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 to are all condemned. The question, moreover, has won such an immediate and practical significance in the country that it is no longer a subject for academical discussion amongst economists, about whom opinions may differ without importance.

The Senate of the United States has just passed a bill containing the following provision:

“Sec. 2. That immediately after the passage of this act the President shall invite the governments of the countries composing the Latin Union, so called, and of such other European nations as he may deem advisable, to join the United States in a conference to adopt a common ratio between gold and silver for the purpose of establishing internationally the use of bimetallic money and securing a fixity of the relative value between those metals; such conference to be held at such a place in Europe or in the United States at such a time within six months as may be mutually agreed upon by the executives of the governments joining in the same. Whenever the governments so invited, or any three of them, shall have signified their willingness to unite in the same, the President shall, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, appoint three commissioners who shall attend such conference on behalf of the United States, and shall report the doings thereof to the President, who shall transmit the same to Congress.”

The conception which governed this legislation is plain enough. It proposes to secure a concurrent circulation of the two metals at a fixed ratio by an international agreement. The proposition is to put the experiment at work when only three nations besides ourselves consent and in the meantime to remonetize silver here at sixteen to one when the market ratio is seventeen and one-half to one. This adds to the absurdity of the bill, but has no bearing on my present controversy. I challenge the postulate which is assumed, which has never been dis-