The dollar has been devalued to such an extent ...
Actually, it hasn't. But those green peices of paper labeled "Federal Reserve Note" aren't dollars - in ANY sense of the word. They aren;t even money. If you look at the Constitution, in the Bill of Rights:
"Amendment VII
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed
twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law. "
and Article 1, Section 9
"The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importation, not exceeding
ten dollars for each person. "
Bear in mind, this is BEFORE the Constitution is ratified, yet the term "dollars" is used, meaning it had a commonly known definition BEFORE the United States Government, or any of its mints, existed. Yet another clue...Article 1, section 8:
"To
coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of
foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures; "
So what were the colonies using for money BEFORE they were independant? NOT paper money, note the language - "coin money". This is further reinforced in Article 1, Section 10:
"Section 10.
No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal;
coin money;
emit bills of credit;
make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts; pass any bill of attainder, ex post facto law, or law impairing the obligation of contracts, or grant any title of nobility. "
So the States themselves are prohibited from "coining money" and "issuing bills of credit" (a form of "paper" money?) - they can only use "gold and silver coin" - & they can't "inflate" the currency by reducing how much gold or silver is in an ounce, because that power is reserved to the Federal Congress. Remeber, only foreign coins are available, right - so WHAT gold or silver coin is in use BEFORE the U.S. government, and is commonly known as a "dollar"?
From Wikipedia:
"Millions of Spanish dollars were minted over the course of several centuries. They were among the most widely circulating coins of the colonial period in the Americas, and were still in use in North America and in South-East Asia in the 19th century. They had a value of one dollar when circulating in the United States.
The coin is roughly equivalent to the silver thaler issued in Bohemia and elsewhere since 1517. The German name "thaler" (pronounced "tah-ler" and "dahler" in Low German) became dollar in French and English.
The peso nominally weighed 550.209 Spanish grains, which is 423.900 troy/avoirdupois grains (0.883125 troy ounce or 27.468 grams), .93055 fine: so contained 0.821791 troy ounce (25.560 grams) fine silver. Its weight and purity varied significantly between mints and over the centuries.
The peso had a nominal value of eight reales ("royals"). The coins were often physically cut into eight "bits", or sometimes four quarters, to make smaller change. This is the origin of the colloquial name "pieces of eight" for the coin, and of "quarter" and "two bits" for twenty-five cents in the United States.
Prior to the American Revolution there was, due to English mercantilist policies, a chronic shortage of English currency in its colonies. Trade was often conducted using Spanish dollars. The pricing of equities on U.S. stock exchanges in 1/8 dollar denominations persisted until the New York Stock Exchange converted to pricing in sixteenths of a dollar on June 24, 1997, to be followed shortly after by decimal pricing."
