2266. DOLLAR, Stopping Coinage.—
I
should approve of your employing the Mint on
small silver coins, rather than on dollars
and gold coins, so far as the consent of those
who employ it can be obtained. It would be
much more valuable to the public to be supplied
with abundance of dimes and half dimes,
which would stay among us, than with dollars
and eagles which leave us immediately. Indeed
I wish the law authorized the making
two-cent and three-cent pieces of silver, and
golden dollars, which would all be large
enough to handle, and would be a great convenience
to our own citizens.—
To Robert Patterson. Washington ed. v, 61.
(W.
March. 1807)
