Double

standard. The double standard of values exists where by law it is enacted that gold and silver shall be ac- ° cepted as a legal tender for debt at an established ratio. As a matter of fact in all such countries gold is the real measure of value and is admitted to coinage without restriction, while silver is coined only in limited quantities and under governmental restriction to serve as representative money. Silver retains its parity with gold because of the limitations on its coinage and because of the fiat of the government under whose authority it is coined. The mere po e ion by a country of the double standard is not the same thing as bimetal ism, an e ential feature of which is a mint open to the coinage of any quantity of either gold or silver that may be brought to it.