174 METRIC SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. 



Congress authorized the metric system in the United States 

 by passing the following bill : 



AN ACT TO AUTHORIZE THE USE OF THE METRIC SYSTEM OF 

 WEIGHTS AND MEASURES. 



Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives 

 of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

 That from and after the passage of this act, it shall be law- 

 ful throughout the United States of America to employ the 

 weights and measures of the metric system ; and no contract 

 or dealing, or pleading in any court, shall be deemed invalid 

 or liable to objection, because the weights or measures ex- 

 pressed or referred to therein are weights or measures of the 

 metric system. 



SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That the tables in the 

 schedule hereto annexed, shall be recognized in the construc- 

 tion of contracts, and in all legal proceedings, as establish- 

 ing, in terms of the weights and measures now in use in the 

 United States, the equivalents of the weights and measures 

 expressed therein in terms of the metric system ; and said 

 tables may be lawfully used for computing, determining, and 

 expressing, in customary weights and measures, the weights 

 and measures of the metric system. 



The utility of the metric system commends itself, even 

 at a glance, and hence it becomes important that all should 

 become acquainted with it. It will doubtless soon come in- 

 to general use to the exclusion of all other systems of weight 

 and measure. The following is a brief and condensed view 



