136 LIVES OF THE PRESIDENTS February 12, 1873, when gold became the only unlimited legal-tender metallic currency of the country, are justly payable in gold coin, or in coin of equal value"; and that "the bonds issued prior to 1873 were issued at a time when the gold dollar was the only coin in circulation or contemplated by either the government or the holders of the bonds as the coin in which they were to be paid." He added: "It is far better to pay these bonds in that coin than to seem to take advantage of the unfore seen fall in silver bullion to pay in a new issue of silver coin thus made so much less valuable. The power of the United States to coin money and to regulate the value thereof ought never to be exer cised for the purpose of enabling the government to pay its obligations in a coin of less value than that contemplated by the parties when the bonds were issued." The President favored the coinage of silver, but only in a limited quantity, as a legal tender to a limited amount. He expressed the fear "that only mischief and misfortune would flow from a coinage of silver dollars with the quality of unlim ited legal tender, even in private transactions. Any expectation of temporary ease from an issue of silver coinage to pass as a legal tender, at a rate materially above its commercial value, is, I am per suaded, a delusion." As to the reform of the civil service he reiterated what he had said in his letter
