_Legal tender._--All forms of deferred payments imply the possible intervention in final settlement of the force of government. While the great mass of promises to pay are met without an appeal to laws or courts, the whole is put in such form by customs of society as to involve the possibility of such arbitration. Government takes no note of debts which cannot be proved in court, and the forms of legal proof are well settled. All the formalities of credit in systems of book-keeping, forms of notes and bonds, and wording of stock certificates imply the possibility of final adjustment in a court of equity. For this reason, governments establish some form of currency as the representative of value, which must be accepted by the creditor in complete satisfaction of a debt. This is naturally what custom has established as the standard of value, but anything else may be substituted if the government so decides. Thus, Massachusetts once made bullets legal tender at a certain price, up to a certain number. Our government now makes copper cents and nickels legal tender to the value of twenty-five cents.
The current notes of the government are usually legal tender, unless otherwise stipulated, whatever their current value. This means simply that the government through its courts secures the collection of _bona fide_ debts, in terms of value defined by law or by contract. The assurance of final settlement, given in this way by the government, is one principal element in extending credit on time. Without such machinery credit would be confined to intimate acquaintances and very limited time.
_Expanding credit._--All the machinery of credit tends to bring the floating capital of a country within the reach of great enterprises. If a body of men have faith in some great undertaking, like a continental railroad or a Panama canal, their faith in the enterprise is easily made a basis for the faith of others. Even the small accumulations, the savings of day laborers, may be turned to account in such great enterprises if the popular expectation of success is thoroughly aroused. The greater the undertaking, the greater is the general faith under skilful leadership.
The same principle applies to undertakings of less national character, like immense factories or combinations in a trust. The stock of such enterprises is often widely distributed, and when profits are fairly begun, even upon a small scale, the chances of gain on the value of the stock are made more prominent than the actual profits of the enterprise. It is not uncommon to find enterprises starting with the expectation that a large portion of this stock will be paid for out of the profits of the business and the profits on a portion of the stock to be sold. This is especially true when business is reviving after a period of depression. It is one of the first symptoms of the return of a speculative spirit. With the rise of such enterprises there is almost sure to be an advance in prices of real estate, though it follows later.