2035. DEBT (Revolutionary), Payments on.—
The public effects of the United States, such as their paper bills of credit, loan office
bills, &c., were a commodity which varied its
value from time to time. A scale of their value
for every month has been settled according to
what they sold for at market, in silver or gold.
This value in gold or silver, with an interest
of six per cent. annually til payment, is what
the United States pay. This they are able to
pay; but were they to propose to pay off all
their paper, not according to what it cost the
holder, in gold or silver, but according to the
sum named in it, their whole country, if sold,
and all their persons into the bargain, might not
suffice. They would, in this case, make a bankruptcy
where none exists, as an individual
would, who being very able to pay the real debts
he has contracted, would undertake to give to
every man fifty times as much as he had received
from him.—
To M. Trouchin. Washington ed. ii, 360.
(P.
1788)
