In any legislation providing for a silver coinage, regulating its
value, and imparting to it the quality of legal tender, it seems to me
of great importance that Congress should not lose sight of its action
as operating in a twofold capacity and in two distinct directions.
If the United States Government were free from a public debt, its
legislative dealing with the question of silver coinage would be
purely sovereign and governmental, under no restraints but those of
constitutional power and the public good as affected by the proposed
legislation. But in the actual circumstances of the nation, with a
vast public debt distributed very widely among our own citizens and
held in great amounts also abroad, the nature of the silver-coinage
measure, as affecting this relation of the Government to the holders
of the public debt, becomes an element, in any proposed legislation,
of the highest concern. The obligation of the public faith
transcends all questions of profit or public advantage otherwise.
Its unquestionable maintenance is the dictate as well of the highest
expediency as of the most necessary duty, and will ever be carefully
guarded by Congress and people alike.

The public debt of the United States to the amount of $729,000,000
bears interest at the rate of 6 per cent, and $708,000,000 at the rate
of 5 per cent, and the only way in which the country can be relieved
from the payment of these high rates of interest is by advantageously
refunding the indebtedness. Whether the debt is ultimately paid in
gold or in silver coin is of but little moment compared with the
possible reduction of interest one-third by refunding it at such
reduced rate. If the United States had the unquestioned right to pay
its bonds in silver coin, the little benefit from that process would
be greatly overbalanced by the injurious effect of such payment