It
may be the doctrine will never come to prevail that a specie basis in
whole or in part is no more indispensable to a sound and safe paper
currency than an exclusive specie currency is possible or desirable in a
country like this. It may be that the people will never come to believe
that a legal-tender paper currency, issued exclusively by the National
Government--based upon the credit of the nation, constituting a lien
upon all the property of the country, and proportioned in amount of
issue to the needs of the people for it as an instrument of
exchange--would, for all home uses, possess in full perfection the
nature, functions, and powers of money. It is a subject we do not
propose to discuss. It is enough now to say that the notes of the United
States, fundable in national six per cent. bonds, and drawing interest
as they do semi-annually in gold, must be admitted by everybody to be as
safe a currency as the banks as a whole have ever supplied, and to
possess other advantages which make them incomparably a better currency
than that of local banks.
The high price to which gold has been carried by gambling speculators,
is not to be taken as indicating a proportionate want of confidence in
the success of the national cause and in the intrinsic value of the
national securities. It indicates nothing of the sort--at any rate,
whatever it may be taken to indicate, it is none the less true that
United States six per cent.
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