or before the date fixed
by law.

I strongly urged the firm maintenance of a policy that would make
good the promise contained in the United States note when issued--
a promise repeated in the act "To strengthen the public credit,"
approved March 18, 1869, and made definite and effective by the
resumption act, and asserted that dishonored notes, less valuable
than the coin they promise, though justified by the necessity which
led to their issue, should be made good as soon as practicable;
that the public credit was injured by failure to redeem them; that
every holder who was compelled by law to receive them was deprived
of a part of his just due; that our national resources being ample,
the process of appreciation being almost complete, and the wisdom
of the law having been demonstrated, it was the dictate of good
policy and good faith to continue the process of preparation, so
that, at or before the time fixed by law, every United States note
would have equal purchasing power with coin; that to reverse this
policy in the face of assured success would greatly impair the
public credit, arrest the process of reducing the interest on the
public debt, and cause anew the financial distress our country had
recently suffered.

The first section of the resumption act plainly provided for the
permanent substitution of silver coin for the whole amount of
fractional currency outstanding. Section 3 directed the permanent
reduction of United States notes to an amount not exceeding
$300,000,000. No distinct legislative declaration was made in the
resumption act that notes redeemed after that limit was reached
should not be reissued; but section 3579 of the Revised Statutes
of the United States provided that "when any United States notes
are returned to the treasury they may be reissued, from time to
time, as the exigencies of the public interest may require."

I expressed in my report the opinion that, under this section,
notes, when redeemed after the 1st of January, 1879, if the amount
outstanding was not in excess of $300,000,000, might be reissued
as the exigencies of the public service required. A note redeemed
with coin was in the treasury and subject to the same law as if
received for taxes, or as a bank note, when redeemed by the
corporation issuing it. The authority to reissue it did not depend
upon the mode in which it was returned to the treasury. But this
construction was controverted, and I thought should be se