paper currency, would only tend to increased and prolonged disturbance
in values, and unless retrieved must end in serious disorder,
dishonor, and disaster in the financial affairs of the Government and
of the people.

The mischiefs which I apprehend and urgently deprecate are confined
to no class of the people, indeed, but seem to me most certainly to
threaten the industrious masses, whether their occupations are of
skilled or common labor. To them, it seems to me, it is of prime
importance that their labor should be compensated in money which is
itself fixed in exchangeable value by being irrevocably measured by
the labor necessary to its production. This permanent quality of
the money of the people is sought for, and can only be gained by
the resumption of specie payments. The rich, the speculative, the
operating, the money-dealing classes may not always feel the mischiefs
of, or may find casual profits in, a variable currency, but the
misfortunes of such a currency to those who are paid salaries or wages
are inevitable and remediless.

Closely connected with this general subject of the resumption of
specie payments is one of subordinate, but still of grave, importance;
I mean the readjustment of our coinage system by the renewal of
the silver dollar as an element in our specie currency, endowed by
legislation with the quality of legal tender to a greater or less
extent.

As there is no doubt of the power of Congress under the Constitution
"to coin money and regulate the value thereof," and as this power
covers the whole range of authority applicable to the metal, the
rated, value and the legal-tender quality which shall be adopted for