Ottumwa weekly courier. (Ottumwa, Wapello County, Iowa) 1872-1899, 1877-12-12

j. NJ. HEDRICK & @
The eedeval censsitution On ~
Question ~ what Neay D =
eo9al-von0oe. (
Section Eight Of the Federal Con
stitution, Gays, in defining the power
| Of Congress, that 1t shall have the an
thority:
ITO coin money, regulate the valu,
/ thereof, and Of foreign coin, and a,
the standard Of weights and meas
ures."
Section Ten, following, In limiting
and defining the power OF States
reads a. follows:
"N0 State shall enter into . treaty
alliance, or confederation grant let
ters Of marque and reprisal; coin
money; emit bills Of credit; make
anything but gold and silver coin I
legal tender in payment Of dehts
pass any bill Of attainder, ex pos
1dcto law impairing the Obligation o.
contracts, or grant any title OF nobil'
ity."
Now we take It, to construe with
out conflict, the foregoing clauses of
the Constitution, and to give fAir
Interpretation Of them In the light q
eighty years Of the history of the
government makes the Constitution
itself require Congress to coin IT. ls-
gal tender out of gold and silver,
excepting, Of course, in time Of great
emergency, like the late rebellion,
when paper may be made . legal
tender.
We do not intend, in this article, to
make more than one or two points.
The chief poiut We make = this
We will suppose that Congress o.
tablishes at this time, gold coin alone
as . legal tender; makes gold the
standard Of valuc. This result, Of
course, 10 reached under the author
ity ofthe first Of the above extracts
from the Constitution. On the other
hand, we will suppose, that the state
Of Iowa, through her Legislature, re-
tains the double standard and makes
gold and silver coin . legal tender.
At once there 10 . conflict between
Federal and State authority. When
the Federal Constitution says In %
many words, that, "no state shall
" make anything but gold and silver
"coin legal TENDER" NO man will
question but that it 10 clear, reserv.
cd right to the state to make such coin
. legal tender.
The only way to defeat this power
Of the state, would be for the Federal
government to collect in all its silver
coin and have none in circulation, or
at least, no silver dollars. But while
It was doing this, the government
would have one coin . legal tender
and the state another. An interpret
alton OF the Federal Constitution
which leads inevitably to such Z con-
fict between the state and Federal
authority, cannot be . correct inter-
probation.
Again, the language of the Federal
Constitution is remarkable, In that It
uses the copulative conjunction, and,
joining gold and silver together - .
legal tender. authorized to the states.
The language is not gold or silver,
but gold and silver. Still, again 1t
may be claimed that, under Section
8, of the Constitution, that Congress
could make copper, iron or any 9TH
er metal, . legal tender, If full and
unrestricted scope is to be given to
the clause, Congress shall coin money
and regulate the value shereof-but
were that 30, then Congress could
make that metal legal tender which
the state could not. Such an inter-
probation Of the Federal Consti utiou,
bringing about 90 radical and distinct-
i've conflict between national and
state authority, would be the sherest
nonsense. What then in the light Of
these two clauses, harmonious in
terpretation Of them taken together,
with the action of the government
hereunder, for eighty years, is fair,
. legitimate construction. To our
minds it can only be this, and that is,
that by the Constitution, Congress is
not only restricted to gold and silver.
in coming its legal tender money, but
it is required to use these metals and
that the coinage from one metal is
clothed with just as full and complete
a legal tender quality ~ the coinage
from the other. We will add just
one other thought, which occurs to
us just now, and that is, it will be mo-
ticed that in the clause comforting au-
thority upon Congress to coin money,
nothing at all is said about what shall
be legal tender. 1t is only in the
clause referring to the states that any
light is given or any mention made Of
what metals the legal tender coin
shall be made.