(2.) Do you propose the free and unlimited coinage of gold and silver at 16 to 1? If not at that ratio, what ratio do you propose?
(3.) Is it not a fact that from 1792 to 1834 we were practically on the silver standard and that after 1834 we were practically on the gold standard, and that this change was the effect of the change of ratio, made by the act of 1834? Why was it that in 1853 the Government coined fractional silver of lighter weight in proportion to value than the standard dollar?
(4.) You claim for the Government the power to create money. If that be so, why clamor for gold and silver only? Let us suppose that the United States Treasury is now full of such money as you propose, Gold, Silver or Fiat. I want some of it. How am I to get it?
I agree with you heartily that the making of our Federal Government is all out of joint, and I think that it is the unwarranted meddling with affairs over which it has no rightful control. The remedy, as I think, is not in enlarging and extending its powers, for every step taken in that direction makes worse conditions possible. Let us say to her in plain language: “Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther. Get back to the track marked out for you and stay there.”
What is here written is in all honesty and in a controversial spirit and should you see fit to refer to them, I will be glad to have the number.
I am not a subscriber now. May be soon.
Best wishes.
ANSWER
(1) Money that is “redeemable” in other money is not my idea of money. A dollar is not redeemed by swapping another dollar for it. The only redemption of the dollar which amounts to anything beneficial is when a debt, public or private, is redeemed by paying it off in legal tender. I redeem my promissory note by paying the amount of money it calls for: I redeem all my other dues and debts in the same way. Nothing is redeemed when a gold dollar is given for a silver dollar, or a metallic dollar exchanged for a paper dollar. That method of fooling the people will go out of fashion as the people become educated. All money is absolute fiat money. That is, the law makes the money. God made no money. Nature made no money. Evolution made no money. The law takes raw material and makes money out of it, just as the lumberman takes a log and makes plank or shingles out of it.
The Government fiat makes gold money, makes silver money, makes nickel money, makes copper money. It would with equal ease and certainty make iron or paper money.