CHAPTER III

coinage—of delivering at the Mint the same weight of pure metal coined as should be brought to it in bullion or foreign coin. Hamilton justifies his ratio thus: "The difference established by custom in the United States between coined gold and coined silver has been stated to be nearly 1:15.6. This, if truly the case, would imply that gold was extremely overvalued in the United States, for the highest actual proportion in any part of Europe very little, if at all, exceeds 1:15, and the average proportion throughout Europe is probably not more than 1:14.8." He also deduces his ratio of 15 as a mean between the two lately preceding issues of dollars. "Taking the rate of the late dollar of 374 grs., the proportion would be as 1:15.11. Taking the rate of the newest dollar of 374 grs., the proportion would be as 1:14.87. The mean of the two would give the proportion of 1:15 very nearly, less than the legal proportion in the coins of Great Britain, which is as 1:15.2, but somewhat more than the actual or market proportion, which is Page 252 not quite 1:15." As to the express selection of one or other metal for the unit, Hamilton makes a departure which marks clearly that he was creating and not continuing a system, and that if bimetallism is a feature of modern conception that conception is due to American rather than French statesmanship:⁴—"Contrary to the ideas which have heretofore prevailed in the suggestions concerning a coinage for the United States, though not without much hesitation arising from a deference for