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Show - PAY TIIE BONDS IN SILVER. Charles E. Coon, lately Assistant Secretary Sec-retary of the Treasury, writes a lengthy letter to the New York Herald in support of the proposition that good faith requires that the bonded debt of the United States should be paid in gold, tliat being the coin, and the only coin, Mr. Coon urges, which Congress, down to June 19, 1877, had any thought of when the matter mat-ter of the payment of our outstanding bonds was under discussion. To sustain his position, Mr. Coon incorporates incor-porates in his letter a number of extracts from the speeches of Senators and Representatives Rep-resentatives at the time the act to sustain the public credit was under consideration in Congress, and concludes as follows : I respectfully submit that in view of the plain intent of Congress, as shown by the debates and attendant circumstances, together to-gether with the action of the Executive, there can be no doubt that we have agreed to redeem these bonds in gold coin of the present standard value, and that those who invested their savings in our bonds, whether before or after the remonetizing of silver, rightly believe that such was the contract between themselves and the Government. But purposely or otherwise, Mr. Coon, who seems to have evoluted out of the position of a Government servant into ! that of an apparently well-paid agent of the golb-bug ring of the East, overlooks a very important resolution which was adopted by both branches of Congress in January, 1878, and which any one may find upon the records as follows : Whebeas, By the act entitled "An Act to strengthen the puhlio credit," approved March 18, 18G9, it was provided and declared that the faith and credit of the United States was thereby solemnly pledged to the payment, in coin or its equivalent, of all the interest-bearing obligations of the United States, except in cases where the law authorizing author-izing the issue of Buch obligations had expressly ex-pressly provided that the same might be paid in lawful money or other currency than gold and silver; and Whebeas, All the bonds of the United States authorized to be issued by the act entitled en-titled "An act to authorize the refunding of the national debt," approved July 14, 1870, by the terms of said act were declared to be redeemable in coin of the then present standard value, bearing interest payable semi-annually in such coin; and Whebeas, All bonds of the United States authorized to be issued under the act entitled en-titled "An act to provide for the resumption of specie payments," approved January 14, 1875, are required to be of the description of bonds of the United States described in the said act of Congress, approved July 14, 1870. entitled 'An act to authorize the refunding of the national debt:" and Whebeas, At the date of the passage of said Act of Congress last aforesaid, to-wit: the fourteenth day of July, 1870, the coin of the United States of standard value of that date included silver dollars of the weight of 412 grains each, declared by the act approved ap-proved January 18, 1837, entitled "An Act supplementary to the Act entitled 'An Act establishing a mint and regulating the coins of the United States,' " to be a legal tender of payment, according to their nominal value, for any sums whatever; therefore, Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives Rep-resentatives concurring therein) That all the bonds of the United States, issued, or authorized to be issued, under said Acts of Congress, hereinbefore recited are payable, principal and interest, at the option of the Government of the United States, in silver dollars, of the coinage of the United States, containing 412 grains each of standard silver; sil-ver; and that, to restore to its coinage such silver coins as a legal tender in payment of said bonds, principal and interest, is not in violation of the public faith, nor in derogation deroga-tion of the rights of the public creditor. Is it not clear from the foregoing that ample notice was given to all whom it might concern that this nation would liquidate its indebtedness in silver if it so chose? And furthermore, is it not clear that by "silver," the dollar of to-day, containing 412) grains of standard silver, was the money with which it was intended those bonds should be paid off? It has very much that appearance to us. The only bonds now outstanding that were issued prior to the passage of the resolution above quoted, were $200,000,-000 $200,000,-000 of xi8 and $75,000,000 of 4s all the rest are subject to payment as the resolution resolu-tion directs, in silver; if the Government shall so elect. Of these 4s and 4s, the,, former will become due in 1891, and will, without question, be paid off in gold or its equivalant. The $75,000,000 of 4s, therefore, are the only bonds to which I Mr. Coon's argument has any practical application, and in the language of the New York Sun, the amount is too small to make it worth while to engage in any dispute about them. No, the Government does not stand pledged to pay off the national indebtedness indebted-ness in gold, and, with the exceptions noted, it will not so be liquidated. The silver dollar, as honest a dollar as ever dropped from any mint, is good enough for the masses of the people ; it will also have to be good enough for the bloated bondholders. |