I thought statutes of limitations on debt only applied when the debt was in default. I.e. you could hold a promissory note for as long as you wanted pursuant to the terms of the note, but if you demanded payment in 1990, you had until 1997 to actually collect the money or sue or else it became uncollectible. A note that is payable “on demand” is not in default until you actually demand payment and the debtor fails or refuses to pay.
For those interested: Samuel C. Upham - Wikipedia
It’s OK if a Confederate does it.
And thanks for the book recommendation. I’ll hunt it down.
Define a “union dollar” or a “confederate dollar”. Were they gold coins? Yep, those traded at 1:1–they had the same amount of gold. (The Confederacy minted damn few of them, but not zero.
Were they pieces of paper printed by the USA or CSA government? Neither traded at par with gold, or with each other. Would they ever? Well, both governments promised that their notes would eventually be redeemable for gold, at the prewar rate of 23.2 grains per dollar. The USA eventually kept that promise, in 1879. The CSA obviously didn’t. As the war dragged on, it became clear that even if the CSA won there were so many outstanding notes that they would be unlikely ever to redeem them at the statutory rate. They would have to devalue. Then, the US$ and CSA$ would have been defined differently, in terms of gold and/or silver. But, that would have been a decision for after the war.
Were your “Union dollars” or “Confederate dollars” private bank notes? Well, then they weren’t really Union dollars or Confderate dollars at all–they were just bank notes. Their value depended on public confidence in the issuing bank, which in turn varied with proximity to the bank, the amount and nature of reserves the bank had on hand, and the amount of note issue by the bank.
Try to wrap yourself around the mindset of that era–even within a country, different things called “money” with a face value of $1 could have wildly different purchasing power.