voted at once on the veto--passing the bill against the
objections of the President, by _ayes_ 196, to _noes_ 73. The vote
was taken in the Senate on the same day, without debate, and the bill
was passed over the veto by _ayes_ 46, _noes_ 19. The senators not
voting were paired. Had every senator been present and voted the
result would have been _ayes_ 53, _noes_ 23. New England, New York
and New Jersey supplied the principal part of the negative vote.
Mr. Bayard, Mr. Pinkney Whyte, Mr. Butler of South Carolina, and
Mr. Lamar were the senators from the South who voted in the negative.
Pennsylvania, the South and the West sustained the bill. The Pacific
coast was divided,--Mr. Booth supporting the bill and Mr. Sargent
opposing it. The only vote for the bill in either House from New
England was that of General Butler. The proportion and general
location of the votes in the House were about the same as in the Senate.

The opinions of senators and representatives were of three distinct
types. The majority believed, as the vote showed, in the policy of
coining silver dollars of full legal-tender, regardless of their
intrinsic equality of value with gold dollars,--thus creating two
metallic currencies differing in value for all purposes of commercial
interchange with the world, and keeping them at an equality of value
at home by the force of law. The great mass of the Democratic party
and a considerable number of Republicans joined in this view.

A small minority of both parties disbelieved in the use of silver as
money, except for subsidiary coins, with its legal-tender value limited
to small sums,--fifty dollars being the highest proposed, the majority
apparently favoring ten dollars.

A majority of Republicans and a minority of Democrats asserted the
necessity of maintaining silver coin at full legal-tender, but upon
the basis of equality in intrinsic value with the gold dollar. This
class feared the effect of an exclusively gold standard, while the
supply of gold, compared with the commercial demands of the world, is
relatively and rapidly growing less. They had seen the ratio of
gold-supply far beyond that of silver for a series of years following
1850, and then for a series of years the ratio of silver-supply in
excess of the supply of gold. The theory advanced by this class rested
upon the proposition that the dollar of commerce could not with safety
be exclusively based either upon the scarcer or upon th