effect of 

 this promise. And I here come to what I re- 

 gard as a painful feature to discuss how have 

 we redeemed our promise ? It was Congress 

 that made it, in obedience to the public voice ; 

 and no act of Congress ever met with a more 

 hearty and generous approbation. But I say 



