Silver coinage

“ In 1294 the scarcity of silver coinage was so great that a proclamation was put forth ordering silver to be brought to the Mint, and forbidding the export of the metals. In consequence of the futility of this ordinance, a further proclamation was issued in 1309, forbidding the circulation in France of English silver sterlings and gold florins of Florence, and crying down the exchange denomination of all other foreign coins. ”

“ Although a silver coinage, the government, like Japan’s, stands to guarantee the fixed value of the coinage as equal to half its face in gold; that is to say, the central bank will hold reserves so as to redeem or guarantee a silver dollar at fifty cents gold. ”

“ The closing of the mints of British India to the coinage of silver coins of full-debt-paying power is the most momentous event in the monetary history of the present century. It is the final and disastrous blow to the use of silver as a measure of value and as money of full-debt-paying power, and the relegation of it to the position of a subsidiary, or token metal. It is the culmination of the evolution from a silver to a gold standard which has been progressing with startling rapidity in recent years. ”

“ Every piece of coined silver in every country in the world is part of the monetary circulation of that country, and even when of short weight and classified as a mere "token" is passing at par as full valued money. No gain could possibly accrue, therefore, to the owners of coined silver anywhere by shipping it to this country for any purpose, and there is no surplus stock of bullion anywhere. ”

“ In adapting the new silver coinage to the ordinary uses of currency in the everyday transactions of life and prescribing the quality of legal tender to be assigned to it, a consideration of the first importance should be so to adjust the ratio between the silver and the gold coinage, which now constitutes our specie currency, as to accomplish the desired end of maintaining the circulation of the two metallic currencies and keeping up the volume of the two precious metals as our intrinsic money. ”

“ When silver was the unit of value, gold enjoyed free coinage, and was legal tender in the payment of all debts. Now things have changed. Gold is the unit and silver does not enjoy free coinage.
THE PEN MORE POWERFUL THAN THE SWORD.
THE PEN MORE POWERFUL THAN THE SWORD.
It is refused at the mints. We might get along with gold as the unit, if silver enjoyed the same right gold did prior to 1873. But that right is now denied to silver. When silver was the unit, the unlimited demand for gold to coin into money, made the demand as great as the supply, and this held up the value of gold bullion. ”

“ The proposition to remonetize silver or to increase the silver coinage was vigorously opposed, but the arguments then presented by the advocates of remonetization never have been, and never can be, refuted.
In fact, but rarely has there been any attempt made to answer those arguments. Puerile attempts at wit, and diatribes of abuse are all that the silver men have heard in sixteen years in answer to the contentions they have made in favor of the remonetization of silver. ”

“ Whereas the silver coins of the realm have, by long use and other circumstances, become greatly diminished in number and deteriorated in value, so as not to be sufficient for the payments required in dealings [Pg 243] under the value of the current gold coins, by reason whereof a great quantity of light and counterfeit silver coin and foreign coin has been introduced into circulation within this realm, and the evils resulting therefrom can only be remedied by a new coinage of silver money.... ”

“ Nay, more, silver bullion—disparaged and discredited as it is by being shorn of the money function, and denied access to the mints, instead of decreasing in purchasing power, has maintained so steady a relation to commodities that 4121⁄2 grains of uncoined silver will exchange for as much to-day as would the coined dollar, whether of silver or gold, in 1873, when the full money function attached equally to both metals. ”

“ I apprehend, therefore, that the two conditions of a near approach to equality of commercial value between the gold and silver coinage of the same denomination and of a limitation of the amounts for which the silver coinage is to be a legal tender are essential to maintaining both in circulation. If these conditions can be successfully observed, the issue from the mint of silver dollars would afford material assistance to the community in the transition to redeemable paper money, and would facilitate the resumption of specie payment and its permanent establishment. ”

“ Have gentlemen considered the effect of a single gold standard universally adopted? Let us not deceive ourselves with the hope that we can discard silver for gold, and that other nations will take it up and keep it as a part of the world's currency. When all the silver available for coinage could gain admission to some mints and all the gold available for coinage would find a place for mintage, and some nation like France maintained the parity by means of bimetallism it was of comparatively little importance whether a particular nation used silver, or gold, or both. ”

“ I call to witness the vast sums that have been coined in England since the free coinage was set up. What is become of it all? Nobody believes it to be in the nation, and it cannot well be all transported, the penalties for so doing being so great. The case is plain—the melting-pot devours it all; and I know no intelligent man who doubts but the new money goes this way. Silver and gold, like other commodities, have their ebbings and flowings; upon the arrival of quantities from Spain, the Mint commonly gives the best price, i.e. coined silver for uncoined silver, weight for weight. ”

“ Otherwise you cannot have a stable money.
"Free coinage at a fixed quantity to constitute a dollar does take it off the market, and that is what is necessary in the treatment of a money metal. That is the way gold is now treated, and silver should be so treated.
"But your statement is not true. Silver men are not benefited by remonetization except in common with others. Silver is now worth about 60 cents an ounce as measured in the new standard—gold. It was worth $1.29 per ounce under free coinage. The owner of silver bullion can now buy as much with an ounce of silver as he ever could. ”

“ Free coinage means that we shall purchase not merely four and a half million ounces a month, but all the silver that is offered, come from where it may, if presented in quantities of one hundred ounces at a time. We are to give the holder either coin or treasury notes, at his option, at the rate of one dollar for every 371 grains, now worth in the market 77 cents. Who can estimate the untold hoards of silver that will come into the treasury if this policy is adopted? ”

“ They are left without a shadow of consolation except that the coinage of $2,000,000 worth of silver bullion each month has not succeeded in placing silver at a par with gold. They affect to believe that the advocates of silver in 1878 expected that that metal, under the very limited demand of $2,000,000 a month, would be brought to a level with gold, which, owing to the demonetization of silver, had risen abnormally and ruinously in value. ”

“ The hoarding of gold which has already taken place indicates that we shall not escape the usual experience in such cases. So if this silver coinage be continued we may reasonably expect that gold and its equivalent will abandon the field of circulation to silver alone. ”

“ In his life-time the mints of France and of the Continent were open for the coinage of silver equally with gold, and the money supply of the world was not constantly narrowing by being limited to the yield of a single metal whose annual output would hardly more than meet the demand for the arts. ”

“ We could well afford to let gold go, since, by the coinage of silver, our own money volume would not be reduced. The rise of prices which it would effect in Europe would not only, as I have stated, secure better prices for our exported goods, but would undoubtedly enable us to maintain prices here at a substantial parity with those of Europe—that is to say, with those of the new, more rational and more beneficent gold standard which would be established by the full remonetization of silver in this country. ”

“ The objection that silver is too heavy for the pocket is an objection common to all metallic money. We see hardly any gold in circulation in this country—infinitely less than of silver. When our people have a choice as to the form in which they will take money they prefer paper representatives as being the most convenient. The extraordinary perfection to which the arts of the engraver and paper maker have been brought gives paper money a security against counterfeiting and imitation far superior to any immunity which can be claimed for the metals. ”

“ And yet outside of this capital, I do not this day know of a single great and recognized advocate of bi-metallic money who regards it prudent or safe for any nation largely to increase the coinage standard of silver at the present time beyond the limits fixed by existing laws.... Yet we, who during the past two years have coined far more silver dollars than we ever before coined since the foundation of the Government; ten times as many as we coined during half a century of our national life ”

“ But even should all our gold go by reason of the remonetization of silver, it will not be to the injury of the gold standard, but to its great advantage, and to the equally great advantage of the masses of the people, as well of this country, which the gold may leave, as of all countries to which it may go. ”

“ France and the Latin Union, with less population and wealth than we have, maintained a premium on silver for forty years by opening their mints to its free coinage, and at a ratio of 151⁄2 to 1, while ours was 16 to 1. ”

“ The act of 1792 established a mint for the purpose of a national coinage. It was the result of very careful and thorough investigations of the whole subject, in which Jefferson and Hamilton took the greatest parts; and its general principles have controlled all subsequent legislation. It provided that the gold of coinage, or standard gold, should consist of eleven parts fine and one part alloy, which alloy was to be of silver and copper in convenient proportions, not exceeding one-half silver ”

“ Provided, however, That the Director of the Mint shall, at the option of the tenderer of such silver, deliver silver certificates in lieu of the standard silver dollars to which the tenderer of such silver for coinage would be entitled and in an amount in dollars equal to the coined standard silver dollars that the tenderer of such silver for coinage would receive in standard silver dollars. ”

“ And those who do not shut their eyes to the truth must see that the change of relation between the metals has been effected by depriving silver of its legal-tender function, as the want of accord between the clocks was brought about by depriving the silver clock of a portion of its motive power—the weights. The only thing that has prevented a greater divergency between the metals is the limited coinage by the United States—the single weight that, withheld from the gold clock, prevented its more ruinous gain. ”

“ About one-third of it is gold, one-third silver and one third paper. One-third of our money is redemption money, and two-thirds is credit money.
"The blunder was made when silver was demonetized. The remedy is to remonetize it, and thereby restore its commercial value. Purchase acts, or any treatment of silver short of free coinage will have no beneficial effect." ”

“ The cheaper money will always be the money in circulation. Wherever free coinage now exists silver is the only money, while where gold is the standard, silver is employed as a subsidiary coin, maintained at par in gold by the mandate of the government and its receipt for or redemption in gold. ”

“ It is, however, a significant fact that every silver dollar that has been coined under that act is at a parity with gold, and will to-day buy as much of all the objects of human desire as will the gold dollar. ”

“ From those figures it is plain that no continuous, extraordinary yield of silver, such as might warrant the slightest fear of an unnecessary addition to the money volume, is to be expected. On the other hand the continuous drain of gold for use in the arts, as dentistry, gold plate, jewelry, gilding, and articles of decoration generally, is seriously encroaching upon the annual supply. ”