Lambert v. Ghiselin. 9 H. in this case. 1. That due diligence was not used by the holder to ascertain the residence of the indorser before the notice was sent to Nottingham. And 2. If reasonable diligence was used at that time, yet the information he afterwards received in Baltimore imposed on him the obligation of giving a further notice to the defendant himself, or of sending it by mail to his nearest and usual post-office. As regards the first question, the court is of opinion that due diligence was used before the notice was sent to Nottingham. The case shows that there was very little, if any, trade between Alexandria and Nottingham at the time of this transaction, and but few persons, therefore, in Alexandria would be likely to know whether the defendant did or did not reside in Nottingham. The bill of exchange was not dated at any particular place, and the acceptors resided in Baltimore. The defendant was not engaged in trade, but was a physician residing in the country, and it does not appear that he was in the practice of visiting Alexandria, or of having any business transactions there. And the proof is, that Travers, of whom the holder inquired, from the nature of the trade in which he had been many years engaged, first to Nottingham and [*558] afterwards to Baltimore, was as likely as any other person in Alexandria to give the information which the plaintiffs were seeking to obtain, if not more so. The answer he received was direct and positive, both as to the knowledge of Travers and the residence of the indorser, and he had a right to rely upon it. And although Travers was mistaken, and the notice was not sent to the nearest or usual postoffice of the defendant, yet the plaintiffs used all the diligence which the law requires, and had sufficient reason to believe that the notice would be received. The liability of the indorser was therefore fixed. The case of Harris v. Robinson, 4 How. 345, is conclusive on this point. The second objection taken in the argument has not been so directly settled by judicial decision on the point, but is, we think, equally clear upon established principles. We have already said, that the liability of the indorser was fixed by the notice sent to Nottingham. The plaintiffs had acquired a right of action against him by this notice, and might have brought their suit the next day. Could that right be devested by the information which was subsequently given to them? We think not, and that all of the cases in relation to this subject imply the contrary. The books are full of cases where mistakes of this kind have been committed, and suits afterwards brought when the residence of the party was discovered. Yet it does not seem to have been supposed in Lambert v. Ghiselin. 9 H. any of them that a second notice was necessary, nor are we aware that such a point has ever been raised. Yet if a notice thus given, after diligent inquiry, is not equivalent to actual notice, knowledge subsequently obtained would be a defence to the action, even if the holder had brought suit before he learned what was the nearest or usual post-office of the defendant. The case of Firth v. Thrush, 8 Barn. & Cress. 387, which was much relied on in the argument, depended upon different principles. In that case, the holder knew that notice had not been given to the indorser. He had been engaged in making inquiries for his residence, without being able to obtain any information upon which he might have acted. And the question there was not whether a second notice should be given, but whether due diligence was used in sending the first. The rule contended for by the defendant would produce much uncertainty and difficulty in transactions of this kind. For if a second notice must be given, is it to be required in all cases where there has been an error in the information as to the defendant's post-office? Certainly, the practice of the courts has been otherwise. [* 559 ] * And if it is not to be required in all cases, it would be impossible to fix any certain limits as to time or circumstances. The subsequent information might come to him casually, when his mind was occupied with other engagements; he might not confide in it as much as in that which he had before received; it might come to him in a few days, or months might elapse before he obtained it. The rule would be loose and uncertain in its application, and constantly lead to litigation, where the residence of the indorser was unknown, or an error committed as to his usual post-office. It would also be contrary, the court think, to the usages of commerce, and to the uniform practice in courts of justice. In the case of Harris v. Robinson, before referred to, no second notice was given nor did the court intimate that any was necessary. The law does not require actual notice. It requires reasonable diligence only, and reasonable efforts, made in good faith, to give it. And if sufficient inquiries have been made, and information received upon which the holder has a right to rely, a mistake as to the nearest post-office or usual post-office does not deprive him of his remedy. He has done all that the law requires; and the notice, thus sent, fixes the liability of the indorser as effectually as if he had actually received it. This we think is the true rule, and the only one that can give certainty and security in transactions in commercial paper. We shall therefore certify, that reasonable diligence was used by the plaintiffs to give the defendant notice of the dishonor of the bill. 18 H. 517 United States v. Marigold. 9 H. THE UNITED STATES, Plaintiffs, v. PETER MARIGOLD. 9 H. 560. Though the 8th section of the 1st article of the constitution only empowers congress to provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States, yet, as congress has power to coin money and to regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, it may also provide for the punishment of the offence of bringing into the United States, from a foreign place, false, forged, and counterfeit coins, made in the simili. tude of coins of the United States, and also for the punishment of the offence of uttering and passing the same; and the act of March 3, 1825, section 20, (4 Stats. at Large, 121,) is a constitutional and valid law. THE case is stated in the opinion of the court. Johnson, (attorney-general,) for the United States. DANIEL, J., delivered the opinion of the court. This is a certificate of division of opinion from the northern district of New York. [ * 565] The case is clearly and succinctly stated in the following abstract from the record: "At a circuit court of the United States, begun and held at Albany, for the northern district of New York, in the second circuit, on the third Tuesday of October, in the year of our Lord 1848, and in the seventy-third year of American independence. "Present, the Honorable Samuel Nelson and Alfred Conkling, Esquires. "THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. PETER MARIGOLD. "State of the Pleadings. "This is an indictment against the defendant, charging him, under the 20th section of the act of congress entitled, 'An act more effectually to provide for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States, and for other purposes,' approved March 3, 1825, *"1. With having brought into the United States, from [*566] a foreign place, with intent to pass, utter, publish, and sell as true, certain false, forged, and counterfeit coins, made, forged, and counterfeited in the resemblance and similitude of certain gold and silver coins of the United States, coined at the mint, he knowing the same to be false, forged, and counterfeit, and intending thereby to defraud divers persons unknown. "2. With having uttered, published, and passed such counterfeit coins, with intend to defraud, &c. United States v. Marigold. 9 H. "To this indictment the defendant demurs, and George W. Clinton, attorney of the United States for the said district, who prosecutes in this behalf, joins in demurrer. "This cause coming on to be argued at this term, the following questions occurred: "First. Whether congress, under and by the constitution, had power and authority to enact so much of the said 20th section of the said act as relates to bringing into the United States counterfeit coins. "Second. Whether congress, under and by virtue of the constitution, had power to enact so much of the said 20th section as relates to uttering, publishing, passing, and selling of the counterfeit coins therein specified. "On which said several questions, the opinions of the judges were opposed. "Whereupon, on motion of the said attorney, prosecuting for the United States in this behalf, that the points on which the disagreement has happened may, during the term, be stated, under the direction of the judges, and certified under the seal of the court to the supreme court, to be finally decided, it is ordered, that the foregoing state of the pleadings, and statement of the points upon which the disagreement has happened, which is made under the direction of the judges, be certified, according to the request of the attorney, prosecuting as aforesaid, and the law in that case made and provided." The inquiry first propounded upon this record points, obviously, to the answer which concedes to congress the power here drawn in question. Congress are, by the constitution, vested with the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations; and however, at periods of high excitement, an application of the terms "to regulate commerce" such as would embrace absolute prohibition may have been questioned, yet, since the passage of the embargo and non-intercourse laws, and the repeated judicial sanctions those statutes have received, it can scarcely, at this day, be open to doubt, that every subject, falling within the legitimate sphere of commercial regulation, [* 567 ] *may be partially or wholly excluded, when either measure shall be demanded by the safety or by the important interests of the entire nation. Such exclusion cannot be limited to particular classes or descriptions of commercial subjects; it may embrace manufactures, bullion, coin, or any other thing. The power once conceded, it may operate on any and every subject of commerce to which the legislative discretion may apply it. But the twentieth section of the act of congress of March 3, 1825, United States v. Marigold. 9 H. or rather those provisions of that section brought to the view of this court by the second question certified, are not properly referable to commercial regulations, merely as such; nor to considerations of ordinary commercial advantage. They appertain rather to the execution of an important trust invested by the constitution, and to the obligation to fulfil that trust on the part of the government, namely, the trust and the duty of creating and maintaining a uniform and pure metallic standard of value throughout the Union. The power of coining money and of regulating its value was delegated to congress by the constitution for the very purpose, as assigned by the framers of that instrument, of creating and preserving the uniformity and purity of such a standard of value; and on account of the impossibility which was foreseen of otherwise preventing the inequalities and the confusion necessarily incident to different views of policy, which in different communities would be brought to bear on this subject. The power to coin money being thus given to congress, founded on public necessity, it must carry with it the correlative power of protecting the creature and object of that power. It cannot be imputed to wise and practical statesmen, nor is it consistent with common sense, that they should have vested this high and exclusive authority, and with a view to objects partaking of the magnitude of the authority itself, only to be rendered immediately vain and useless, as must have been the case had the government been left disabled and impotent as to the only means of securing the objects in contemplation. If the medium which the government was authorized to create and establish could immediately be expelled, and substituted by one it had neither created, estimated, nor authorized,-one possessing no intrinsic value, then the power conferred by the constitution would be useless, wholly fruitless of every end it was designed to accomplish. Whatever functions congress are, by the constitution, authorized to perform, they are, when the public good requires it, bound to perform; and on this principle, having emitted a circulating medium, a standard of value indispensable for the pur- [*568 ] poses of the community, and for the action of the government itself, they are accordingly authorized and bound in duty to prevent its debasement and expulsion, and the destruction of the general confidence and convenience, by the influx and substitution of a spurious coin in lieu of the constitutional currency. We admit that the clause of the constitution authorizing congress to provide for the punishment of counterfeiting the securities and current coin of the United States does not embrace within its language the offence of uttering or circulating spurious or counterfeited coin (the term counterfeit, |