Great Britain

first adopted the gold standard (1816), One by one the nations have fallen into line, the United States as recently as 1900, leaving the Latin Union as the most important representative of the double standard system, while the use of silver as the standard is practically confined to the Far East and to Mexico and some parts of Central and South America, The bimetallic system in its unrestricted form has proved: a failure owing to the wide variation in value between gold and silver and no nation any longer undertakes to coin both gold and silver in unlimited quantities. The countries which still retain, nominally the double standard place severe restrictions on the use of silver and mint it only on government account, while gold is coined as freely as it is offered. Thus, gold has become practically the standard of the world, for not only do the double standard countries restrict the use of silver for the purpose of keeping their silver money at a parity with gold, but the silver standard countries in all international transactions are forced to’use gold as the basis of exchange. The value of a gold coin depends on the amount of pure; gold it contains; therefore, governments in establishing their monetary standard and monetary unit declare by law the weight and quality of the coin in which values are to be measured. Thus, in the United States, where gold is the standard and the dollar the unit, it is enacted that a gold dollar shall contain 23.2 grains of pure gold and 2.6 grains of alloy, making the weight of the dollar 25.8 grains of standard gold—gold.goo fine. In Great Britain the unit is the sovereign or pound sterling and contains 113 grains of pure gold and 10.27 grains of alloy, making the standard of finene .916 2-3 instead of ’.goo as in the United States and most other gold-using countries. For additional information see Moneys of the world.