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Two minutes later the news was on the wires. Ten minutes later in every stock and commodities exchange throughout the land prices were soaring upward. If the Justices believed that their upholding the Government would calm the economic world, they were mistaken. In every market there was turmoil—orders to buy, buy, buy and few or none to sell. Within 15 minutes the Chicago Board of Trade, the grain markets of St. Louis and Kansas City were closed to prevent a buying panic. The New Orleans' Cotton Exchange stayed open and the price of cotton jumped $1 a bale. The New York Stock Exchange likewise continued to function, although the ticker fell eleven minutes behind sales. The stock of the Baltimore & Ohio—the gold clause of whose bonds had been specifically invalidated by the decision—soared from a forenoon price of 10 to 15. Other railroad stocks made similar gains; the market seethed.
Meantime, ignorant of this excitement, Chief Justice Hughes read on, giving reasons, citing precedents for his opinion. At the White House play-by-play reports of the decision came to the President and his friends. To Secretary Morgenthau the luncheon planned as a possible council of war had become purely a social occasion. Attorney General Cummings and Senator Robinson came to join the White House jubilation. An official bulletin said: "The President is gratified by the decisions." To the New Deal, however, the import of those opinions may yet have significance.
The Court upheld the right of Congress —under the Constitutional power of regulating money—to void gold clauses in private bonds. But no such clean bill of health was given the Government in abrogating the gold clauses of its own bonds. Government bondholders were denied the right to sue in the Court of Claims on the somewhat extraordinary grounds that it is impossible to tell how much damage they have suffered since it is now illegal to own gold. However, the Court did not uphold the propriety of the Government's offering devalued money in place of old-size dollars to its own bondholders. That, said the Court, was not a question of regulating the value of money but of the Government's keeping its promises. In short, Government bondholders have now the right but no legal opportunity to collect, and morally the Government is no better than a malefactor who takes refuge behind a legal technicality—in this case the right not to be sued without its own consent. No pretty position is this for any government to be in. It posed a problem in New Deal morals.