legal-tender laws create value.

It may be going too far to say that monetization creates no demand, but
whatever demand it may be supposed to create is not a commercial one. In
the latter sense the word signifies both an actual purchase, or the
exchange of one thing for another, and a permanent withdrawal from the
market of the thing bought. The act of coinage is certainly not a
purchase, for, directly or indirectly, it aims to restore to the offerer
of the bullion not something else, but the _precise thing received_; nor
is the metal retired from the market, since it is actually or virtually,
though in an altered form, immediately restored thereto. The whole
process is merely one of bailment. It would therefore seem incumbent
upon those affirming the efficacy of monetization to raise the price of
the metal to show by scientific analysis just how, why, and to what
extent it does so. The fact that from 1792 to 1873, with free coinage at
a very close approximation to the market value, not once did the legal
and commercial ratios coincide, and that the change of the former from
15 to 1 to 16 to 1 in 1834 had no perceptible effect on the market,
seems to be conclusive proof that the general belief that free coinage
at a fixed ratio appreciates the over-valued metal is delusive.

It is important to inquire into the grounds upon which the use of silver
and gold is founded, for if we have _chosen_ them for that purpose there
is an implication that other substances might have served the same
object almost, if not quite, as well. Such is not the case. Silver and
gold are absolutely unique in possessing the qualities indispensable for
money, and not only nature, but immemorial custom and deep-rooted
prejudice combine to compel their use in the exchanges irrespective, and
even despite, of legislation. Monetization, therefore, cannot, for this
further reason, add to, or take away from, their respective values,
because the exchangeability that monetization is supposed to give them
is a natural quality and not the creature of law. But so much more is
this true of gold than of silver, that the dependence of modern
commerce, and, through it, modern civilization, upon it is almost
absolute. If, therefore, free coinage at a ratio unfair to gold were
attempted, gold would cease to be offered at the mints, but it would
nevertheless continue in use in final settlements, especially in
transactions of some magnitude, thus preventing its decl