In proof of the facts that the decisions of the supreme court of the United States are not always controlled by the constitution, let us again refer to the legal tender decisions. Here again, the opinion of a bare majority of the court (five of the judges concurring and four dissenting) establishes the law for forty millions of people, and does violence to both the letter and spirit of the constitution. Under the constitution the power to coin money and regulate its value is vested in congress. The states are prohibited from coining money, and from making anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts. The letter of the constitution does not deny to congress the power to issue paper money and make it a legal tender; but when we take into consideration that the power is denied to the states, the conclusion is irresistible that the power was intended to be denied to the general, as well as to the state governments. While as a war measure the power might be exercised, it certainly could not be in time of peace. Being one of the extraordinary powers vested in congress in time of war, rising above the constitutional restriction, if we may use the expression, governed by the law of necessity, the power should not be enlarged by judicial interpretation, nor should the plain letter of the acts of congress passed as war measures be made to extend beyond its express provisions. When the highest court in the nation decided that the legal tender act was ultro-active in its operations, that court decided, in effect, that under the constitution congress possessed the power to annul contracts made between private citizens, that one might legally take from another a part of his property without compensation. While that court has uniformly decided that bonds obtained from counties, cities, and towns fraudulently, and without consideration, must be paid, it decides that a retroactive statute may be passed which takes a man's property without consideration; and that congress, without any such power being conferred by the constitution, can substitute a new standard of values. Not only that congress can do this, but that the legal tender act extended beyond its plain reading, and made paper money, a thing that is of no intrinsic value, a legal tender for debts generally; that this paper was the standard of values, and that coin, gold and silver, were but articles of commerce, the value of which was fixed by this new paper standard. If one not learned in the law had been called upon to interpret the constitution he would have arrived at a different conclusion. If ten years ago one learned in the law had been called upon to interpret the meaning of the constitutional provision above referred to, he would, without hesitation, have decided that such an act was unconstitutional. If the eminent jurists who graced the supreme bench at any time since the organization of our government had been required to decide as to the