The suggestion that Senator Stewart of Nevada was assenting to the demonetization of the silver dollar derives support from the fact that, in the month of February, 1874, he indorsed the gold standard in two speeches, delivered, respectively, on the 11th and 20th days of that month. On the 11th he said: "I want the standard gold, and no paper money not redeemable in gold." On the 20th he added: "Gold is the universal standard of the world. Everybody knows what a dollar in gold is worth." It is certain that in the month of February, 1874, when the contents of the Mint Bill were in the public statutes, the demonetization of the silver dollar, and the recognition of the gold dollar as the unit of value, had not affected the judgment nor disturbed the sensibilities of the advocates of silver. I dismiss this branch of the subject with the observation that the act of 1873 placed the United States in a commanding position in regard to the use of silver. If that metal had continued to maintain its supremacy upon the ratio then established between gold and silver coin, there could have arisen no demand for the coinage of silver. If, on the other hand, silver should depreciate, the government might, at its pleasure, use, or it might decline to use, that metal as coin. I now pass to a part of the history of the controversy not heretofore considered in public discussions, from which it will appear that the trusted representatives of the silver interest put aside the most inviting opportunity, if not the only opportunity, for the adoption of the bimetallic system by the commercial nations of the world. The act of 1873 prepared the way for the use of silver by the commercial nations of the world, upon an agreed ratio with gold, if indeed, the possibility of such an arrangement ever existed. We were upon a gold basis; the balance of trade, by groups of years, was in our favor; we had a gold revenue from customs of about $200,000,000, and the excess of Treasury receipts over expenditures was nearly $100,000,000 a year. If we had chosen to accumulate gold and postpone payments upon the Public Debt, we could have brought the nations of the earth to our feet. It was under circumstances thus favorable for negotiations for the use of silver that the Silver Commission of 1876 was constituted, and authorized, among other things, to inquire "into the policy of the restoration of the double standard in this country, and if restored, what the legal relation between the two coins of silver and gold, should be." This authority opened a way for the introduction of a policy on the part of the United States looking to an arrangement for the use of silver by the states of Europe, and on that authority the commission dealt with the project of an international bimetallic system.