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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



as the Senator from Indiana does, that as no 

 time was fixed, no man could be convicted for 

 a penitentiary offense for a violation of the law. 

 But what is this pledge ? Let me read it again : 



And the United States also solemnly pledges its 

 faith to make provision at the earliest practicable 

 period for the payment of the United States notes in 

 coin. 



" What is the meaning of that ? Does it not 

 mean that the United States shall apply its 

 means, its power, its energies, its revenue, its 

 money, to redeem these notes ? Does it mean 

 a vague promise, such as party platforms some- 

 times use to deceive and mislead the people ? 

 Does it mean only a vague, indefinite promise 

 by which business men are to be gulled and 

 deluded into basing their contracts upon an 

 artificial standard ? No, sir ; it is the promise 

 of a great, proud, and rich people, who mean 

 what they say that every practicable means 

 shall be used to that end. 



" Now, sir, I ask, has it been practicable at 

 any time in the last four years to advance in 

 some degree these notes toward the specie 

 standard ? My honorable friend from Indiana 

 says that for the last four or five years we have 

 had a time of unbounded plenty and great 

 prosperity ; we have built thousands and tens 

 of thousands of miles of railroads ; we h ave built 

 furnaces; we have expanded our enterprises 

 and proved our energy. Yes, sir ; all this we 

 have done. We have gone through a period 

 of prosperity almost unexampled ; but it seems 

 we never were prosperous enough during all 

 this time, according to the Senator from Indi- 

 ana, to fulfill any part of this obligation which 

 we made on the 18th of March, 1869. Sir, 

 when will it be practicable ? 



" But now let us come to the specific ques- 

 tion of the time for resumption. Shall the re- 

 demption of this pledge be -postponed until the 

 public debt is paid ? Why, sir, one-tenth of the 

 money we have used to pay the public debt not 

 due would have brought us to a specie stand- 

 ard. No one supposes that under an ordinary 

 state of affairs the currency of the country 

 the greenbacks need be reduced below three 

 hundred millions in order to bring us to a spe- 

 cie standard. I have heard some of the ablest 

 and most experienced business men of the 

 country declare that, whenever the right to con- 

 vert greenbacks into gold or its equivalent was 

 secured so that prudent men would see that 

 the Government had the power to maintain its 

 specie standard, there would be no reduction 

 of the currency to any appreciable extent. But 

 whether that be so or not, no one has claimed 

 that the amount of greenbacks need be reduced 

 below three hundred millions in order to bring 

 that remaining three hundred millions up to the 

 standard of gold. -That would be a reduction 

 of $56,000,000. Fifty-six millions of the money 

 that we have applied to the payment of debt 

 not yet due would have brought all the remain- 

 ing greenbacks up to par in gold, would have 

 made our bank-notes convertible into the 



standard of gold, and we- would have had, 

 without knowing it, specie payment a solid, 

 safe, and secure basis. The forty millions of 

 greenbacks we paid as premium for our bonds 

 would have accomplished this result. Thou- 

 sands of men who have been ruined by the false 

 ideas that sprung from this fever-heated, depre- 

 ciated paper-money would be now useful, able, 

 and successful business men, instead of being 

 ruined by bankruptcy. 



" Sir, we gain nothing by postponing the ful- 

 fillment of our promise with a view to reduce 

 the public debt. We have to pay the debt in 

 coin any way, and the same coin that pays it 

 now would pay it after our currency had been 

 restored to par. If the old idea of Mr. Pendle- 

 ton had prevailed, that these bonds should be 

 paid in greenbacks, then there would be a mo- 

 tive for us to depreciate the greenbacks in or- 

 der to pay off our bonds at the cheapest rate. 

 But this promise to pay in coin extended to the 

 bondholder. We promised to pay the bond- 

 holder gold for his bond and the people gold 

 for their greenbacks. We have fulfilled our 

 promise to the bondholder. We have paid him 

 in gold. We have bought the gold. We have 

 paid him at a premium of ten per cent, on our 

 currency. Not a single effort, not a single 

 measure, has succeeded in either House of 

 Congress that looks to the redemption of the 

 promise to the people who hold these green- 

 backs, and which measure their daily toil in 

 their productive avocations. We cannot post- 

 pone this obligation until the payment of the 

 public debt, because, although we have rapidly 

 advanced in the payment of the public debt, it 

 will be many long years before that ' consum- 

 mation most devoutly to be wished ' will be 

 reached. 



" Shall we postpone the redemption of our 

 greenbacks until we can accumulate enough 

 gold in our Treasury to pay them ? We know 

 the effect of that policy. Any attempt to ac- 

 cumulate great masses of gold in the Treasury 

 will not only excite popular opprobrium, by 

 holding idle in the vaults of the Treasury money 

 that ought to draw interest, but it will create 

 a stringency in the gold-market. It will ad- 

 vance the value of every thing we wish to get. 

 Accumulate gold in great masses, and it will 

 advance the price of gold all over the world. 

 We could not now', with all our teeming pro- 

 ductions, draw to this country $200,000,000 in 

 gold without disturbing the Bank of France, 

 the Bank of England, and all the money cen- 

 tres in the world. Therefore the idea of post- 

 poning the day of specie payments until we can 

 accumulate enough gold to redeem the green- 

 backs would be the idlest, vainest delusion and 

 the most foolish hope. 



" Mr. President, I have gone into this argu- 

 ment to show, first, that we are bound by the 

 obligation that we assumed on the 18th of 

 March, 1869, to resume specie payments, or to 

 do something to advance our notes to the par 

 of gold. I have endeavored to show that such 



