I shall confine myself to a cursory review of the remaining powers comprehended under this third description, to wit: to regulate commerce among the several States and the Indian tribes; to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin; to provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the current coin and secureties of the United States; to fix the standard of weights and measures; to establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws of bankruptcy, to prescribe the manner in which the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of each State shall be proved, and the effect they shall have in other States; and to establish post offices and post roads.
All that need be remarked on the power to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, is, that by providing for this last case, the Constitution has supplied a material omission in the articles of Confederation.
To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;
No State shall enter into any Treaty, Alliance, or Confederation; grant Letters of Marque and Reprisal; coin Money; emit Bills of Credit; make any Thing 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.
Barbicane, therefore, opened the enclosure to all comers; but, true to his practical disposition, he determined to
coin money out of the public curiosity.
The one can prescribe no rules concerning the commerce or currency of the nation; the other is in several respects the arbiter of commerce, and in this capacity can establish markets and fairs, can regulate weights and measures, can lay embargoes for a limited time, can
coin money, can authorize or prohibit the circulation of foreign coin.
"Perhaps, mademoiselle, they might give that much at the mint, for there they
coin money; but, in this shop, no one will give more than five francs for that thimble."
For, though nobody knew with the least precision what Mr Merdle's business was, except that it was to
coin money, these were the terms in which everybody defined it on all ceremonious occasions, and which it was the last new polite reading of the parable of the camel and the needle's eye to accept without inquiry.
(that she often was unable to understand), sufficed to make her reject an aspirant as unworthy: this one had neither heart nor delicacy; that one told lies, and was not religious; a third only wanted to
coin money under the cloak of marriage; another was not of a nature to make a woman happy; here she suspected hereditary gout; there certain immoral antecedents alarmed her.
Despite technological evolutions, the highest risk is neglecting the value of banknotes and
coin money for exchange," he added.
The Constitution provides, "Congress shall have the power to
coin money [and] regulate the value thereof." The Constitution was written at a time when coins were the only recognized legal tender; so the Constitutional Congress effectively gave Congress the power to create the national money supply, taking that role over from the colonies (now the states).
* "To
coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures";
"Since the
coin money was introduced into the market, prices of goods and services still remain very high.
About all this, die Constitution merely says in Article I, Section 8, Clause 5, that Congress shall have the power "To
coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin."