"I would also ask the privilege of submitting your answer to the consideration of the committee.
"With high respect, faithfully your friend,
"Samuel B. Ruggles,
"U. S. Commissioner to the Paris Exposition and Member of the
Committee.
"Hon. John Sherman,
"Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Senate of the United
States, etc., etc., etc., now in Paris."
To this letter I made the following reply:
"Hotel Jardin des Tuileries, May 18, 1867. "My Dear Sir:—Your note of yesterday, inquiring whether Congress would probably, in future coinage, make our gold dollar conform in value to the gold five-franc piece, has been received.
"There has been so little discussion in Congress upon the subject that I cannot base my opinion upon anything said or done there.
"The subject has, however, excited the attention of several important commercial bodies in the United States, and the time is now so favorable that I feel quite sure that Congress will adopt any practical measure that will secure to the commercial world a uniform standard of value and exchange.
"The only question will be, how can this be accomplished?
"The treaty of December 23, 1865, between France, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland, and the probable acquiescence in that treaty by Prussia, has laid the foundation for such a standard. If Great Britain will reduce the value of her sovereign two pence, and the United States will reduce the value of her dollar something over three cents, we then have a coinage in the franc, dollar and sovereign easily computed, and which will readily pass in all countries; the dollar as five francs and the sovereign as 25 francs.
"This will put an end to the loss and intricacies of exchange and discount.
"Our gold dollar is certainly as good a unit of value as the franc; and so the English think of their pound sterling. These coins are now exchangeable only at a considerable loss, and this exchange is a profit only to brokers and bankers. Surely each commercial nation should be willing to yield a little to secure a gold coin of equal value, weight, and diameter, from whatever mint it may have been issued.