ow that Congress cannot authorize the
issue of bills of credit. But I submit to him that this question
has been settled by the practice of the government. We issued such
bills during the War of 1812, during the war with Mexico, and at
the recent session of Congress. We receive them now for our
services; we pay them to our soldiers and our creditors. These
notes are payable to bearer; they pass from hand to hand as currency;
they bear no interest. If the argument of the Senator is true,
then all these notes are unauthorized. The Senator admits that
when we owe a debt and cannot pay it, we can issue a note. But
where does he find the power to issue a note in the constitution?
Where does he find the power to prescribe the terms of the note,
to make it transferable, receivable for public dues? He draws all
these powers as incidents to the power to borrow money. According
to his argument, when we pay a soldier a ten dollar demand bill,
we borrow ten dollars from the soldier; when I apply to the secretary
of the Senate for a month's pay, I loan the United States $250.
This certainly is not the view we take of it when we receive the
money. On the other hand, we recognize the fact that the government
cannot pay us in gold. We receive notes as money. The government
ought to give, and has the power to give, to that money, all the
sanction, authority, value, necessary and proper, to enable it to
borrow money. The power to fix the standard of money, to regulate
the medium of exchanges, must necessarily go with, and be incident
to, the power to regulate commerce, to borrow money, to coin money,
to maintain armies and navies. All these high powers are expressly
prohibited to the states and also the incidental power to emit
bills of credit, and to make anything but gold and silver a legal
tender. But Congress is expressly invested with all these high
powers, and, to remove all doubt, is expressly authorized to use
all necessary and proper means to carry these powers into effect.

"If you strike out the legal tender clause you do so with the
knowledge that these notes will fall dead upon the money market of
the world. When you issue demand notes, and announce to the world
your purpose not to pay any more gold and silver, you then tender
to those who have furnished you provisions and services this paper
money. What can they do? They cannot pay their debts with it;
they cannot support their families with it, without a